OK so, my daughters and I have had the top 3 cars in Royal Rangers (wood dowel cars like Corvid's) at both the church and at the division races. The church uses a plastic Derbymagic track and the division uses a BestTrack aluminum track. We were faster than we have ever been (scale speeds on the BestTrack were around 205 mph), but the big race (all of Northern California and Nevada are invited) is this Saturday and all they use are wood tracks. I have not prepped for a wood track since I was a teenager back in the 80's. Bearing in mind that these are 6 oz. cars with home-made razor wheels (I have no clue how to post pics with the URL system or I would post them), how should we adjust steer for a wood track? I know the speeds will be slower, but my physics brain is contradicting itself. Part of me says to leave them alone, the other part says to reduce steer a bit to get more speed at the risk of developing wobbles. The safest bet is to leave the cars alone......but that is very hard to do. Any suggestions?
prepping for wood vs aluminum
- Thread starter kickaxe
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G
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- Nov 24, 2011
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OCDD we usually suggest 4" in 4'. 1" in 4' usually is not enough. I've raced a lot and the only cars that I could get away with that little of steer are Razor wheeled cars.
Wow, now I really do need to decide....... These are razors...
The remote control car on the left has 3/4 inch com....the other 2 are more aggressive. The dragster is just under 1/2 inch and needed 5 inches of steer to kill the wobbles on the BestTrack.....hmmm decisions, decisions. I will let you know how it all turns out.
Thanks for the advice guys.
The remote control car on the left has 3/4 inch com....the other 2 are more aggressive. The dragster is just under 1/2 inch and needed 5 inches of steer to kill the wobbles on the BestTrack.....hmmm decisions, decisions. I will let you know how it all turns out.
Thanks for the advice guys.
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That's just a really good starting point. If you can tune it on the track and make the tuning adjustments between runs, that is optimal.
I think I would leave it be if you already tuned them for the best track. As far as I can remember the common wood tracks aren't as aggressive in the transition as a BT. The seems may not be as smooth but you already have a good amount to get the car back to the rail if pushed off at a joint.
Thank you Ng.
Kinser's post has me thinking about other aspects now...... if less travel is better for razor wheels, then would that mean less bend in the axle is also preferred? I have always bent them so that the wheel just fits without gouging out the bore, but I wonder if a lesser degree of bend would be better for razors since they already run on their edge......
Kinser's post has me thinking about other aspects now...... if less travel is better for razor wheels, then would that mean less bend in the axle is also preferred? I have always bent them so that the wheel just fits without gouging out the bore, but I wonder if a lesser degree of bend would be better for razors since they already run on their edge......
Thank you for the advice on running wood tracks.
My daughter's cars finished 3rd and 4th out of 36 racers. Their run times were inconsistent due to very slight track mis-alignments in each lane. The track was not horrible, but did have some slight left/right center rail issues that caused them to not track straight in 2 of the lanes. Their cars did post the 2 fastest single times of the day in the straightest lane, but their 6 run average was not as good. I think too much steer into the misaligned rails was the issue.
My racing experience was a completely different story....... The other wood track was the worst track I have ever seen used at a race. It actually had 2 lanes where the platform was raised in comparison to the previous section. Drop offs are bad, but raised sections are the equivalent of a a jump/speed bump.... Lanes 1 and 6 were throwing any cars with speed off of the rail all day and the "officials" insisted that it was, and I quote.... "the car builders' fault for not building cars capable of running on any track". Anyway, my car jumped off the rail and skidded across the finish line sideways in both lanes 1 and 6. Since it did not interfere with other cars, the race results were declared valid. My car won each of the heats it ran in lanes 2,3, and 4, was second in lane 5 and obviously did not win in lanes 1 and 6. I still placed 3rd out of 28 builders, but am unhappy that a major event would use an obviously flawed track.
My daughter's cars finished 3rd and 4th out of 36 racers. Their run times were inconsistent due to very slight track mis-alignments in each lane. The track was not horrible, but did have some slight left/right center rail issues that caused them to not track straight in 2 of the lanes. Their cars did post the 2 fastest single times of the day in the straightest lane, but their 6 run average was not as good. I think too much steer into the misaligned rails was the issue.
My racing experience was a completely different story....... The other wood track was the worst track I have ever seen used at a race. It actually had 2 lanes where the platform was raised in comparison to the previous section. Drop offs are bad, but raised sections are the equivalent of a a jump/speed bump.... Lanes 1 and 6 were throwing any cars with speed off of the rail all day and the "officials" insisted that it was, and I quote.... "the car builders' fault for not building cars capable of running on any track". Anyway, my car jumped off the rail and skidded across the finish line sideways in both lanes 1 and 6. Since it did not interfere with other cars, the race results were declared valid. My car won each of the heats it ran in lanes 2,3, and 4, was second in lane 5 and obviously did not win in lanes 1 and 6. I still placed 3rd out of 28 builders, but am unhappy that a major event would use an obviously flawed track.
G
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The TV remote car was 2" over 4' with a 7/8" COM and ran very smoothly with the most consistency and had the fastest time of any car on that track for the day.
The carbon fiber black car was set to 3 1/2" over 4' with a 3/4" COM and ran very fast in the straight lanes, but .03xx slower in the slightly misaligned/rough ones.
The copper and carbon fiber dragster was set to 4 1/2" over 4' with a 1/4" COM and had the best time of the day on the best lane of the terrible track, but on the outside lanes it jumped the rail and skidded in sideways with times .06xx slower (lane 6) and .05xx slower (lane 1).
The carbon fiber black car was set to 3 1/2" over 4' with a 3/4" COM and ran very fast in the straight lanes, but .03xx slower in the slightly misaligned/rough ones.
The copper and carbon fiber dragster was set to 4 1/2" over 4' with a 1/4" COM and had the best time of the day on the best lane of the terrible track, but on the outside lanes it jumped the rail and skidded in sideways with times .06xx slower (lane 6) and .05xx slower (lane 1).
V
Vitamin K
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Man, it pains me when people cannot properly align tracks. You're gonna have people spend all this time building their cars, only to have them destroyed by misaligned sections? And then blame the builders? Forsooth!
BTW, would love to see some pics, especially of your homemade razors. I did some (as yet untested!) homemade razors for an Awana race my kids have coming up, with some pretty horrible rules. /images/boards/smilies/smile.gif
BTW, would love to see some pics, especially of your homemade razors. I did some (as yet untested!) homemade razors for an Awana race my kids have coming up, with some pretty horrible rules. /images/boards/smilies/smile.gif
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