I have been lurking here for over a year. I have asked a few questions, read nearly every post, and even sent a few PM's. This year's pinewood is over, and my son is moving on to Boy Scouts, so this is the end of his pinewood career. I want now, to thank some people here.
Laserman answered several questions early on, helped guide me to posts on various subjects, and directed me to talk to bracketracer about four wheel down alignment. Also, you got me the original Puma weights after they were discontinued. I love them, and I have a few ideas about how to work them.
NG young for pointing out that Laserman had posted about the weights on another forum.
Bracketracer, you told me how to set it up for a rail runner on four wheels. Your advice was spot on, and we owe every bit of our success to you. If it hadn't been for your alignment advice, we never would have been successful. Thank you Stephen.
Goat Boy, the drill block is pure gold. Thank you for that, and for the second chance to get one, after I dropped the ball the first time I talked to you about it. For any newby who wants his axle holes drilled for winning, and won't be using a drill press, for whatever reason, Goat Boy's fixture is worth every penny. I will have to sell mine unless I can convince my wife that this can be a hobby that doesn't consume your entire life, as it has doen for the scout race.
Now, for the overall board. Thank you everyone for the wealth of information here, I devoured it, and we had a great race.
Here's what happened last year http://www.pinewoodderbyonline.com/post/show_single_post?pid=1284795427&postcount=2
So, this year, we did a nice x braced car. I present: The Destroyer
BOTTOM VIEW
Original Puma weights, with the clearance slot on top and outboard, so maximum weight at the bottom, and full wheel cavity coverage, notice seven 1/4" cubes across the back, 1 in front of the axle, and two grams of putty right next to the DFW. The front is also hollow, but has plywood on it so we had somewhere to write the names, etc. This gave us something like a 0.35" COM.
For the finish, it got a thin CA glue shower, was allowed to dry, and then sanded down. The car is 0.283" thick at the back end, 0.266" directly in front of the rear wheels, 0.205" thick directly behind the front wheels, and tapers all the way down to 0.139 at the line where the 1/64" plywood stops at the top, then it is chisel pointed at the very front.
Wheels are mold matched, but NO modification other than to polish the bores. Axles are Revell axles, hand cut grooves except the DFW, which was bent 1.5 degrees, and all polished. Four wheels down is required.
TOP VIEW
Now, tuning was off a bit, which I couldn't fix during the race. Afterwards, they ran the 8 fastest cars and I made a slight adjustment for that since it wasn't official.
We are running on a Best Track, I think it is standard length. We averaged about 3.15 with the faulty tuning, 3.08 after I fixed the steer to take out the wobble.
Same format as last year. Eight rounds, four cars each. Ranking based on time. During official racing, 2nd among Webelos, and sixth overall. He won every heat except for one that he was against the kid who won it all. He also got fourth overall in design.
Here is the car that my daughter ran in the sibling race. Mostly built by her brother.
It averaged 3.09 and never had an issue. The front is actually an airfoil, and there are three tungsten cubes and a 3.5 oz. tungsten canopy in the car.
Now, a word about rules. I hope that everyone who reads this will take to heart. Rules need to be crystal clear about what is allowed and what is not. One major difference between our car and the car that won was the fact that they had lightened lathed wheels. They looked like they might be DD4H's Litespeed wheels.
Our rules state, "Wheels cannot be wafered, beveled, ridged, crowned, drilled, or altered in any way. Burrs present in the axle hole or on the outside may be removed and wheels may be polished. BSA lettering MUST be visible on the outside of the wheel."
I interpreted this very strictly, "or altered in any way" being the defining portion of what is not allowed with the rest of that sentence being a non-exhaustive list of examples, but specifically allowing burrs to be removed from the perimter and from the axle hole. Others, including this years and last year's champions interpret this as, "Your wheels cannot be wafered, beveled, ridged, crowned, or drilled, and the letters have to be on the outside, but other than that, anything goes as long as you don't change the shape of the wheel."
This is a rules ambiguity, and because of different perspectives, I restricted our car in a way that many others did not. We were running a different race. I felt like they cheated, but can see how they don't feel that way at all.
The winner is a good friend's child, I know they worked just as hard on their car as we did on ours, and the kids had fun. So what do you do? I did point the difference out to the leadership, with a clear caveat that I didn't want the discussion to affect this years race. I do however, want them to notice the difference between the cars, understand the impact on the results, and fix the rules for next year.
So, for all of you organizers out there. It doesn't matter what you allow, or what you don't, but you need to be precise in your wording, and if you are going to list what is not allowed, make it clear if the list is complete, or if it is just some examples of what is not allowed.
Laserman answered several questions early on, helped guide me to posts on various subjects, and directed me to talk to bracketracer about four wheel down alignment. Also, you got me the original Puma weights after they were discontinued. I love them, and I have a few ideas about how to work them.
NG young for pointing out that Laserman had posted about the weights on another forum.
Bracketracer, you told me how to set it up for a rail runner on four wheels. Your advice was spot on, and we owe every bit of our success to you. If it hadn't been for your alignment advice, we never would have been successful. Thank you Stephen.
Goat Boy, the drill block is pure gold. Thank you for that, and for the second chance to get one, after I dropped the ball the first time I talked to you about it. For any newby who wants his axle holes drilled for winning, and won't be using a drill press, for whatever reason, Goat Boy's fixture is worth every penny. I will have to sell mine unless I can convince my wife that this can be a hobby that doesn't consume your entire life, as it has doen for the scout race.
Now, for the overall board. Thank you everyone for the wealth of information here, I devoured it, and we had a great race.
Here's what happened last year http://www.pinewoodderbyonline.com/post/show_single_post?pid=1284795427&postcount=2
So, this year, we did a nice x braced car. I present: The Destroyer
BOTTOM VIEW
Original Puma weights, with the clearance slot on top and outboard, so maximum weight at the bottom, and full wheel cavity coverage, notice seven 1/4" cubes across the back, 1 in front of the axle, and two grams of putty right next to the DFW. The front is also hollow, but has plywood on it so we had somewhere to write the names, etc. This gave us something like a 0.35" COM.
For the finish, it got a thin CA glue shower, was allowed to dry, and then sanded down. The car is 0.283" thick at the back end, 0.266" directly in front of the rear wheels, 0.205" thick directly behind the front wheels, and tapers all the way down to 0.139 at the line where the 1/64" plywood stops at the top, then it is chisel pointed at the very front.
Wheels are mold matched, but NO modification other than to polish the bores. Axles are Revell axles, hand cut grooves except the DFW, which was bent 1.5 degrees, and all polished. Four wheels down is required.
TOP VIEW
Now, tuning was off a bit, which I couldn't fix during the race. Afterwards, they ran the 8 fastest cars and I made a slight adjustment for that since it wasn't official.
We are running on a Best Track, I think it is standard length. We averaged about 3.15 with the faulty tuning, 3.08 after I fixed the steer to take out the wobble.
Same format as last year. Eight rounds, four cars each. Ranking based on time. During official racing, 2nd among Webelos, and sixth overall. He won every heat except for one that he was against the kid who won it all. He also got fourth overall in design.
Here is the car that my daughter ran in the sibling race. Mostly built by her brother.
It averaged 3.09 and never had an issue. The front is actually an airfoil, and there are three tungsten cubes and a 3.5 oz. tungsten canopy in the car.
Now, a word about rules. I hope that everyone who reads this will take to heart. Rules need to be crystal clear about what is allowed and what is not. One major difference between our car and the car that won was the fact that they had lightened lathed wheels. They looked like they might be DD4H's Litespeed wheels.
Our rules state, "Wheels cannot be wafered, beveled, ridged, crowned, drilled, or altered in any way. Burrs present in the axle hole or on the outside may be removed and wheels may be polished. BSA lettering MUST be visible on the outside of the wheel."
I interpreted this very strictly, "or altered in any way" being the defining portion of what is not allowed with the rest of that sentence being a non-exhaustive list of examples, but specifically allowing burrs to be removed from the perimter and from the axle hole. Others, including this years and last year's champions interpret this as, "Your wheels cannot be wafered, beveled, ridged, crowned, or drilled, and the letters have to be on the outside, but other than that, anything goes as long as you don't change the shape of the wheel."
This is a rules ambiguity, and because of different perspectives, I restricted our car in a way that many others did not. We were running a different race. I felt like they cheated, but can see how they don't feel that way at all.
The winner is a good friend's child, I know they worked just as hard on their car as we did on ours, and the kids had fun. So what do you do? I did point the difference out to the leadership, with a clear caveat that I didn't want the discussion to affect this years race. I do however, want them to notice the difference between the cars, understand the impact on the results, and fix the rules for next year.
So, for all of you organizers out there. It doesn't matter what you allow, or what you don't, but you need to be precise in your wording, and if you are going to list what is not allowed, make it clear if the list is complete, or if it is just some examples of what is not allowed.
