My son and I are fairly new to pinewood derby. We both won our pack races(scout and open adult) and our district races. We moved on to mid America in Omaha and that was a different story. best was 2.994. after the fact I weighed the cars and found both were really close to: 1 oz. DFW, 2.6 oz. on non dom rear and 1.4 on dom side rear. How screwed up was I?? Both were max wheelbase and had 4" drift in 4'.
Weight Placement - newbie
- Thread starter Cobbler73
- Start date
1oz on the DFW is about twice what I run. I usually try to keep the balance on the rears closer to equal but you have to give the car what it wants and that you can only determine by track testing.
MA is an unusual race, hard to compare times with the ultralite wheels there.
MA is an unusual race, hard to compare times with the ultralite wheels there.
If your car was all stock, that was an impressive time. Even if it wasn't, that is still a good time for your first time out at MA. I did not even get under 3 seconds my first time out. Without knowing all of the parts, how the car was put together, and your prep process, its tough to determine how much better you could have done. If you provide a bit more specifics about your car(s), it might be possible for some here to provide you with additional advice, specific to your cars.
Like BT said, most run with much less weight on the FDW and the rules at MA are wide open.
If you are interested in getting faster, send a car in to the next NPWDRL race. Yep, you'll get beat. I do every month. BUT, you'll get some track time to try different things. You'll be able to see your times, make changes, and compare it to the previous race.
Like BT said, most run with much less weight on the FDW and the rules at MA are wide open.
If you are interested in getting faster, send a car in to the next NPWDRL race. Yep, you'll get beat. I do every month. BUT, you'll get some track time to try different things. You'll be able to see your times, make changes, and compare it to the previous race.
The cars were both extended wheelbase with stainless grooved axles and stock wheels trued and polished. I drilled axle holes and had rears bent 2 dgrees neg cant and front dom 1 degree neg cant. just aligned rears to drift out both forward and backward. I guess nothing special. I overheard people talking about scaling 3 wheels at a time so thats why i checked mine. After we checked in and I saw al the crazy cars I figured we brought sharp knives to a gunfight/images/boards/smilies/eek.gif I could see lots of fenders and really thin wheels with thin bodies. I fugured we were toast but was suprised to do as good as we did.
To win districts with bent axels is a huge accomplishment. Use some of the tips around here and you will be even faster next year!
V
Vitamin K
Guest
They were just the matched speed wheels with outside true from Max-Velocity. We polished axles and bores ourselves and then packed with graphite and rolled them back and forth on a glass door laying horizontal to work graphite in. I have the pro body tool and a few of the other goodies. Just wasn't aware of the process to go through for MA. That was quite a learning experience.
MA has always been a tough race with lots of top tier racers coming to the event. Your here now and can start training for next years race. FYI this was our 3rd year and I'll show you how my kids did.
Joshua. Kenzie.
2013 3.1619 3.0546
2014 2.9654 2.9652
2015 2.9522 2.9655
As you can see running a sub 3 first year is pretty good. Like John says, winners train and losers complain.
Joshua. Kenzie.
2013 3.1619 3.0546
2014 2.9654 2.9652
2015 2.9522 2.9655
As you can see running a sub 3 first year is pretty good. Like John says, winners train and losers complain.
Just out of curiosity, how long did it take to get the rears aligned?
Most everyone here now uses a block like the Silver Bullet to drill canted rear axles. There is a wealth of knowledge and plenty of good guys to learn from! Don't be afraid to ask questions!
Most everyone here now uses a block like the Silver Bullet to drill canted rear axles. There is a wealth of knowledge and plenty of good guys to learn from! Don't be afraid to ask questions!
Aligning rears wasn't too bad. I have an old display freezer door that's 20" x 50" thick glass. set it on a cart and leveled it. Ran cars backwards till wheels just drifted out, marked axles, then did the same forward, marked axles again and turned halfway between. Seemed to work good. Both cars followed rail nice and straight. Never had a death wobble with either. Not going to touch these cars till we get our new track timer for local pack and make sure they are close to the MA times we ran and then start building 2016 cars/images/boards/smilies/smile.gif
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