100 Posts - What Have I Learned?

By the time I started this blog, I had already had a track for awhile, and had even already made my first track expansion. My first post of any worth was about painting Carrera track, and I was already well into my slot car fever, which started when I was a kid.

So what have I learned over the past three years of track improvements, car upgrades and blog posts?

1. Get some decent quality slot cars that aren't the same brand as your track. Slot.it, NSR, BRM, Scaleauto, etc. Many companies make better cars than the big box companies do. Learn to separate the way you feel about the track over how you feel about the cars. Doesn't matter which track you have, there are better cars out there than the track brand cars.
2. Expand if you can. For a lot of people, space is at a premium. And Carrera track is LARGE. 1:32 track in general is large. But if you can do it, expand. I know I ran for a long time happily with not much track, but the more track I got, the happier I got. 
3. Don't forget to race. There are a lot of times when I find myself racing alone, so I run my own races. They're all over the place on this blog. I think running mindless laps with no timing is enjoyable in itself, but there are times when I want to see what my car can do. It's one thing to think a car is the fastest car, but it's another to prove it against a clock. Even if you don't have a lap counter or sophisticated timing system, you can still do good enough work with the timer on your mobile phone. Most of those even allow you to tap your laps on a lap counter that'll give you a lap time. If you don't have any competitive cars and are down to one good one and one shit one, that's a hard one. Maybe try suggestion #1.
4. A clean car is a happy car. Slot cars are reasonably sturdy if you drive them correctly, but that doesn't mean they don't need work to continue running at high speeds. If you get in the habit of cleaning and tuning your cars regularly, they'll respond much better to everything. Supplies don't cost much, and many can be found already around the house. Chances are if you're looking at nice slot cars and considering buying them, you're already wanting to get under the hood. That's how I am. I love that aspect of the hobby.
5. If you have the space, make a table. Such a huge improvement in every way over rug racing. That's a tough one, though, because many people don't have enough space to dedicate to a track. It's really easy to take up half a room with just the table. But if you can do it, you won't regret it. 
6. Try a lot of things. You might think that your car likes to have a loose pod float because it set the lap record with one, but you didn't take into account all the other things that could have had an influence on that happening. I've had that happen to me loads of times. I think I have an idea what might work, and end up making things worse instead of better. It takes experimentation, trial and error to learn what works and what doesn't, and that's what it really comes down to. This is especially important when you're getting into the nitty gritty of your track and how to make it its fastest. Trying different banking ideas, supports, angles and whatnot are a good way to find the unexpected.
7. Be patient. Just be patient with everything. If the car isn't running, focus on getting it running. If the track layout sucks, change it. If you want to get on a table but are stuck on a rug, be patient. If you make a blog and nobody reads it, be patient.