The Sweeper

I absolutely love the Sweeper curve that has been made from 2/30's, a 3/30 and a 1/30. It's fast enough to give you that satisfaction of speeding through a big turn, yet not so big that it feels like you're lost in it.

So now my problem. Originally I had wanted that section to be a bit higher in elevation, and not level with the front stretch of the track. Problem was, when I started to raise the sweeper section, cars started going off with more regularity. So I started added slight banking. Then that got bigger, and the banks started getting out of control. The cars were going around, but they were starting to stutter through the turn, almost as if they were catching somewhere.

So I went back to square one, took out all the elevation and banking, and did a race session. I was going to need to put a little banking back in.

[cars come in from the right rear] I wanted to have a bit of banking on the straight leading in to the Sweeper, as it helped the curve bank a bit better. This pic is with the new outer banking supports in place. 

I still needed to do some adjusting, but if I did it at just the right places, I should be fine. It amounts to about an inch on the outside of the track to about 1/2 inch on the inside. Barely noticeable, but enough to keep the cars happily going around the curve.

Here's how I did the inside banking:

First, buy a pack of these. They're sold as cable fasteners and got a bunch for not much. 

I took a cable fastener and cut the plastic loop a little over direct-center. Then I replaced the nail that came with it with a slightly longer nail.

Basically you make something that looks a little like that.

Carrera track has side sockets for clips that normally go unused unless you make a track with more than two lanes. There are usually two open rectangular areas on each side of the track. Insert the clip into the socket, then while grabbing the socket, bring it and the track down the length of the nail, holding it, which will free you up to hammer the nail. Be careful doing this. I am not responsible if you somehow hammer your track or crack it or break it or something.

There. I cut it slightly over direct-center so the plastic would be a little more flexible. This is an easy temporary fix if you want to try banking your track. Of course, there are a million other ways. This is just one.

See my point about grabbing the plastic and the track and bringing them down toward the table? It'll free up the nail head so you can hit it with a hammer. Nice thing is, this whole mechanism sits under track level, so it wouldn't get in the way of any sweet racing action.

So this is a temporary fix, as I'll eventually be raising the whole section at least a few inches. I'll still need to secure the track to the undersupport, and this might be a good way to do that.

Finished section. It's a subtle bank, but just enough to keep the cars on the turn at high speed. It really doesn't take much when you're running without magnets. A little banking goes a long way.

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Other Notes:

It's been bugging me that I haven't found a consistent way to name my cars for this blog now that I have so many of them. Brand names don't work: too many Fords. Model number? Too complicated. How about car number? The only problem is that I have two #11 cars. I have, however, only one car that is not a classic. It happens to be a #11. But it's also known by it's other name, Leyton House. The Porsche. The LH.

So, from this moment on, shorthand versions of the cars will be their numbers: #2, #5, #8, #11 and LH. I've changed them in the sidebar.

• Alfa                      #2
• '66 Ford GT40     #5
• '67 Ford GT40     #11
• '68 Ford GT40     #8
• Porsche 962C      LH

Also I think it's time to reincorporate the controller information into here. Reason being is that now the cars will be on the same layout all the time, so I'm going to try to get the best performance I can out of them. That means special controller settings for each car. I think it would be interesting to see the differences, plus it'll give me more to go on about. Just another aspect of slot cars.


It's going to be some time before I get more wood to continue with the next step, which will be to add the underlayer to the track. Until then I'm going to carry on. I'm loving how each car is running on the track these days, so I'm going to invest time in each one, tweaking and running trials. I'll probably do individual features on each car. I'd like to expand it even more by doing things like tire comparisons and other such things as well.


I'm considering doing some videos too. We'll see about that.