New Car: NSR Porsche 917K Hippie Car

 Here she is, first and last car of the year for me, the NSR Porsche 917K Hippie Car:

A beautiful car with an absolutely stunning paint job. I think this pic captures it pretty well.

Right around xmas of 2022, after making a pretty large amount of car purchases, I realized I needed a new bass guitar. My old one [Gibson EB3] is limited in what it can do, and I was looking for something a little more flexible. I found it in a Fender Jaguar Bass. Totally excellent. Of course, dropping that kind of drip meant I couldn't buy that many slot cars for awhile. Oh well. I had loads of new ones and plenty to race, and I really haven't had the chance to do much over the last year. I think I ended up buying two slot cars throughout that time.

So I put my mind to this bass and not thinking about slot cars. Of course xmas rolled around, which is usually prime slot car season, and I finally got a chance to look at the shops and see what was new. Once I saw the Hippie Car, I knew I had to have it. 

This one's gonna be really easy to see on track.

This car ran at Watkins Glen in 1970. That fits in just right with all the other cars I have from that era, and this is my sixth 917K. The Hippie livery is from Martini, which is my first livery from that brand. I'll have to look into others. I know there is a 917/10 in a more traditional Martini striped livery. Now I guess I have a good reason to pick that one up. Can never have too many teams. 

The 917 comes with the 21.5k Shark motor, which is in line with Classics not only from NSR, but many other companies as well. That keeps them competitive with each other right out of the box. The Shark is a fantastic motor, and the overall build quality of the car is as good as you can get.

For home use on your plastic track, they can pretty much be run as-is. They come with a magnet and three magnet socket positions, but I don't use magnets, so they go on my fridge. If you currently run magnets and are looking to get more out of your slot cars, take the magnets out. I've taken them out of all my cars but the F1 cars, which run better with the magnets in the car. But for the most part, running without magnets makes you rely more on car setup, driving skill, tires and overall tuneup decisions. Running with magnets negates all those aspects. So my track is pretty much No-Mag.

I don't have any other pictures of the car currently as I just got it today, took some quick shots, then started tuning it. Tomorrow will be track day, so this writeup comes before that. I haven't gotten it on the track yet, but I'm confident that it's going to run great. That's pretty impressive to be able to make that claim from a slot car, when you think about it. 

So, what about future car purchases? Good question. There are a few things floating around out there that I want, but I suspect they'll be around for awhile. I might try to go back to a one-a-month plan again, but I'm not sure there are enough cars to justify that kind of thing right now. Maybe a car per quarter. At most I can only think of two or three that I actually want. I might have to look at a new brand. Put it this way; I usually buy two cars at a time to save on shipping charges. I didn't this time, as I only got one. 

Okay, racing tomorrow. Probably an invitational of 10 cars or so. I'll try to get pics.

Holy crap, I just thought of something. The Hippie Car already has a teammate, and you're not going to believe who it is.....

Surprise.

Yep, the Porsche Spyder 918 with the modern Hippie livery. That team is doomed.