Tips for Solo Racing During Lockdown

Like most of us, you're probably locked down, wondering how you're going to have fun racing alone. The nice thing about slot cars is that there is still plenty to do, even if there's no one else to do it with.
Here's a list of things you can do or think about during the time you have to yourself. These are in no particular order of preference.

1. Tune your cars into their best, fastest shape. The first one's a no-brainer. Getting each car up to its fastest lap speed will help sort out a lot of things for you. It'll tell you if you need to buy more cars that are competitive, it'll tell you which cars are maybe too fast/slow to be competitive, and it can also tell you which cars need more love than a little oil and grease. If you have enough cars, it can also help you sort those into classes based on run times [and likenesses]. So getting down to the roots of each car, rebuilding from the ground up, making up custom settings for each individual car, and testing/timing those cars can give you multiple sessions of competitive racing, even if you're by yourself.
2. Consider changing your track layout. Nothing is worse than a boring track. And it could be a great design, one that you've worked years on, and be awesome. But it could still get dull and predictable. It's totally possible to get sucked into a zombie-like state when you've gotten too used to running laps on the layout you've had for years. Even if you think you have a limited space and you've used it to its fullest, try changing the design anyway. Consider stripping down some of the bells and whistles. Add difficulty where there wasn't before. And don't worry about losing your current awesome layout. Just take pictures of it before tearing it down and you can always look at the pics to get it back together. Make it a weekend layout. I've changed layouts hundreds of times and found loads of great challenging racing. It's how you discover new possibilities in track design you may not have seen before.
3. Consider your racing surface. You might be rug racing, considering making a table to put the track on. Or you might already have a table, but are looking at doing something a little more scenic and permanent. Think of your options. If you have the space to devote to making a table, you could design something that is up against the wall, or in a corner, or even in the middle of an open space. And you don't have to have a layout design you love to make a table. You could just make a table based on your available space, and then worry about designing a layout afterward. And that may be as far as you ever go. That's where I am right now. I've pretty much given in to the idea that I likely won't ever commit to a permanent layout, so I won't be adding scenery to my table. I've covered it in fake grass and will likely stop there. That gives me lots of options for track design. And if I ever change my mind and decide to go further, all I have to do is take the fake grass off and I have my table ready for scenery. 
4. Hardware satisfaction. Consider things like your power supply, controllers, if you have digital then all the digital stuff, lap timers, etc., and whether you're getting the most out of them. I know I didn't like the standard Carrera controllers, and am very happy with the Slot.it controller I have. Not everyone needs one or wants one, but if you're frustrated by the lack of control you have over your cars, something like a better controller might be the type of upgrade for you. And if you want a better distribution of power than the standard wall wart the track comes with, a decent one will cost about the price of a slot car.
5. Challenge yourself as a driver. It's easy to put your car on the track and try to get it to run a fast lap. If you don't go fast enough you can just go faster the next time around. Easy, right? No real challenge to the driver. Try running a multiple-lap race, the more laps the better. I do it all the time and find it to be a lot more challenging getting a car to maintain a fast consistent speed without going off the track. Making it so you have to do 50 laps makes the driver more important. The car can do 50 laps, no problem. But the driver has to work with the car. And since each car is different, it requires a different understanding of the intricacies of the car. And it may come down to you going "this is a shit car and it slides out in the corners all the time...it'll never be competitive", and that may be just the way you have to drive it to get the most out of it. It might be a totally different driving situation to some of your other cars. And while a car might get around a lap easier than another one, it doesn't mean it's going to be easier to drive all the time. It might be so easy to drive that you don't push it as much out of it's relative smoothness. Weirder things happen. I've had plenty of times when I've thought that a car would do great in a particular race, only to have it clearly not do as well as other cars. But that's what racing's all about, isn't it?

So there you go. Some of those suggestions could probably be expanded upon to be their own posts, but I wanted to get the ideas out there. It's super easy to get into a thing where you're buying cars, running them around the track and not getting the fun out of it. 

Slot cars are fun. Don't be afraid to explore possibilities. 

Quarantine 2020 - 16 Days In

This is a weird timeline.

But it has given me an opportunity to spend time in the attic working on my track. The table had been doing double duty as an indoor training facility for my new Axial SCX10 II Chevy Blazer crawler. But now that the weather is nicer the table is being turned back into slot car racing central.

I wanted to keep it simple, yet long. A few mild switchbacks to keep things interesting, and then it's all-out speed from there.

Nothing like a fresh racetrack to get one going again. While I enjoy the RC truck outdoors, if I were somehow needing to stay indoors for an extended period of time, I think it would be a good time to have a 20' slot car table.
So I got out the vacuum, did the green grass, wiped down each track piece with a lint-free towel, and started building. One of the first things that popped into my head was to make an exaggerated version of the original suggested layout of the original box kit I got. It was the Carrera Le Mans Contest. It presented an over-8 layout, with one loop slightly longer to accomodate the power track.

This was the suggested layout for Le Mans Contest. I ordered more track pieces as quickly as I could.

So once I got the elongated version of the layout up, I still had a whole bunch of unused track pieces, including some really sweet 2/30 and 3/30 curves. So I made a couple of mild switchbacks and inserted them into the layout; one at the end of the long straight and one just before the start of the overpass. I don't usually do layouts with overpasses, but got the itch to do this one.

After building the initial layout, I opted not to change anything about this part of it. All extensions and changes occur at the other end of the layout.

At first I thought a track like this would favor the longer cars, but it looks like each car is doing great so far on it. I haven't done any official timing yet. I still want to give each car a once-over first. But I'll be doing a race on this track for sure.

Looking down the end to Turn 1. Those nice easy curves do very little to keep the car stable before hitting the brakes off the straightaway. 

I'm loving the 2/30 - 3/30 track combination. Even if I only use them in the form of esses, they still do so much to the overall track. The flow improves dramatically, even when they're relegated to a secondary role. They make straights much more interesting, as well as elongating existing ones. And while you can fly through them, they'll still kick you off if you're not careful. You just crash at a faster speed, that's all.

The Porsche is sitting on a 2/30, turned right, connected to a left 3/30, then a left 1/60. So coming off the straight, the car starts to climb right, then left and starts to unweight, then a hard left. It's super easy to throw the backside out on that 1/60. 

I like speed. I like long tracks with fast flow and challenging spots. Making multi-radius curves really pushes the driver to drive the track. You can tell when you let off too early, or didn't handle the turn effectively, or maybe spun out in it. When you have a track of only 1/60 turns, what happens is that you get into a subconscious thing where you know exactly where your thumb needs to be to make it through a 1/60 curve at the best speed. Once you find that, it's just a matter of always hitting that mark for the best time.
But when you have turns made of different radii, suddenly that one turn becomes a multi-faceted monster, capable of either taking the wind out of you or taking your car off the track. That's rad. In that pic above, I've been working on the best way through that section. The curves going in are so smooth that the 1/60 curve comes up very abruptly. Approaching it wrong guarantees a wipe out. Leaving it wrong takes all the power out of the car for the overpass.

So I'm going to run with this track for a bit. I still have extras, and I might use a couple of track pieces still. Not sure about that yet. I think with a few additions/adjustments we could have a good track that doesn't have so many potential drift elements [both 180° endcaps]. I have a couple straights and those little curves I might use. We'll see.

Winter Update

There have been some things:

I got more grass and finished off the extension. I really like it, although I think I need to strengthen the extension a little with cross bracing.

It's a bit dark as I haven't put any lights up yet over the extension. I also need to add that sliver of grass on the corner.

I had big plans to buy straights and some more large radius curve pieces so I could get a good track going, but those plans fell through when our money ran out. So I'll have to wait. Meanwhile, I took out a bunch of unused 1/60 tracks and reintroduced them into the layout. It turned out making a good technical section out of the extension. I also added some lighting.

i ended up using all but three track pieces, with 26 curve pieces used in this layout. I tried mixing things up so there was variety through the 1/60 curves. I think I got there.

I still want to do the other extension, but it would be pointless right now as I have no more track. I have the wood and grass, cut and ready to go. I'm turning laps in the high 7's right now, which is a pretty good lap time.

By this time next year I will have everything I need to get this done. I know this. I guarantee it. I'll also have some new cars. I know this. I guarantee it.

The other half of the track. It's mostly for speed, with some 2/30 and 3/30's adding some twisty bits at the beginning of the backstretch.

Meanwhile this track has turned out to be pretty impressive. There are some things I'd change: a larger right side to break up the 180° turn, build a faster technical section using less 1/60's and more large radius curves. I just love them. So much more variety can be had with the addition of a handful of 2/30 and 3/30 curves.

I still like the grass. I had a friend over the other day and we had a pretty good time with it in its current state. The grass helped make for clean racing and was a nice landing area for offs.

I figure I'm a long ways away from deciding on a permanent layout. Since changing out my last long--term layout, I've changed now dozens of times. I'm still going for fast sections, technical sections, big sweepers, that sort of thing. Just having a 20'x10' space to fill is a little daunting. Never thought I'd have to say I had too much space.

Be that as it may, i probably won't be satisfied until I've done the other extension and have made a complete circuit with the track pieces of my choice.

Rebuilding this section into a more technical one was surprisingly easy and fits great as an alternative to another two straightaways. 

I think it's pretty easy to make a track that's all straightaways, with turns that are more for utility's sake than for any kind of racing challenge. If I made a giant L-shaped track with two 180°s and two 90°s, that would get boring pretty fast. I like speed as much as the next racer, but there's gotta be a challenge to stay on the track in there as well.

My nephew was over for the holidays, and when he was asking me how he should approach going through this section, I told him to find a comfortable speed without sliding, and then try to hit that speed through the whole section as a start. Once he gets comfortable with that, start with little punches in the small straights, setting up a rhythm. He figured it out and improved his lap time.

Current Layout

Sadly, like every year, it's too cold to spend any length of time in the attic racing, so I have to wait until it warms up a bit. We're at freezing temps now, so I would rather not stand in a refrigerator. But this track is up and ready to race. I might make a tweak or two to it, but I plan on it being the next race in my season.

The cars are lubed, tuned and ready to go. I'm going to throw in a curve to make the next race interesting. Not going to say what that is yet.

2019 Season - Race 1 - Extension Connection

And it's official. The first race has been run, and there were plenty of surprises.

25 timed laps. All cars were cleaned and tuned prior to racing.

Conditions were a bit slippery on the track today. I attribute that to the new layout shuffling the track pieces and throwing off the line. A couple of curves just don't have the grip that they would if they were worn in.
The tunings were very very light, as the cars were in great condition. At first I thought I'd need to do all of them, but I really didn't need to do any of them. Still did anyway.

Without further ado, here are the results from the first race of the new season:

Car          Time          Lap        Crash      Points

Gulf         3:01.6       7.2           2                 0   
Shell        2:50.2       6.8           0                 4   
Alfa         2:48.5       6.7           1                 6     
#5            2:45.1       6.6           1                 8   
Porsche   2:50.5        6.8          1                 2     
Matra      2:43.1        6.5         1                11           

It wasn't a flawless performance, and there was a little tail twitchiness, but otherwise this car handled like a dream.

Every car, with the exception of the Shell GT40, had crashing issues. Almost all occurred on the same section of track, which was the esses coming in from the extension. I'm not a fan of the layout, so it'll be good to work on a new, better one. I sure do love that extension, though.

The Matra has made itself known this race day, winning its inaugural race. At first I wasn't sure if it was running well, or I was just used to it. Turns out it's both. Incredibly smooth car. I don't expect this car to lose many races.

I think this car is becoming my take-it-for-granted car. I never bet on it, but it's always right up at the front. Totally great car that really likes this track layout.

A surprise in the pack was the Alfa, which not only did very well, but I feel probably could have been pushed a bit more for a better time. I felt the same way about the Shell GT40. It just felt like it had a little more to give if I was psycho enough to take it. It's the first race. Gotta shake the bugs out. Or wasps. Whatever. But the Alfa. I didn't expect that to happen. I knew it liked racing on this layout, as it's a fan of tracks with more turns and less long straights. But it just ran glued to the track. Excellent ride.

I had to add a step of power in the controller to give the Porsche a little more headroom. I'm not sure if I added enough. It requires a bit higher power setting than the other cars do, but it uses that upper range beautifully. 

I thought the Porsche also did well, and felt like it was going faster than it actually was. About halfway through its race I said "that's the way", as though to signify that I thought the car had a pretty good chance to win it all. It ran a respectable race, just .3 sec per lap behind the leader and right along in the pack. I think I need to pump a bit more power to it.

I've had issues with this car since race 9 of the first season. Getting this thing up to speed is going to be a priority.

The car that didn't perform well was the Gulf #11 GT40. When I was racing it it felt like I couldn't get in a good rhythm with it, so it kinda chopped its way around the track. It ran well off the pace of the pack by over 10 seconds. I pushed the car, but it didn't seem to have the capacity to step up. Not sure why. I'm going to look over it later and see if maybe I didn't do something funny to it while tuning before the race.

But I gotta say, the most impressive car of the bunch was the #8, even though it didn't set the fastest time or whatever. It just felt like it had a lot to give and was ready. I didn't run it conservative. I just ran it. That it didn't come off the track even once was also a nice thing.

So there it is. The first race of a new season. I labeled it by year, and I'll probably go back and do that for the previous seasons. I'm planning on 20 races, hopefully on 20 different layouts. I'll get the layout maker up and running and add a layout photo as well [like the old days].

I think it's a little early to call favorites to win it all, so I won't. I am going to give the #11 a good once over. It needs to run faster.

New Season Plans and Notes

I'm planning a 20-track championship series. Six cars, all Slot.it. If I get any more they'll be late additions, but I'm not expecting to. Races will be 50 laps timed. Clock will stop in the event of a crash.

Points for races will be distributed as follows:

Place     Points

1st            11
2nd            8
3rd             6
4th             4
5th             2
6th             0

The reason I give 11 points for 1st is to avoid a potential tie at the end of the season. This came close to happening before because of my math. Not this time. Also the three point differential between 1st and 2nd keeps it competitive. And since it'll be over a variety of layouts, no single car should dominate. We shall see.


Car Notes

The Matra has yet to run a legit race here. I've done loads of laps, but haven't had a single race since getting it. So that makes it the big question going in. The Porsche was able to make a good showing coming into the party late in last year's championship races. I expect there will tracks he will totally dominate at. I expect the same from the Matra too. The other cars, we'll have to see. I'd love a good surprise, and I think there are favorites and long shots.

I'd call this one a favorite.

Cars will be treated to a full tune-up, cleaning, lube and oil change. Tires will be sanded once every 5 races and cleaned before each race. If 5 proves too long I'll shorten it, but if one gets it, they all do. Another lube and cleaning will likely occur halfway through the series.

I've been running all the cars the last few days and am ready to prep them for the race. They're all running well, so it's hard to tell without timing which car is the fastest. The results should be interesting.

Quick Notes

The #8 GT40 is handling very nicely these days.

• Love the extension. So far cars are averaging around 8 seconds a lap, but I could probably push that number down a little bit over the next few days. I'm still running the temporary layout just to get the feel of adding an extension. I also found that if I stand a couple feet away from the table I have a better view of the entire track. 
• Since I'm messing with a temp layout, I got to thinking; why not do another championship series using various layouts again? It'll be awhile until I have a truly satisfactory layout, but until then I should take advantage of this sweet table and the lack of a permanent thing yet. So that's probably what I'll do, and I'll likely start with this current layout. 
• Curiously enough, the car that is handling this current layout the best seems to be the GT40. All three of them cruise right through everything, handling much smoother than the other cars. This is probably due to not many sharp turns and not many straights longer than three track pieces. That makes the Fords sled right through most of the track. Should be interesting. 
• I've been doing an informal poll of crashes and specifics around them. A large percentage of crashes occur going through the outside of a 1/60 turn. A huge percentage of the time a car won't roll over when it crashes, and rarely go more than a few inches from it's crash location. 

I ran the Alfa for a bit, but it needs a tuneup and a bit more attention.

• The more I race on larger radius curves, the less I like 1/60s. I've got a nice flowing curvy backstretch, but it's choked by sharp turns on either side. I'm going to need to pick up some more track.
• The grass is a huge success. It's much quieter than bare wood. I can race at any time, day or night and not bother anyone. I just need a few more rolls of the stuff to cover the rest of the table. 
• This leads to another question: what about the other extension? My original thought was to make two. As it stands at this moment I would have enough track to cover it. I have the wood, however. It's all cut and could be in in an hour. But I need to think about how badly I need it now. I suppose I could use that extension as my workbench for the time being. Now that I have the grass down I can't very well work on that. So maybe it'll be that before more track.

Last layout RIP LOL

So the other day my wife tells me over breakfast that she's having a work colleague over for coffee and cake, and don't worry, I don't have to be there. So reflexively I ran upstairs, put a few things together, and made an extension:

4x4 extension. Started with the ol' out-n-back. I'll have to come up with a clever name for the extension, as well as a clever section.

I did a bit of cheating. Since I had kind of built myself into a corner, I had to secure the extension to the main as I was building it. I couldn't just make a 4x4' table and connect it. I needed to get the table evenness just right. So I attached two legs I had measured from the current legs on the main to the main itself. Then I did the other legs, then added crosspieces. The whole thing barely fit under the roof while still being level with the main table. Felt pretty good for a novice work.

Quick and dirty track design. Don't care for it much, but I like the windy backstretch. That's pretty fun.

Now I need to put grass on the extension and consider some table walls. I'll have to build something for the back where the roof comes down. Those holes are a straight drop to the floor in a very hard to reach spot. I'm also considering a front wall/border. Something going right along the front of the table about an inch or so up. Not sure about that yet. I still don't have an issue with cars flying off the track. I'm sure someday I'll have that special visitor do it for me.

So of course I had to toss a quick track layout up to test it. The layout isn't the best, but I'm enjoying the extension. It tends to stop the tennis spectator effect when racing cars. Makes me turn and look. And the post isn't in the way at all. Also, there's no feeling like it's really far out there or that I can't make out the cars. I do need to work out the lighting. But I think the extension works pretty great, partly due to the 80cm height.

Threw in those softer curves as an afterthought. I really love those curves. Wish I had more. I really hate the 180° at the end.

I took the Matra around this current layout and averaged 8 seconds a lap. So I've gained about 3 seconds on my previous track. That's pretty good. I'm going to run it this way for awhile and see how I like it. I'll do layout changes for sure, but I like parts of what's going on here. Small parts.

I've also almost used up all my track pieces. I'm down to 4 1/60s and 2 1/30s. That's pretty good. I'm fine with leaving those out.