What An Awesome Day @ DeBary Glen Raceway

[Florida_Slotter]

All I can say is WOW!

Yesterday was one of those days you would like to hit the 'Repeat' button and do over - again and again.

To begin with the weather was one of those "Chamber of Commerce" ones where the local chambers take a photo to put on all their advertisement. Mid 70 degree temps, nice blue sky and a gentle breeze blowing from the west. That just makes the inside of our building so comfortable - no A/C nor heat is needed. Just a perfect environment.

The day started out with a few test sessions.

First and foremost was the typical "Ford vs Chevy" one - the newly acquired Carrera Cobra 289 had a chance to race against the Carrera Cheetah. For the record, all that was done to either car was to place it on a section of spare track that has sandpaper glued to it to sand the tires down. After that we ran the cars around the track at a very slow speed to make sure we had no out of rounds or other maladies. There were none. Both ModlerBob and I then took some hot laps to get ourselves ready and before we knew it . . . . . the race started.

Neither car was superior to the other car. The Ford could not outdo the Chevy, nor the Chevy outdo the Ford. It came down to which driver tried a bit too hard to get back to the throttle coming out of a turn and the car slid a bit sideways. For those that think a sliding car is faster then a planted car, I saw with my own eyes that this is not a true statement. Each time it happened and depending on the severity of the slide, distance was lost by the car doing the sliding. You really had to ignore the other car - yeah like that's a simple thing to do - and just race the track with your car. At the end of the test session, our TrackMate lap counting / timing system showed that the difference between the cars was .008! That comes to about 1.25 inches per lap!

The bottom line of this testing sessions shows that the Carrera Cheetahs and Cobras can be run together as a class at our club. So we will probably discuss this as a new class with some of our members and possibly start doing some more of this type of racing. Now we just need to come up with some ways of providing more liveries so we can tell the cars apart while racing. Dave Kennedy, if you are reading this, you might want to bring to the attention of your company that they have created something that is going to become very popular. Now they need to put together more cars of this ilk so they can all be raced together!

After the "Carrera Question" was answered, it was time to find out whether the Racer Capri or the Racer Lancia was fastest. The setup was duplicated on both cars. We had decided to lower the magnetic downforce just to see what would happen. We chose to run at a total of 3 times the car weight as a max. So you could only use 2 times the car weight in downforce. Our Magnet Marshal showed us both cars weighed the same and had the same amount of downforce. Both cars were also shod with 1407c SuperTires. Both cars also had the stock 0 mm offset parts in them. Aside from the paint jobs and names on them, they were about as close as you could get.

During the 'stare and compare' process, we did note that the Capri has about a .400 longer wheelbase and also the guide lead was also longer by about the same. The Lancia had more 'overhang' behind the rear wheels, most of it is plastic.

Once again we basically drove the wheels off of both cars for many laps. I must say it took a lot more talent to keep the cars going at a good clip around the track. If you went wide open throttle ever so slighty before you had the car in a straight line, you were rewarded by a lot of fishtailing and the other car went flying by you. Neither car had any advantage on our long straight over the other. If they entered the straight side by side, they were still side by side at the end of the straight. The performance of these cars was even closer according to the TrackMate timing system. It showed .002 between both lanes. Remember, there is a slight difference in length between lanes, so I think this shows the cars are even more close in performance. This class will take more talent to race then some of the other classes we are presently racing.

Then it was time for planning. Up until this week, the back of the club building housed a model railroad. That has been sold in preparation for moving our newly acquired routed track in, hopefully this weekend. Our club will then have 2 racing surfaces, one plastic - Scalextric Sport - and one wooden track. I think there is a foot or two difference with overall lap lengh and of course a big difference in surface. We're looking forward to getting the new track in place and starting to use it. The lane spacing on the new track is 3.5 inches and the slot is a commerical sized 1/8 by 1/4. I'm sure it will get a lot of use, but so will the Scalextric Sport track.

Of course we also just had FUN racing some Fly Can-Am, Scalextric Classic Formula 1, Slot.It Group C. Several of our friends dropped by during the day, so a lot of bench racing also took place. As stated earlier, just an awesome day!

[dreinecke]

Glad to hear you boys had a good time. Next time I come down to FL, I'll have to hook up for some racing.

[Florida_Slotter]

The Red Carpet will be unrolled for your visit.

[dreinecke]

Wow! You guys have carpet? Must have a bigger allowance than me...or you're expecting my car on the floor like it usually is and you're trying to protect it.

[HomeRacingWorld]

Nice race report. Those lap times are virtually identical. The driver is likely the difference they are so close, and that is how it should be.

I know on our smaller layout they are a great match up.

Carrera has full intentions of making more versions. You have to wait awhile though. I am pretty happy they brought out 4 at once! A lot better than what most others bring us.

Besides, you guys can paint right? :) Pick a color, add a new meatball number and pretty soon you have wide variety of cars.

[Florida_Slotter]

Hopefully DeBary Glen will soon transform from a great place to slot car race to one that is over and above all expectations.

We are hoping to move our new acquistion from it's current location to our club facility in DeBary.

To avoid confusion - like that would ever happen - "DeBary Glen" will be our Scalextric Sport track that we have been enjoying for over a year now. "Palm Bay" will be our routed wood track that we just purchased and hope will soon be up and running.

David - "DeBary Glen" has a carpet under it, so you will enjoy running on that track. :lol:

Yep, each week, normally on Tuesdays, we get together for some play time - hey, I can be blatantly honest about what we do there! 8-) Bob and myself also start out each session with a declarartion, kind sorta like this . . . ."Hello, my name is __________________ and I'm a slot car addict!" Works for us.

We don't care what you like to run, I think we have something we can run with you.

From DeBary Glen to Daytona is under 30 miles and it's mostly interstate driving. So if anyone is coming down for the Rolex 24 or Daytona Speedweeks, please feel free to drop in and let us know you'd like to come over and do some playing with little toy cars with us.

[Modlerbob]

As you all know next Friday, the 21st, is the last day of earth's existence according to some. So to commemorate this occasion I have decided to put on an event that I will call "the Race From Here to Eternity". Anyone within driving range of DeBary Glen (actually anyone who would come from wherever they are) is invited to come and join the fun. I don't expect too many takers as I am sure most of you will be too busy making your final preparations for the journey into the next cycle of earth, aka Christmas shopping, but if you are available I, at least will be spending the latter part of December 21st at DeBary Glen.

[Florida_Slotter]

Awesome!

Rather then having to go to a den of sin and iniquity as I did back in 1971 when Jeanne Dixon forecasted the sinking of the northern island of Honshu - right where my base was located, I can now go to a friendly environment and enjoy slot car racing with friends and soon to be friends.

ModlerBob, thank you for doing this. So are we going to race until the earth ends or just until the power goes out?