Le Mans Miniatures Jaguar
Posted: Sat Feb 10, 2018 1:37 pmWe all know that Le Mans Miniature cars are beautiful, heavy, expensive and run badly. I mean, like REALLY beautiful and they run REALLY awfully. Right?
Well, maybe not...
I got my Le Mans Miniatures purple Jaguar #3 for under $100 on a sale a few years ago. I had prepared it and it always ran quite well actually: surprisingly mine has always been competitive with my Slot.it Jaguar XJR 12. On Luf's previous incarnation of his Targa track, best lap time for the Slot.it was 7.244 sec and the LMM car 7.256. Pretty darn impressive I thought.
But I always felt the LMM car could do better. The front end was just ridiculous: two big blocks of resin glued to the inside of the body serving as axle holders for the front axle. The whole thought of a front axle attached to the body of a slot car was just an anathema to me: how could it POSSIBLY go well? On top of that the front wheels/tyres were not particularly true.
So this past week I spent some time on the car: ripped the glued axle blocks off the body, put some SCC axle blocks on the chassis, trued and profiled some Slot.it Zero Grip front tyres and just generally tidied things up. The intention was to take it to the track this past Friday to see how it now compared to the Slot.it Jag lap-time wise. On Luf''s new track I have achieved a best of 6.954 seconds with the Slot.it so that was what I was aiming/hoping for. And recognise that, while this is a decent to good time for a Slot.it Gp C car, it isn't at the leading edge of my Group C cars.
As soon as I got the car on the track I realised that it was now greatly improved and just a treat to drive. I almost immediately got a lap time under 7 seconds (a good time on the new track) but it just got quicker and quicker as I got used to it.
Ended up with a lap time of 6.734 seconds! This is very quick and very impressive! Comparable to all but my very, very quickest Slot.its and faster than an NSR Porsche 997. This with a resin body slot car with the guide BEHIND the front axle due to the intricacies of the nose of the 1:1 car. I thought this rendered any possibility of it running anywhere near well all but unachievable.
Beauty and performance in one package? Don't you love it when an unplanned plan comes together?
Alwyn
Well, maybe not...
I got my Le Mans Miniatures purple Jaguar #3 for under $100 on a sale a few years ago. I had prepared it and it always ran quite well actually: surprisingly mine has always been competitive with my Slot.it Jaguar XJR 12. On Luf's previous incarnation of his Targa track, best lap time for the Slot.it was 7.244 sec and the LMM car 7.256. Pretty darn impressive I thought.
But I always felt the LMM car could do better. The front end was just ridiculous: two big blocks of resin glued to the inside of the body serving as axle holders for the front axle. The whole thought of a front axle attached to the body of a slot car was just an anathema to me: how could it POSSIBLY go well? On top of that the front wheels/tyres were not particularly true.
So this past week I spent some time on the car: ripped the glued axle blocks off the body, put some SCC axle blocks on the chassis, trued and profiled some Slot.it Zero Grip front tyres and just generally tidied things up. The intention was to take it to the track this past Friday to see how it now compared to the Slot.it Jag lap-time wise. On Luf''s new track I have achieved a best of 6.954 seconds with the Slot.it so that was what I was aiming/hoping for. And recognise that, while this is a decent to good time for a Slot.it Gp C car, it isn't at the leading edge of my Group C cars.
As soon as I got the car on the track I realised that it was now greatly improved and just a treat to drive. I almost immediately got a lap time under 7 seconds (a good time on the new track) but it just got quicker and quicker as I got used to it.
Ended up with a lap time of 6.734 seconds! This is very quick and very impressive! Comparable to all but my very, very quickest Slot.its and faster than an NSR Porsche 997. This with a resin body slot car with the guide BEHIND the front axle due to the intricacies of the nose of the 1:1 car. I thought this rendered any possibility of it running anywhere near well all but unachievable.
Beauty and performance in one package? Don't you love it when an unplanned plan comes together?
Alwyn