Not midgetracers but 1/24 dirt track/champ cars

[mattb]

The 3 colored cars are built with Big Donkey dirt track bodies, the white ones are bodies I made a few years ago.
I wanted some cars to run on my home track that would run good and be easy to drive. I wanted something visitors could run and have fun with. I first got a set of Monogram Greenwood Corvettes and put urethane tires on them. They were really shi**y cars. without a magnet you wouldn't even be able to make a lap. I thought about fine tuning them and maybe putting brass chassis under them, but I came to my senses and realized I could build a new/better car just as easy, so I decided on the dirt trackers. The other factor is that on a 4 lane Carrera track those little Monogram cars look lost, a bigger car is much more visually satisfying on a wider longer track. These cars are fun and pretty easy to drive. They all run the MT (Mark Thomas) motors that we used to run in our commercial track cars.

They are mostly geared around 4 to 1. The frames are all brass, either Sprintsplus cut and extended or just motor bracket and front axle bracket soldered to 1 inch wide brass. No more urethane tires, silicone coated sponge is a little quicker and stickier and it's what we run on all our cars, so other guys cars grip fine, too.

These cars are fun to race and easy to drive and anybody that comes in can have fun with these cars. I have molded a "T" track roadster body and built a similiar style car for the home track and it looks really promising in the first trial runs. It is pretty small, but still 1/24 scale. I'll do some pictures of this car when I finish detailing it.

Building these cars also gives me a chance to use a lot of the 1960's parts I have that don't get used on a commerial track cars.

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[HomeRacingWorld]

Nice projects and one heck of a nice looking grid!

[btaylor]

Great group of slots right there! Fun looking cars for sure.

Bob

[glasshorsevh]

Love those! That is a really, really cool grid!

Val

[Broman62]

Those are soooooo cooool Matt...beautiful lineup!!

[Quickcars]

Those look awesome. I think I'll build one of these for my grid as well.

Well done Sir!!

QC

[mattb]

You can get a nice body with all the trim from bigdonkey resins. They are big enough it is easy to build a 1 inch wide chassis from flat brass... I did cut a piece of wood an inch wide with rounded ends. I take the bodies and use hot water to soften them, then put the wood in the underside to hold it apart while it cools. Makes the chassis fit easier.

I appreciate the good words. These are not great artistic works, but fun cars you are not afraid to race in anger!! I do try to balance the detail and finish work of cars we race with the banging and destroying they get sometimes. I did build one car more to look at then race and I've put this pic up here before. I tried to build it similiar to the great Midget Racers some of you guys build.

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My best car is the Hot Wheels Trans Am Camaro driven by Jack Baldwin. It got so tore up, I built a second model to have a nice body again. Within 2-3 months, it is in worse shape then the original body. Next time I will just build the model and put it on a shelf to look at, but race my old wreck!!! The body style is just a great aero design and the paint is really eye catching. The junky old cut in half womp frame is the best handling of all my cars! It's a beater, but it sure runs good!

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[strangebrew]

Impressive lineup..... :clap:

[chappy]

Nice job Matt, they look really good and enticing to give a try at.
Bob

[mattb]

These cars are not great models, or highly detailed, but they go together quick and are easy to run. If something breaks, a little glue makes them right again!

[GASSERMAN]

Really nice job on the Midgets Mat. Beautiful looking. Bob.................