Chassis building beginner set ?

[demether]

Hi,

I'm interested into chassis building, I built some pvc or wood stick chassis or convert some plastic chassis too. But I never obtained anything really good, since I had no tools, no supplies.

I'm 100% home racer. I only raced (and will race once my tracks will be ready again) slot cars with beginners and/or casuals, on relatively small tracks.

So I don't need the best racing parts and I dont want to create competition chassis. Just cheap but nice balanced chassis for my needs, scratch build cars and conversions.

Concerning basic tools : I'm wondering what should be the (really) necessary tools to start "seriously" to build slot car chassis (1/32). A chassis jig ? a pinion puller ? etc...Again, budget minded.

Concerning materials : what are the brass thickness used in 1/32 ? Maybe other materials exists also, easier to work with ?


COncerning slot car parts : where can I find cheap "generic" parts, if something like that exists ? "noname" motors in boxes of 20, big bags of guides, pinions or bushings, axles sold at lenght...I exagerate a little, but you get the idea.

Finally, are you making your own tires, or is there somewhere something like what we can find in HO scale (bags of 10 or 20 pairs or tires) ?

Thanks you for your help.

[Florida_Slotter]

[HomeRacingWorld]

[Florida_Slotter]

[RazorJon]

first time builders list for brass
Find a K&S Brass kiosk and get the 3\32X3\16 tube
they make square and round tube that works great for front axle
they have strips of brass stock .5-.75-1 inch width and they are .032-.062 thick great for pans and guide keel brackets

I started building chassis with a small pencil torch, a home-made jig (I sell for 75.00) a few pliers and a X-Acto razor saw.

Now I have all what Harry said plus.

If you think building chassis is cheap, its not, you can buy a H&R ready to run chassis cheaper than you can build it, I do it because its a lot of fun, and its a challenge.

Hope you have fun with it

[waaytoomuchintothis]

I think its wise to remind you that there are dozens of different types of scratchbuilt chassis. For example, I haven't built a jaildoor chassis in decades, because I am a home racer and never go to commercial tracks. I just don't like the commercial tracks. I build flex chassis from fiberglass, rigid chassis from brass sheet and tube, and I sometimes build a chassis around old Fly sidewinder drive pods I have a bag of. Sometimes you can build a car with no chassis at all, using a hard plastic body with elements of what would be a chassis attached to the underside. When you learn to build a house, you don't start with the Winchester Mansion, after all. Start simple. If you like commercial tracks, folks here can help with that, but if you start with the most complex structure that requires great skill and lots of practice, you'll burn out before you ever get a running platform.

[demether]

Thanks for your answers. :text-thankyouyellow:

Now...I understand why there is no beginner set available :mrgreen:

Concerning good tools, I believe I just have a good pair of flat pliers, a pro A2 sized cutting mat, an X-acto knife with hundred blades, an Olfa blade cutter with thick Stanley blades, a 50cms steel ruler, and a entry level Velleman soldering station with assorted bits, pump and third hand.

Not speaking of my quite good miniature painting tools and brushes, all my other tools are crap cheap ones :lol: So I'll have to invest maybe about 2 or 3 times what I plan to invest in my home slot center project....Not for now I guess.

But thanks, really usefull. When it will be time, I'll have to check european/french "count as" versions of tools and stores too (no wallmart or homedepot here).

[Retro Racer 44]

[HomeRacingWorld]

That is a great tool. I need one. Thanks for this.

[DManley]

This is great information, and great questions! I am just starting with the brass chassis building questions myself. I posted about solder a few weeks ago, and I am just cutting and mocking up my first creations. I have experience building other things, so I have some tools and some of my skills should port over. I have also built slotcars from plastic and fiberglass before. I have even built some from aluminum channel for 1/24 scale bodies back in the '90s.

In my limited experience, I agree on the Rotary tools. Variable speed and quality count. There are a few good brands out there. Anything that is on sale for $29.99 at a big box store isn't going to last very long or work very well cutting brass. As soon as the tool gets even a little bit wobbly, it becomes useless for making precise cuts, and won't ever leave a clean, straight, smooth edge or surface again. (Knowledge gained from years of flying model aircraft and racing RC cars, as well as static models)

Luckily, I have been collecting files, sanding sticks, dental picks, rasps, rifflers, nippers, pliers, mini vises, paint brushes, forceps, tweezers, reamers, 3rd hand tools, scissors, and the like for well over 30 years now, plus I am a third generation tool hound. If I need it, I have it (But I might not be able to find it.) I will probably just start building with what I have, and if there is something I really need, I will buy it. Otherwise, I will just set up a small caddy to hold the tools I end up using the most and keep them near me while I work.

As for generic parts, I do see some motors being sold on Ebay for a good bit less than the name brand ones. I think Lakota has some cheap ones, BWA/Dart has NC-1 and Narrow motors for $5.00 a piece. Professor Motor had some cheaper ones IIRC, but I don't see them on the website right now. I bought a couple of bags of Motors from Slot Car World back in the day, with my Artin track. I am down to my last few, and looking for another large batch. One thing I have never been able to deal with is gears. For me, gears are the most expensive part of revamping old cars, or scratchbuilding cars. I have cut bushings from plastic or metal. I have cut axles from music wire and I have even made my own wheels on a metal lathe. Drill bit blanks can be purchased from material supply places like McMaster Carr or Travers, Guides and braid can be found in slightly cheaper form by shopping around on the net, but I have not found any really killer deals yet. (Although 1 meter package of braid will do a lot of slot cars for four bucks.)

If I really wanted to build on the cheap, I would consider TSRF's idea for the guide. They just use a fixed pin, and fixed braid on either side of it. No moving parts. Just take a stainless pin of some type (or a piece of piano wire of the appropriate diameter) and fix it to the chassis. Then wrap two pieces of braid around the front edge of the chassis. Instant poor man's guide. (WARNING! if you use this method, check your track to make sure that the pin does not rub the edge of the track braid or the rail while sitting in the guide. If the opening between the track rails or track braid is not wider than the slot, you will have shorting issues. Then you would need to fabricate a plastic guide flag.) If the metal pin won't work on your track, them make a fixed guide flag out of a thin piece of narrow plastic. (Maybe Delrin or UHMW types of plastic. Maybe even polycarbonate or Lexan?) If the flag was short enough from front to back, the fixed flag should negotiate the tightest corners, but if you slide out too much, it will snag up, and it won't last as long as a moving guide. ANOTHER WARNING! If you do this, with a pin or a short plastic guide, you need to keep the braids very short. If the braids can touch each other, they will! You will then owe the track owner a fuse.

Tires are pretty easy to cast, but the initial investment is going to be a hundred bucks or so. I cast my own, and it saves quite a bit of money because I run on one really abrasive track (Grip paint) and I shred them like nobody's business. Mostly I cast them because I like making my own tires, and I can make them in any size, shape, compound or color I want whenever I want to.

Good luck, and I will be watching this thread.

Dave

[bill from nh]

A couple thoughts:

1.) The red squirt tube on a WD-40 can makes a very good pin on a pin guide car. Stick a length of .047 piano wire in it if you think you'll need the strength. (You won't.)
2.) Use the back (un-toothed) edge of a hacksaw blade as a fence when cutting brass. Your cut will be straighter & carbide cutting discs don't easily nick the blade's hardened steel.
3.) .047 piano wire works well as pegs for those honeycomb ceramic propane plates Retro Racer 44 showed above. A flat piece of hardwood or a flat 1' square ceramic floor tile also make good chassis building surfaces.
4.) Radio Shack sells a small $5 can motor if you're building something such as a midget. Smith Speedway in Charlestown, NH sells a $5 'FK' motor, the same size as a Falcon of TSR, if you're building something bigger.
5.) My personal favorite type of chassis are the brass/wire ones. You can also build nice chassis from glued plastic or wood (popsicle sticks) using ordinary modeling tools, but a minimum of power tools.

[Ember]

On files: Riffler files are a good investment. They can get into places that standard needle files won't go.

On Dremel style tools. My best investment for my Dremel was a chuck. I just find it much quicker than using the collet and it means you can use third party attachments or regular drill bits. Also useful are a range of brushes for cleaning up your chassis after soldering, the brass ones and steel ones at the very least. Safety glasses and other safety equipment.

Exacto: I only use 2 blade styles. The standard #5 (or is it #11 these days, it's the diamond shaped blade with a good point) and a curved one, I think it's #2. Buy the pointy blades in boxes of 100. They are useless when the point breaks or blunts, they will need changing often. The curved one I use mainly for cutting metal foil, so we can perhaps ignore it for now.

Soldering station: Some like a blow torch. Some like an iron. Me? I like a soldering iron for control. I can just imagine setting the desk alight if I was to use a torch. Tips, everyone has their favourite shape, but I'm a chisel tip fan. Acid flux.... I think most things have been covered above.

A jig is not vital. My first two chassis attempts were made without a Jig. BUT... A jig to hold things square does make the process much simpler.

Another thing I've found really useful, though I don't know what on earth to call it is a device for removing burrs from the inside of tubing. Let's call it a rotating de-burrer.


Chassis do not have to be complicated to be functional. Nor do they have to be beautiful, thankfully. The important thing is to try. Each one will be better than the last, and eventually you'll be able to produce something every bit as beautiful as the chassis shown earlier on.

[btaylor]

Another great source for slotting tools,is any place that sells Gunsmiths tools,there is a huge selection of screwdriver bits that are always hardened steel,and files are perfect sized for chassis building and body prep.i have found that even the cheapest of smithing tools are usually a better grade than most over the counter stuff.

[demether]

Great, great infos ! Really nice tip on the honeycomb stuff ! thanks !


edit : by the way, are you using a miniature soldering torch or a soldering iron ? What power/reference ?

thanks

[bill from nh]

I'm using a 50 watt Ungar soldering iron with mine. This iron reaches a tip temperature of about 900 F. Mine is an old iron, but Weller sells the modern version of this iron. The info that came with my honeycomb plates indicated they would withstand temperatures up to 1800 F, so they should work okay with most mini-torches.