No racing facility is complete without the pit garages where all the automotive sorcery takes place. The SlotStructures pit garage is a four-stall, two story building that has plenty of room to fill it up with tool boxes and floor lifts. The pit garage makes use of all its available space. It has spotter balconies above the garages and souvenir stands below the stairways. Details like garage numbers and no smoking signs are nicely etched
into the kit’s fiberboard material. My sample was sent already assembled and is a final prototype, but the production versions will ship in the punch-out boards as shown in the grandstand and Dunlop Tire Bridge articles (Click here to see the articles). It may be safe to say there could be some minor changes in the final production product to add more details or ease assembly.
These kits are very well made, constructed from medium density fiberboard (MDF) and laser cut to consistent tolerances. Once assembled, the structures are rigid, heavy and hold their form well. They are made to last and will be a great collectible heirloom for generations to come, to enjoy your HO slot racing world in all its realistic detail.
The Pit Garage has a nice second level, perfect for spotters or maybe TV cameras. This area wraps completely around the building. The little boxes on the roof are AC units. The rails around the second story can be left solid to hang sponsor banners or can have the center pieces removed to look like a balcony rail.
Let’s check out the business side of the pit garage. Here we can see all of the area that will see all of the action of each of the pit stops and repairs.
The picture on the top shows the view with the roof removed. There’s plenty of space for tools and lifts. The pit garage is the hub of activity at any race track. The picture on the bottom is a driver’s point of view coming
into the garage area.
It looks like SlotBorders/SlotStructures is stepping right up to the challenge and are offering some outstanding products to make our HO racing world that much more like the 1:1 world. The size and details lend themselves very well to any type of track layout, from oval to road course. One really nice aspect of the designs, is they have enough elements from various eras of racing, that each structure could be from the 1950’s or from next weeks latest F-1 or NASCAR event.
So as mentioned earlier, I have not glued or finished these new offering yet, so you could see them as they come from the manufacturer. All units are designed to accommodate rapid and square assembly and most parts fit tight enough to not need glue, though glue (or glue dots) and paint are always recommended. The kits are also scaled to modern 1/64th scale and not the smaller train scale of 1/87th (true HO) so they more readily accommodate modern HO race tracks and cars.
I will write additional articles on the detailed finishing of these kits, along with some suggestions on how to further add details, both scratch-built and purchased, ready to install (Click here to see the articles). Half the detail battle is won just by starting out with great kits like we have seen here from SlotBorders/SlotStructures.