Rebuild, Rebirth and a New Era
So now I have gotten myself into this comfortable nitch. I was working on Speed Inc. bodies, customizing and general fooling around with scenery bits here and there, when I went did something that would shake up my comfy little slot car world here at Woodrum Ridge Raceway…I designed and installed a timer/counter sensor and put in Slot Race Manager. That seemed harmless enough. I just wanted to see how fast my cars really were. With the timer system and the lap counter I would surely end arguments between me and/or the girls about who was in the lead etc, etc. But those little light sensors did WAY more than that. I started noticing, specifically on the banked oval, how fast the cars were going, and how little effort it took to drive them. The banked oval is just a tad bit under 41 foot per lap and I was turning that in under 2 seconds with what amounted to a stock car with slip-on silicone tires. Modified and unlimited class chassis were screaming around in the sub-1.5 second range, again with little driving effort. Hmmmm….how boring will this get and how fast will I hit that boredom wall? I mean, I had the road-course to keep my driving skills sharp, right?
In late April of 2012, my wife and CFO of Woodrum Ridge Raceway, was restricted to bed-rest with a 1.4cm kidney stone and the recovery time from having an ultrasonic procedure to crush it along with enough time to pass it. I stayed at home for that period, working from home and using some of my sick days to be on hand for whatever she needed (there was one ER run at one point). She has recovered perfectly well and is back to her wonderful self. But while I was taking care of her, I had time to analyze the WRR track situation.
Another irritation I had with the high banked oval was none of my older or more specifically, non magnet/slower style cars, could negotiate the banking of the turns or the short chutes in between. And all of the cars had issue with the sharp transition between the flat front and back straights going in and out of the banking. If your right pick up shoe began to wear down, you would lose electrical contact in these twisted transitions. So between these minor headaches and my desire to watch a T-jet fly down an 16 foot straight, along with making the oval a bit more challenging, I set about the task of designing a much lower banking angle that would make me “drive” the track and accommodate the older, slower cars.
To keep it fast, I decided to use the widest radius turns available to Tomy AFX track, the 18 inch radius turns with 15 inch radius turns nested for the inside lanes (WRR is a four lane track). For this project I will remove the standard Tomy AFX banked 9 inch and 12 inch turns (banking was around 40 degrees) and will replace them with 18 inch and 15 inch flat turns which will be reshaped to 14 degree banking. I will still have to “drive” it around the turns, but with just enough of a shallow dish effect to not have to scrub off all of the speed. And the banking will be shallow enough for older cars to negotiate without sliding down the banking before the forward momentum can carry them across the distance of the turn. I will document the process as I make these changes and create the custom banked curve sections.
This is the old banking configuration. The angle is about 40 degrees using the Tomy AFX 12” and 9” banked turns.
This shows the angle of the banking a bit better.
The old retaining walls were made out of 1/8 inch flooring and are screwed into the banking supports. They have a 3/4” inch gap to the outside edge of the track surface.
Here’s a good shot of the old foundation structure holding the banked track in place. The support braces were cut from 2 x 6 lumber. They sit a little over 4 inches high.
Here’s another shot of the braces from a different angle.
This shot shows the severity of the transition between the banking and the flat front straight. Once the pick up shoes on a car start to wear (usually the right one first) they will begin to lose electrical contact with the track in that transition. Where the support bracket is marked “2” is the area this loss of contact occurs.
Here’s the same transition from a different angle. You can see how steep the track gets. Even stretching the transition over 45 inches doesn’t reduce the twist enough.
The new supports look like the one in the foreground. The angle is reduced to about 14 degrees and the track is lifted at the highest point of only 1-1/4 inches. This along with the wider radius turns will be quite a different driving experience.
Out with the old! Here are all the old banked sections being retired from WRR. Time to get the paving crews ready for the new sections of track.
Once I removed the old support brackets, it was time to sand any rough spots and vacuum up all the debris. It is always best to start with a clean surface before a major renovation.
I laid all the new sections out on the floor to get a feel for the how the radius change would look. This also gave me a chance to place the new banking supports in position and get a better idea of how much alteration the flat track will go through when reshaped into a banked configuration. This new design will shorten the front and back stretch by 6 inches and reduce the short chutes by 12 inches. This is due to the wider radius turn being placed in the same physical location where the smaller turns were originally located.
Once I place the new track on the table and connected it to the original sections that remained in place, I started positioning the banking supports. I am adding several more supports to this design because it will not only support the track, but it will also be used to force the shape of the banking of the flat curved sections. Supports are positioned at the entry and exit of each track joint and in the center of the turns where the most stress will be focused in forming the banking of the track itself. Red Oak was used for the supports that will be absorbing the most stress, forming the banking. Poplar was used for the straight sections.
Once all of the supports are in a general location, I will go over each area to fine tune the position of each support and make certain there are no spots missed.
You should have something like this once you have all of your supports generally in place.
I plan on creating a 1” apron on the outside and inside of each turn and short chute. I will now adjust the bank supports to be 1” from the outside edge of the track. Do this for each support.
Once each of the supports are placed with the 1” gap for the apron,
mark the location of each support, completely around the bottom of the support. This will help relocate the support back to its exact location and help identify the locations to drill the holes to secure the supports to the table.
Once I outlined all of the supports, I removed the track and numbered the supports and the location outlines to match.
Make sure to mark the supports as well. Each one can be slightly different
and you don’t want to readjust things if a support is swapped.
Now I am drilling the holes that will allow me to screw the supports in place and keep them secured to the table surface.
I secure the support with 2 screws to prevent the support from pivoting. I used the support in this picture to determine where to drill the 2nd hole. Placing the 2nd securing point too far down the support would place the stress on a thinner section of the support.
After drilling all the holes, sand the surface smooth so the banking supports sit flat on the table’s surface. A good vacuuming will clean up the remaining debris before you start permanently fixing the banking supports to the table surface.
Now I placed the supports on their sides, aligning them with their position marks on the table. Using a 90 degree straight edge, the bottom of the support is marked in line with the holes drilled in the table surface.
Pre-drill these holes so the screw does not split the support bracket.
We’ve stopped here on July 26, 2012. More to come soon.