Avant Slot have just announced a new car. Okay, maybe not a totally new car - they have revived the moulds for the Spirit Group A BMW 635CSi and will soon be producing these three liveries...

   
51701: Macau Guia 1984 "Hans Stuck" No.1

   
51702: Rally Ciudad de Telde - Exclusivo Toñi Ponce

   
51703: Macau Guia 1984 "Dieter Quester" No.2

That's all the details at the moment - although we do have the Spirit cars as a reference, including a 2010 review at Home Racing World here: http://www.homeracingworld.com/S26.htm

The body was a very nice mould of one of the dominant Group A saloon cars of the 1980s - capturing the lines and details pretty well. It's certainly a big car - but also extremely sought after... expect to pay around £150 for a Spirit model  in new condition, if you can find one.

       

Underneath, the Spirit chassis was a decent racing set-up with a flat pan chassis, adjustable front axle height and a long-can motor. I suspect Avant Slot will produce their own podded chassis, but at least there will be no modifications necessary to the interior for the standard Avant Slot long-can motor.

There are a huge number of exceedingly nice touring car liveries Avant Slot can choose from - plus the option of road cars too. The two Marlboro-sponsored Schnitzer-run BMWs from the 1984 Macau Guia race are a good start - Stuck and Quester finished third and fourth to the TWR Jaguar XJ-S cars of Walkinshaw and Hans Heyer...



For rally fans, there will be relatively slim pickings - a 6-Series BMW was not an obvious choice for throwing around twisty tarmac, let alone gravel... However, one of the first three cars is a rally 635, seen in action here (second car) at the 2000 Rally Ciudad de Telde in the Canary Islands...



Antonio 'Toñi' Ponce retired the 635CSi in his only competitive appearance with the car. It certainly stood out from the crowd of hot hatchbacks! I suspect the same car was raced by Antonio's older brother José María in the Canary Islands Rally Championship between 1984 and '87, winning three rallies outright. Another 635CSi competed in the same championship during 1984 and '85, driven by Fernando Capdevila. José Juan Torres also drove a 635CSi in the Canaries from 2001 to 2010. Possibly the Ponces' car? Anyway, the rally BMW 635CSi seems almost unique to the Islas Canarias - but these do give Avant Slot options to please their loyal slot rally fans.

I will add more news about the Avant Slot BMW 635CSi  when I hear anything.

This is a project the team at Galileo Engineering have been working on for a while - the publication of a historical archive of every Slot.it car ever made...

   

You can find the archive here: http://slot.it/archive-2/

The index lists each theme - eg 'Classic', 'Group C' etc - and each product line by name and CA number.

However, it's not just a list, there's a gallery of fabulous photographs for almost every model. The various special editions haven't all been catalogued yet - they are gradually being added now.

It is a remarkable archive - and a reminder that Slot.it have always focussed on accurate scale models with authentic liveries and plenty of history. They're pretty fine slot cars too

I'm looking to build a car & use flanged ball races in a Slot.it pod using 3/32 axles (see below). The Slot.it ones are of course out of stock & so want to buy an alternative online. Can anyone tell me what external diameter I should be looking at or make a recommendation? I'm happy to pay more for better quality. Thanks!
   

   

I do enjoy creating realistic simulations for Scalextric digital racing. For my club, I've used RCS64 - and many of those formats transfer nicely to the Scalextric ARC app. However, a long-format GT or endurance race doesn't really work with the app - pit stops are way too frequent, ruining that endurance vibe that is a different challenge and great fun. During lockdown last year, I spent a few weeks properly exploring the Magic ARC app and creating a very satisfying GT format for ARC Pro.

The Magic ARC app was produced by Italian developer Cristiano Ruisi of Magic Studio as a more detailed alternative to the official app. Scalextric released the Bluetooth communication protocols for the ARC powerbases back in 2018 so that third-party developers could create their own apps. So far, Cristiano’s is the only one commercially available. You can find it in the Microsoft Store, GooglePlay, Apple App Store (if it’s not there, check back in a few days) and Amazon appstore. The webpage is here: magicstudio.eu/index.php/games/arcapp

The Magic app works in a similar way to the Scalextric app. It doesn’t have the visuals or the panache, but Cristiano has included many layers of user-definable settings that are lacking in the Scalextric version. It is aimed at the digital slot car enthusiast - borrowing a lot of features from RCS64 - and is surprisingly easy to use. A pdf User Manual is available from the website and is also bundled with the app. Of course there are glitches, but they don’t take much to work around – and Cristiano has worked hard to fix those bugs via a feedback forum here.

       

My starting point with any simulation is the real-life racing series itself. For this example I looked at the British GT Championship, but any GT series or stand-alone race would work. I watch the British GT races and looked back at some highlights and full race re-runs on YouTube to refresh my memory and to drill down into the minutiae of the format - this page on their website helped too: https://www.britishgt.com/about/british-gt

This is what I identified as the characteristic features I wanted to include in my Magic app format:

• Race length. As you can see from the 2022 calendar (above, right), there is a mix of distances. Two-hour races feature at three weekends, plus there’s a three-hour races at Donington and Silverstone. The other two weekends are double-headers, with a pair of one-hour races on the Sunday. A Scalextric GT championship should also feature this sort of variety – as the different race lengths require different skills and strategy. The longer endurance events score 50% more points for the championship standings than the one-hour sprint races.
  
• Classes of cars. The British GT Championship races include both GT3 and GT4 cars. This mix of classes is one of the things I like about the British GT Championship – great for spectators and for the drivers. In a Scalextric championship, we can tweak the build regulations – or use power settings in the app – to give the GT3 cars better performance. Or we can leave them the same. At the moment, there aren’t too many Scalextric GT4 cars to choose from.
  
• Driver grading. All racing drivers are categorised by the FIA, based on their experience and success. The top drivers in the world – such as those in Formula One – are Platinum; Gold and Silver make up most professional drivers; and Bronze are amateur drivers. The British GT Championship currently has Pro-Am, Silver-Am and Amateur teams in GT3. In GT4, all-Silver driver pairings are still permitted. In a Scalextric championship, pairing the best drivers with less experienced ones is the ideal way to create competitive racing – and replicate the Pro-Am crews that are the backbone of the British GT Championship.
  
• Drive time regulations. In most GT championships, the time each driver is in the car should be fairly equal to their team mate. In British GT one-hour races, there is a driver-change window between 22 minutes and 32 minutes for GT3 and 28-38 minutes for GT4. The difference is to avoid an overcrowded pit lane. For the longer races, it is specified that the starting driver must drive for at least 62 minutes – or 58 minutes in GT4. Although maintaining similar driving times, we can be flexible with our Scalextric championship – not everyone can race for half an hour – or an hour – especially when using the ARC controllers.
  
• Pitstops. All cars in the British GT Championship are restricted to a minimum pitstop time to change driver, refuel and change tyres. The times differ for each circuit, GT4 cars stop for longer and there’s extra for the all-Silver driver pairings. Each car must make at least one pitstop – and in the three-hour races, teams must complete at least three stops. One of the benefits of using the Magic app is that we can set nice long stints and set the pit stop duration to 10 seconds - which feels quite a long time.
  
• Success penalties. In the British GT Championship, time is added to the pitstops of the top three finishers from the previous round. In one-hour races, that’s 10, 7 and 5 seconds. For the longer races, it’s 20, 15 and 10. This isn’t the easiest thing to add to a Scalextric race, but there are ways to do it. One option is to start those three cars from the pitlane and delay them leaving – or to give them a Stop-Go penalty during the race. Success penalties add to the fun and the strategy of the championship.
  
• Balance of Performance. BoP attempts to keep all the different makes of car on a similar performance level – delivering exciting racing and encouraging manufacturers to enter their cars, knowing they are in an equal fight. GT series organisers spend a lot of time analysing data and adjusting BoP. The main techniques they use are weight, engine horsepower and aerodynamics. In a Scalextric GT series using the Magic ARC App, we could use the Max Power setting, although very small adjustments don’t make a whole lot of difference. It could also be a very time-consuming process to get right – and like in real GT racing, car owners and drivers will never be entirely happy!
  
• Control Tyre. Another way to standardise performance is to use a tyre from a single manufacturer. Pirelli currently supply tyres to the British GT Championship and have developed a range of tyres that give similar grip and performance for the various GT3 cars. In GT4 there is a standard wheel and tyre combination. This could be simulated in a Scalextric GT series if all cars use the same tyre – or compound. Mechanical grip from the tyres is super-important when running slot cars without magnets. The newer in-line GT cars can all be fitted with NSR or Slot.it tyres. One or other of the Slot.it P6 or NSR RTR tyres would be ideal. Unfortunately, the older ‘sidewinder’ cars have different-sized wheels, so that may be a case of changing the wheels to 17.3mm Slot.it plastic wheels, glued to the axle and fitted with suitable wheel inserts.
  

That's the research done - but before I get into the software set-up, I'll quickly go through the hardware needed and choose some cars...

Running 2-4 cars, including Pace on a 18.5m track with Pit and 2 Lane Changers.

What settings would you use on the Magic Arc App so you’re not pitting too often?

Also - with the Scalextric app cars auto go slow until your reach the pits. With Magic I cannot see that feature and if you don’t get to the pits in time the car just stops. What setting would help that?

All help and advice always appreciated.

Gday all, never came across this forum until a mate told me about it, so here I am

I recenty bought a very cool Butch Leal Camaro that had a blem. It looks like a hot iron got too close to the body when someone installed the glass.

   

I sent an email to AW about it. They requested a pic.

Within minutes of sending a pic, I get a reply with a shipping notice and a tracking number for a complete new replacement. Wow!

Auto World customer support is fantastic!

Cheers,
Ken

   

Hello all,
Is this any use to anyone?  Either just the snorkel part or both the snorkel and the base. I am thinking it would be suitable as a camera post for a racing circuit layout. The base unit has extending stabiliser legs.  A coat of  BBC green or such would conceal its origins.

Not looking for any payment other than reimbursement of actual shipping costs.  The snorkel is plastic and fairly light, the base unit has a die-cast metal top and legs and so will increase the shipping cost a bit.
Located in UK.

If interested, message me soon or it will be re-cycled at the end of the month.


Leo

How long after a car passes over the Arc Pro PB does the lap count increase and the sound FX is heard? 


Using Scalextric app or Magic my lag is about 1.5 seconds. Typical?