[BAracer]

A must watch video that put a smile on my face!

[MrFlippant]

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[MrFlippant]

[BAracer]

Such a tease!

[BAracer]

#51

"Why is it all so complicated?"


Our Alan makes it look easy. He showed us "the one he had made earlier" in his live hydro-dipping tutorial last week. He was happy with how the ink had applied itself to the body detailing, and no-one could disagree.

John Kitt also made the production of a Porsche white kit look easy. But the detailing of the little things that make things that take something from being good to being REALLY good, like the door handles and gear levers, left all the Chatters in stunned silence...which was only broken when he mentioned the price, and the orders started piling in like a good old fashioned stocks and shares trading floor.

And then things became hard.

Gio showed off all the work has has done over the past few weeks to a TA71 Bentley Continental GT3 body. The trouble is, that was just to get it smooth! And he wasn't quite there yet...and all the time in the back of his head was the weight of it, and how much work he would have to do to get it down to something acceptable in a competitive environment. But at least he was able to show us lots (and lots) of handy tips on body preparation techniques. 

Wayne showed of his free gift from Dennis off all the tyre off cuts from out of his rubbish bin. Both were happy with the deal. How difficult is it to put a tyre on a hub? Very if it is an air hub. Someone had done it and was getting tyre wear where they shouldn't. Nobody could explain exactly why, it could be for any one of a dozen reasons!

How easy is it to create body float? Very. How easy is it to create just the right amount of body float? Not very. Surely you just undo the body screws a little to create the body float? No no noooo...what you are doing there is creating chassis float! With the body acting as a mass damper (especially if it is Gio's Bentley), its the chassis that is floating all over the place. Or as ChrisW explained, imagine going round a sharp corner a heavy bag of shopping in the boot, or as Wayne explained, imagine being in a tall building in a typhoon, or as Alan explained, imagine you are sitting in a train going round a corner...first it's your feet that swing round, then your knees, than your shopping bag falls off the rack. Dennis had the solution, a guide with a bit of play; so the guide goes round the corner, but the rest of the car keeps straight on. Sorted.

How hard is it to find a car with a flat chassis? Very. Boiling water, lots of magnets, and Greg strongly recommends use of a circular saw blade. Put them all in the oven overnight at 50, 80, 100, 200, 240 or 250 degrees centigrade or fahrenheit. Remove and place of wet kitchen worktop. If you can lift it off, then it's not flat. If it's not flat, repeat. If it happens again, dump it in ChrisW's shopping bag with all of his warped Thunderslot chassis. If all else fails, screw chassis tightly to body to eliminate all deflections (and body float).

So once you finally achieve nirvana with a flat chassis, how hard is it to keep it on the track? Very if you are a "SCM". But the consensus was that if you lose it on a banked corner, aim for the ceiling tiles rather than the wall. How hard can that be?

[MrFlippant]

(Deleted old links to avoid accidental clicking.)

[MrFlippant]

[BAracer]

#52

"So what did you learn at slot school today?"


Q1: Is running after your postman to collect a slot car package obsessive behaviour? Not when you have been sent a race prepared chassis from someone who prepares very nice race chassis. Martyn Showed and Told us about it, and Chris gave him, and all of us, some tips on front axle grub screw set up.

Q2: Is spending twice the cost of a normal race slot car on a 3DP one obsessive behavior? NIck says "no" when it's a Corvette from TA71 and it ticks all the right boxes in terms of weight, fit and rarity. Gio described a different experience with his TA71 Bentley last week, but ultimately, he was also happy to have a rarity that was not available from anyone else. 

Q3: How good are we at judging our own car building abilities? "Not very" seemed to be the answer when Anthony showed us a little something he had put together form all his spare bits. Everyone else thought it was stunning, but there seemed to be a consensus that we all probably see the bad points or little failings in our own work, whilst everyone else sees the good bits!

Q4: How old is Greg? "Not very" seemed to be the general response when he let it slip out.

Q5: How much time did Mark spend on his homework for this week's assignment? "Lots" was the answer as he gave us a presentation on his slot car history through the medium of a slide show. Although he was marked down for admitting he had only watched up to Chat #32 of Greg's "Slot Car School".

Q6: How annoying is it when you spend loads of time scratch building and decorating a body shell that can't be bought off the shelf, and then a major manufacturer bring out the exact same decorated car and fill the shelves with them? "Very" is the answer if you are Nick, as he mumbled something about Scalextric not getting the colour right, before bursting into tears.

Q7: What is the most important part of a soldering iron? Dennis knew the answer of course, and he told us all what it is and why. And you could hear the collective sound of everyone on the chat typing it into their keyboards and pressing the 'Buy' button. 

Q8: With group slot racing possibly happening again in the UK soon, what is the best way to clean a year's deposit of oxidation off your track? This is one of those questions where there are lots of right answers, and one wrong one. So right answers included Pepper Pig and some sort of unobtainium plastic matrix; the wrong answer was sandpaper.

Q9: What are the main priorities for tuning cars when you are limited by time or budget? Everyone had their hand up to answer this last question. So "maximise grip" was one specific answer, whereas "follow engineering principles" covered a wide range of answers. 

And then it got silly...very silly. Lots of jokes about "your mother-in-laws attic". Greg did an impersonation of Dick van Dyke. Someone suggested you could use bits of model trains to tune your car. And a detailed argument that green cars can be faster than blue cars. And what more appropriate way to finish the Chat than with the immortal line... 

"I need to go now; I can smell my deodorant being sprayed around by my 7 year old"

[Cgyracer]

I love the summary's.   I'm at work during the day so the summary's are great.

Rob

[MrFlippant]

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