Derby Talk

Pre-cuts - These TWO out of ten rules help the most: "1. You must use official BSA Pinewood Derby bodies, wheels and axles. Use of pre-cut bodies is prohibited. BSA Grand Prix Pinewood Derby wheels and axles that have been altered and re-sold by third parties are prohibited. 10. The winning ra...

The old standards of "out of the box or out of the race" really has reached the limits of what is reasonable as well ad enforcable.... How do you know its out of the box? Do you make them show you the box? Any rule which has zero reliability for enforcement does little or nothing to promot...

You can do several things to offset.... If you cover recharter each year....consider having parents pay this year... Explaining that the additional funds earned through popcorn soul be used for track upgrades... Sell food at the event... Hotdigs, chips, drinks.... /// buy blocks and wheels in bulk @...

I use a Dremel more than any other single tool in my workshop - you can sand, shape, smooth, drill, cut..... I use it with the Wheel tool that holds your wheel for polishing, and I chuck my axles in it to file and polish them as well... They sell a workbench holder as well that helps to keep it in p...

Here are some photos from our Pack Derby Setup -- I decided to angle the track rather than go straight down the long axis of the room, and it simplified things greatly... especially when it came to giving the kids the ability to see the cars in the "impound" area more easily, as well as lo...

I call this type of research R&D ( Rob and Duplicate )

to clarify :) we have a 6 lane track, and the year I scheduled two per lane, or 12 total per kid.. the parents nearly revolted for the length of the event... my thought was a compromise... once down 6 lanes is 6 races / 6 to 36 points possible at end of round / X number of potential point ties at th...

This is the scale we use for all events at PACK,DISTRICt,and COUNCIL Level events, and it reads out to 5.00 ounces.... critical if your event also reads out that far - $20 bucks http://www.harborfreight.com/digital-scale-95364.html Description of Cen-Tech 95364 Precision digital scale has an LCD dis...

you rock! I am very impressed when I learn something new, and I did not know there was a way to d/l youtube videos... that is absolutely going to resolve a major setback for this, and I thank you for your wisdom!

Nicholas

I guess it brings the question to Randy...are there major difference in using a Master Schedule and each rank is a Group vs using one group and schedule there, but use sub-groups to help with reporting/standingse/etc? thats interesting.. I never thought about that aspect... how does the software de...

My experience has been to ignore "subgroups" and use groups for the ranks... also create an open class group and a sibling group. Subgroups, in my experience, has only really been for identifying specific groups of people within that group for data and reporting. Using Groups ( which I ren...

well... mostly free.. you do need to have access to the internet. If you are doing your event in a location that has WIFI or internet access, ask for access to that connection... wireless aircards work in a pinch ,but sometimes the buildings themselves can cause interference... although your interne...

I have never really had any negative feedback regarding adults staging cars / kids watching races... simply because the kids are riding the railing and seeing their names and pictures up on the big screen, screaming for their cars to win, and seeing the finish line up close. I think that if you keep...

I find the Laser start system to simply be a way to sell something that dads think is really cool. It really does very little to HELP the accuracy of the timer system, and often does alot to HURT the accuracy of the timer system. The ET of a heat should start when the gate is triggered, and laser ga...

we are working through coming up with ways to increase the number of races for each racer... my original thought was to mask the outside lanes, use the inside 4 lanes, and run twice per lane, for 8 runs each. Some leaders have it in their mind that two runs per lane is twice as long as one run, even...