Derby Talk

Noskills wrote:I like the blue lightning bolt car. Can you get a piece of clear plastic to cover the cut out like a veneer? I also wonder in led lights that shine straight up would be seen better in daylight (I assume you cant turn off the lights during your derby)
Noskills

Exactly why we mounted them to face out the sides. As it goes down the track the lights will be visible day or night. I was also a little concerned about timer issues with the lights shining onto the track or ahead of the car. Many said no problem but I didn't want to risk it.

That's pretty amazing that it (the lighting components) only weighs .07 oz. Will the top laminate lightning bolt shown in your bottom pic. be illuminated? I had always thought that adding lights meant you had to remove yourself from the competition, speed-wise, but you're changing my mind on that.

Scrollsawer

The lights won't shine onto the center of the body. A little of the light from the backside of the fenders will show up on the body in the dark. We tried many ways of illuminating the actual lightning bolt from the bottom but it didn't look like what we wanted. We even used a knife to scratch the bottom of the photopaper along the entire lightning bolts and all fingers of it. This made the paper thin and the light shined through but not enough to make it noticeable in the daylight. In the dark it looked cool.

I really think tiny arduino technology will continue to offer up cool lighting options over time. I am very much interested in buying this wearable tech kit to see if it can be leveraged into a pinewood car design.

https://www.adafruit.com/products/1285

Scrollsawer

That looks pretty cool. Our weight savings came from not using the included switch board and by using a 2012 battery instead of the included 2032. We hooked up our 4 lights to the 2012 battery and it ran for 18 hrs. We just unhooked it because we knew that was plenty long since we could change the battery if we make it to Districts anyways.

looking good davet!

One of these day's i'v got to use lights on a derby project.

Tried to once using the workings out of card that played music and had lights in it as well.
Had it all working in one of fender guitar cars the stings would light up in different patters like it was playing music.
It looked cool with the lights off to see the stings light up however It did not play the music or light the string long enough.

1st in Pack with All-Time track record. Voted "Best Detail" also. It looked awesome going down the track. We are tossing around the idea of grinding off the front fenders for Districts to get more weight to the back. We can't get lower than .68" COM

I wouldn't ruin the looks of that car for ANY size trophy. That car is GORGEOUS !!!!! Your team does BEAUTIFUL work !!!!!!

Thanks. Been a fun run these last yrs building these things