Confirmation of Rail Riding setup

Secrets, tips, tools, design considerations, materials, the "science" behind it all, and other topics related to building the cars and semi-trucks.
soccerdad
Journeyman
Journeyman
Posts: 26
Joined: Sat Mar 06, 2010 4:11 pm
Location: Thomasville, NC

Confirmation of Rail Riding setup

Post by soccerdad »

I know there are volumes here on this, but I have read several conflicting things. So I would appreciate it if you would offer your thoughts on our planned setup.
Basics: Stock wheelbase, lead powered car. CG ~5/8" in front of rear axle. (discussion and prototype photo on this thread http://www.derbytalk.com/viewtopic.php?f=11&t=8230 ) Stock weight wheels, prepped with LG and graphite.
Track is a 43' BestTrack in decent shape but with some small flaws were someone filed down the areas where the track sections come together to "make it smoother" :eek: Our rail riders go down it without issue, but I typically have had a bunch of drift dialed in.

So our plans:
2.5 degree negative camber on the rear wheels using bent nails
5 degrees positive camber on the DFW using bent nail.
Wheel off the track slightly toed out.
I have never used more than about 2 degrees on the DFW but read that 5 or more was better. And I trust everything I read on the internet... :sick:

So does that sound about right?

Also, we have a 20ish foot wood track that I made several years ago. I have used it a ton for testing and dialing in cars in the past. But I was never able to just set 1" drift over 6 feet. But this year we plan on just aligning it without the front wheels on a test board, Putting on the front wheels and setting the drift at 1-2" over 6', then doing some slower coasting trials down the bottom sections of our track to fine tune it to run as free as possible. Does this sound like a good approach?

As always, thanks!
User avatar
Vitamin K
Pine Head Legend
Pine Head Legend
Posts: 1243
Joined: Sat Apr 20, 2013 7:26 pm
Location: Spotsylvania, VA

Re: Confirmation of Rail Riding setup

Post by Vitamin K »

I like a lot of positive camber on our DFW. We go in the neighborhood of 7 degrees, so I think you're good with 5.

With bent-axle rears, having them in good alignment is critical. Consider building Lightninboy's speed square tester, or using Stan Pope's bias weight method, or both.

Your drift numbers sound rather low to me. I would suggest starting with something like 3-4" over 4 feet. Personal opinion, there.
Last edited by Vitamin K on Wed Mar 16, 2016 6:46 am, edited 1 time in total.
chromegsx
Master Pine Head
Master Pine Head
Posts: 166
Joined: Wed Jan 18, 2012 9:25 pm
Location: PA

Re: Confirmation of Rail Riding setup

Post by chromegsx »

If possible try to avoid bending axles. drill at your desired angle. Not always practical given one's tool availability or creativity and determination in setting up tools...but straight axles are faster than bent ones. And if you do mess up on the drill job you can always still bend the axles but bend them less. Ideally you'd start over and get the holes drilled as near perfect as you can.

Agree with Vitamin...you will want more drift than that I use 8-10" at 7 feet. Which is close to Vitamin's numbers at 4'. So ball park guess at 6' would be 7-8". Stan built a calculator to figure it out a bit better than ball park. Ultimately it depends on a lot of factors but 3-4" in 4' is the normal starting point.
Speedster
Pine Head Legend
Pine Head Legend
Posts: 1972
Joined: Sat Feb 18, 2012 1:48 pm
Location: Toledo, Ohio

Re: Confirmation of Rail Riding setup

Post by Speedster »

Drift numbers always fascinate me. I start with 2" in 4' on the test board. We then take the car to our Best track and tune it to its fastest time. We then take it back to the test board and this year it drifted 2" in 33". The drift has always been less then 2" in 4'. Because of how we have mounted our timer, the car travels 31' from Pin to Timer. We are told cars travel 35' on the Freedom track at our District races. The car set a new track record this year and took 1st place. We had a second (identical) car we built with a scout, same rank, different Pack, same District, that was .01 second slower that came in 2nd place. It too ended up with a drift less then 2" in 4'. We cannot set cant over 3 degrees because of our rule "wheels must be straight up and down" because the cant becomes too obvious. Perhaps the less drift allows too much slop in the bore - or something else. I think Vitamin K might be correct on the drift.
soccerdad
Journeyman
Journeyman
Posts: 26
Joined: Sat Mar 06, 2010 4:11 pm
Location: Thomasville, NC

Re: Confirmation of Rail Riding setup

Post by soccerdad »

Thanks, Great information. Glad to know about the drift. I am now not sure on the bent nails... I already drilled the holes straight and cut the cars. But I may be able to fill and redrill without too much pain. Question- if you use straight axles on the DFW, then how to you adjust the drift?
Speedster
Pine Head Legend
Pine Head Legend
Posts: 1972
Joined: Sat Feb 18, 2012 1:48 pm
Location: Toledo, Ohio

Re: Confirmation of Rail Riding setup

Post by Speedster »

You must bend the axle on the DFW. Some drill an angled hole on the DFW but they still must bend the axle to some degree.

If you have drilled straight holes on the rear and have good, straight axles, you might want to install them and see what the rear wheels do. Bending rear axles might hurt you more than they're going to help.
Last edited by Speedster on Wed Mar 16, 2016 8:06 am, edited 1 time in total.
chromegsx
Master Pine Head
Master Pine Head
Posts: 166
Joined: Wed Jan 18, 2012 9:25 pm
Location: PA

Re: Confirmation of Rail Riding setup

Post by chromegsx »

only straight on the on the rear axles. DFW is bent. I actually drill DFW a little canted too and bend the axle. Makes adjusting the drift a little less sensitive.

I didn't realize you were that far into the build. as long as the rear wheels migrate out to nail head rolling forward and backward, you'll be fine, but I fought with bent axles for a long time when I was first learning and could never get them right. Took me a while to understand the geometry and physics of everything, then straight just seemed to make sense to me and it just seemed to click and be easier for me to get the car setup right.
User avatar
davet
Master Pine Head
Master Pine Head
Posts: 539
Joined: Wed Jan 16, 2013 1:33 am
Location: MN

Re: Confirmation of Rail Riding setup

Post by davet »

soccerdad wrote:Thanks, Great information. Glad to know about the drift. I am now not sure on the bent nails... I already drilled the holes straight and cut the cars. But I may be able to fill and redrill without too much pain. Question- if you use straight axles on the DFW, then how to you adjust the drift?
Do not be afraid of bent axles as long as you use the Lightninboy rear alignment process linked earlier in this thread. It is fast, easy and foolproof. If you mark with Sharpie at 12:00 and bend towards the mark, install axles with the mark in the 12:00 position. Minor adjustments from there one side at a time and the rears will be aligned in less than 5 minutes.

It is so easy and accurate that you can adjust so that both wheels migrate to the head forward and backwards at the same rate, perfect alignment.

Once it's aligned make a new 12:00 mark as it sits in the car with a etching tool. Then whenever you take the axles out just keep them marked for LR or RR and you'll always be able to reinstall exactly as they came out without having to realign each time.

You don't even need a speed square. We made a tool by gluing 3 paint stir sticks (free Home Depot) together side by side. Then at a 90 degree angle we glued a single stick flat on the top so it sticks out to one side about 6". We slide the 3 sticks along a edge table with the one at the 90 degrees used to rest the car on. We used to use a tack with double stick wrapped thick enough to get the front same height as with the DFW installed. We have also just rolled up duct tape until it was thickness we needed to get the correct height.
soccerdad
Journeyman
Journeyman
Posts: 26
Joined: Sat Mar 06, 2010 4:11 pm
Location: Thomasville, NC

Re: Confirmation of Rail Riding setup

Post by soccerdad »

Thanks Guys!
We are doing one car with bent axles since I am used to doing it that way. And one with straight. So today we will set up our test track and see what we got. Should be fun. We already did the initial drift testing. Seems like we need to have a fair amount of toe in on the DFW to get a 3" drift. I used a 1.5 degree bent nail and the bend is set almost full forward to get the drift. The pictures of the Lightninboy alignment process for the rears are not up anymore. But I did some front wheel off tests with it on a small center runner and it goes pretty straight with the axles migrating out in both directions. Since these are only 5/8" CG cars, maybe the rear is just really dominating the setup for my drift trials. We will test some more and have lots of tuning stuff ready for tech day this Tuesday when we get to hit the real track.
soccerdad
Journeyman
Journeyman
Posts: 26
Joined: Sat Mar 06, 2010 4:11 pm
Location: Thomasville, NC

Re: Confirmation of Rail Riding setup

Post by soccerdad »

As an update- We tested on my track and both are fast without any adjustments. And they seem to coast pretty freely . Close to the fastest times run on this track and both seem stable. They are a faster than last year's car today. So I glued the axles, and am adding the bottom skins. This will increase the weight a touch and will bring us up to 5 oz. So we must be close. We will finish the graphics work and do one more speed run. Then they will go into the boxes. Fingers crossed. ;) I'll post some pictures of the cars when they are complete. THANKS AGAIN!
soccerdad
Journeyman
Journeyman
Posts: 26
Joined: Sat Mar 06, 2010 4:11 pm
Location: Thomasville, NC

Re: Confirmation of Rail Riding setup

Post by soccerdad »

So the derby was tonight. AND WE WON! We had 44 cars there. We had about 1/2 of the top 10 fast times. We ended up running the car with the bent axles. It was slower than the straight axle car by a touch during testing. But we re-aligned the rear a tiny bit and it came alive. Both cars trouble with chattering back and forth a little until I got this one dialed in. I think the 5/8 CG was a little aggressive for our skills. But in the end, we got the job done!

So thanks to all that helped. I learned a bunch. Unfortunatly, this is our last race ever. So it is nice to finish on a high. But still a little sad. I have been an advocate for our program for so long they actually named the spirit trophy after me. A humbling honor. So thanks again. Here are some pix and proof that lead powered cars can still be competitive!

Image

Image

Image
User avatar
davet
Master Pine Head
Master Pine Head
Posts: 539
Joined: Wed Jan 16, 2013 1:33 am
Location: MN

Re: Confirmation of Rail Riding setup

Post by davet »

Awesome job! I love to see the old school cars (lead weight, bent axles) whoop em'. A car doesn't know if it's running bent axles or not if the alignment is correct. Sounds like you had quite an impact on the Pack and their derby.
User avatar
Stan Pope
Pine Head Legend
Pine Head Legend
Posts: 6856
Joined: Sat Jul 05, 2003 7:01 pm
Location: Morton, Illinois
Contact:

Re: Confirmation of Rail Riding setup

Post by Stan Pope »

Way to go?!!!
Stan
"If it's not for the boys, it's for the birds!"
User avatar
Vitamin K
Pine Head Legend
Pine Head Legend
Posts: 1243
Joined: Sat Apr 20, 2013 7:26 pm
Location: Spotsylvania, VA

Re: Confirmation of Rail Riding setup

Post by Vitamin K »

Congrats to team Soccerdad!

Any observations/ideas in regards to the tuning of bent rear axles?
soccerdad
Journeyman
Journeyman
Posts: 26
Joined: Sat Mar 06, 2010 4:11 pm
Location: Thomasville, NC

Re: Confirmation of Rail Riding setup

Post by soccerdad »

Vitamin K wrote: Any observations/ideas in regards to the tuning of bent rear axles?
Thanks! I could not do the above listed alignment techniques because the photos are not there anymore and I didn't understand the working. So I just used a board without my front wheels on and put a small skid under the center of the car to bring it up to normal height. I then just adjusted them to have the car go straight, while having it as free as possible. I figure the faster it rolls straight, the toe of the rears must be as neutral as possible. Once that was done I put the fronts back on. But with the 5/8 CG, I had to crank in a lot of toe in on the FDW to get a 3-4" drift on a 4' table. With that setup, it was pretty fast on the real track. But once we found that the other car we had was a little faster, I started adjusting this one again. We still had a little wiggle in the car going down the track. So we rolled one rear axle back a little and it did not help much. So we rolled it forward a tiny amount and it got better. Then we turned the other one a tiny bit in the opposite direction and it got even faster. We then adjusted them again a little more and it slowed back down. So we reset to the fast position and left it. This was the fastest car we have ever put on the track. I think the LG prepped wheels helped, but the CG and alignment were keys as well.

BTW, you cant tell from the pix but the bottom of the car is also skinned with the super thin plywood.

Other notes on the race. This year we had way more fast cars than ever. The internet and forums like this are giving everyone more information and you can really tell. Also we are seeing more factory built chassis and parts, which is a little disappointing. But our turnout improved so good and bad.

Finally, the fastest car of the night, (not in our class) was just a basic wedge (pretty thick) with cheese holes cut in it. So aero it was not. But it just smoked down the track. Just a dad and his son throwing together a car that hit the perfect happy spot. I am sure they did their homework, but they did not get hung up on being trick. Not sure what other prep they did but it was great seeing that car beat all the kit cars.
Post Reply