Who has the longest track?

General track discussions.
Humvderby
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Re: Who has the longest track?

Post by Humvderby »

Now that is one very nice track!! Mike can you tell us a few of the diferences if any that you do to build a car for this track?
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Mike Parrish
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Re: Who has the longest track?

Post by Mike Parrish »

Humvderby wrote:...Mike can you tell us a few of the diferences if any that you do to build a car for this track?
Well tuned, good wheels, COG was approx. 1-3/4", and most were running liquid lube.
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Re: Who has the longest track?

Post by Rainman »

The "mental picture" I had in my head was something like M Parrish's post on the 110 ft track. We have access to several school gym's for an event. I was thinking of having the starting gate at the stage, and the boys would actually go up on the stage to put their cars on the starting gate.

I'm kind of torn, I can see Stans point about having such a different track at a district race. The set up would be different, if the boys raced at the Council level on a shorter tract.

BTW, I'm thinking Aluminum as the preferred material. There are 5 or maybe six aluminum two lane tracks in the county I live in. Each Pack has one. I was "pondering" the possiblity to see how the tracks joint. Maybe we can take several tracks and make one.

Our district is large and we find several Packs do not want to travel 70 miles one way to race. We were thinking about having a Multi-pack sponsered "non official event".

We are in the early planning stages, but several of the more serious Sons and Dads really like the idea of a LONG track.


I appreciate all of the input from the Pinewood Veterans.



BTW: Its our second year and 2nd First Place trophy. The first year was a "Fluke". This second year can be attributed to the tips from this site. It really is a great site!


Thanks to all


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Re: Who has the longest track?

Post by Hot Rod 1 »

Our pack just completed building a new alum. 4 lane 50 ft track from Beta Crafts. We built the frame workout of wood. The starting ramp is only 48 inches high with 12foot of slope the rest straight aways.Really different than running on old 32ft wooden track. Thinking about adding the 7 th section. :D
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BigDozer66
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Re: Who has the longest track?

Post by BigDozer66 »

That hundred and ten footer is awesome! 8)

We had a 32' wooden track at our Pack race and we had the privilege of racing on a 48' Piantedosi Freedom! :dance: :clap:

If we had a drooling icon I would have used it! 8)

There was definitely a difference in the speed of my son's car on the wood and on the aluminum. :mrgreen:

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Re: Who has the longest track?

Post by Mr. Slick »

If you build it, they will come.

I run a 8 section, 62 ft, 6 lane Beta Craft track, with a 4 ft stop area. :-)

The track has evolved from a 2 lane 4 section replacement for a 26 year old wood track 12 years ago.

It uses the Challenger design. We found that 4 sections was too short - not enough differentiation at the finish line. We went to 5 and had much better results.

The race day includes a "practice run" for every car and I explain to the audiences that this is to "train" the volunteers running the track and to see if anyone forgot to get graphite on thier cars. It is actually the result of having a couple of cars not make it to the end. I have found that there are 3 main causes for not reaching the end. 1-no graphite or white stickem from BSA store, 2-wheels glued to axles so the axles stay in the wood, 3-no added weights, just a carved wood body.

I would say that 80% of the DNF's are type 1. We blow out the white teflon with stick and give it some nice Hob-E-Lube or Tube-O-Lube and the cars fly to the finish and the kids, and thier parents, learn that it doesn't take much to change a car's performance.

The type 2 failures are either treated to a new set of wheel/axles and graphite or given a new set of holes with the Pro-Body tool and the axle/wheels are moved from the glue area.

The type 3 cars are given some weight on the bottom attached with duct tape. Running the Beta Craft track there is usually enough clearance to make it go. Type 3's also need graphite 99% of the time. :-)

After the cars are helped along they are "practiced" again until they are making a good show. I have yet to get a complaint from any racer or parent about helping these cars out. This year we raced just over 1,000 cars on the track!

The other thing that was changed was that in order to further guarantee a car makes it to the finish, I "improved the sight lines for the audience" by raising the track off the floor. 8) This allowed for the finish to be about 10" off the floor. . . I did add a 2" per section(93") slope to the entire track while I was at it.

Now a days about the only cars that have a problem making a good race are some of the cars that are covered with fur, the bunnies and cats are usually the slow ones. The demo cat at the workshop has the fur trimmed around the wheels but not everyone does that before the race so make sure you have a small trimmer to groom the fur if needed/allowed by the builder. :)

As to the number of lanes, since we do the electronic timed racing, the amount of time for a race didn't change very much when we went from 4 lanes to 6 lanes.

BTW, I have finished the first 5 sections of the new track. . . I will eventually be able to put the flat sections from the two tracks together so I will be able to have a 15 section, 116 foot, monster track for special events. . . . MN Fall Classic in the Twin Cities the end of October. . .

As to the idea of keeping the tracks the same for pack races and district races I agree, every pack should be able to have a race on a beautiful 6 lane aluminum track! I run derbies for packs, and other groups, on a free will donation basis with the proceeds going back into the track. Hope to add some staging lights for next year!
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Re: Who has the longest track?

Post by gpraceman »

I spoke to a guy today from Wisconsin that said he has a 200 ft track. :shock: I encouraged him to post some pics here. I know that I'd love to see it.
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Darin McGrew
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Re: Who has the longest track?

Post by Darin McGrew »

gpraceman wrote:I spoke to a guy today from Wisconsin that said he has a 200 ft track.
Wow... How high is the starting gate, so the cars make it to the finish line?
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Stan Pope
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Re: Who has the longest track?

Post by Stan Pope »

Darin McGrew wrote:
gpraceman wrote:I spoke to a guy today from Wisconsin that said he has a 200 ft track.
Wow... How high is the starting gate, so the cars make it to the finish line?
And how do the youngsters get up there to stage their cars? :)
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Re: Who has the longest track?

Post by gpraceman »

Sorry guys, I have no additional details. Hopefully, he will jump in here and post pics and details.
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Go Bubba Go
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Re: Who has the longest track?

Post by Go Bubba Go »

Stan Pope wrote:
Darin McGrew wrote:Wow... How high is the starting gate, so the cars make it to the finish line?
And how do the youngsters get up there to stage their cars? :)
Bet they run their little sneakers off trying to beat their cars down to the finish line. :wink:

Definitely sounds like a set up where you would want to ensure the same car isn't racing in 2 (or more) consecutive heats.
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Re: Who has the longest track?

Post by Mr. Slick »

WOW! 200 ft! :shock:

Where could you set it up? It wouldn't fit in any of the Elem/Middle school gyms around here. It would have been a tight fit at the Lima, Oh race in the building at the fairgrounds. . . .but I would love to go visit it and race! :D
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Re: Who has the longest track?

Post by kb9vzd »

It's Offical Indiana State Museum has it.

http://www.in.gov/ism/PublicPrograms/Sp ... derby.aspx

WOW...was it fun to run on!

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Re: Who has the longest track?

Post by gpraceman »

That would be cool to run on. Less than 4.6 seconds to run 125 ft, that's cooking!! Though, I'd hate to see someone jump off the track on the curve :shock: :lol:

Though, there is still the person from Wisconsin that was working on a 200 ft track. Can't wait to see that track.

I wonder what they did with the track after the event. They could make up quite a few tracks for local packs with that sucker.
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Re: Who has the longest track?

Post by tmbnorm »

Here are more pics of the big track in Indiana.
It looks neat, but I am not sure how true of a test it really is.

This page says a top speed of 22 mph.

http://www.brubakerfamily.net/acd
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