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I will be gone May 11 through the 23rd, and I would rather not have to miss two Thunderslot races (besides someone else having to be race manager). I see that the calendar has been changed. Does this mean that a decision has already been made? In this forum I only count two votes for the May 12th date. Would the May 5th date just mean that we would have to park in the other lot? Or is King’s going to fill up the rally track table? Could we schedule a race on the 26th before Rally practice instead of the May 12th or May 19th race?
thanks
Russell
Marty, sorry about the issue with the motor pod. I have a spare motor pod if you need it.
As far as the clearance issues, I am fine with racers putting whatever spacers they want on the front body posts, but, as I said it is unnecessary if you use the front outboard grub screws on the chassis. Screwing these inward raises the front of the body above the chassis by 2mm or more and you can adjust it as needed without having to fiddle with spacers.
And Mark, I am not sure what front wheels you are using, but the ones we spec’d were the 15 X 8 (Part #1508215A) wheels. I measure 13.6 mm at the wheel lip and 15.93 mm over the rib.
I did some testing today with three Thunderslot chassis in both the spyder and coupe bodies. All three chassis had trued original front tires on stock plastic wheels. One chassis had trued original treaded rears, the other two had trued Thunderslot slicks. One of the latter chassis had a small weight in the nose, the other two had no weight added. I made two runs of 10-15 laps with each chassis in the spyder, the coupe, and the coupe with the rear track widened about 2mm to fit the wider coupe body. I recorded fastest lap and median lap in each run.
The first chassis with the trued, treaded rear tires was not optimized and there was some tire chatter. This was the slowest chassis with the least amount of track time. The median times and best times between the spyder and the coupe were virtually identical. After widening the rear track, both the median and fastest time improved about .1 sec.
In chassis number two, the times were just about the same in all runs and variations. There were slight time variations between runs with the same setup, but all the differences were so small as to be considered testing error. There was little difference if the rear track was widened.
In the fastest chassis, with the nose weight and the most practice laps, the spyder’s fast lap and median lap were both about .1 sec. faster than the coupe. After widening the rear track, the coupe narrowed the times to about .05 sec. behind the spyder.
These tests were done by just swapping the chassis, setting the mounting screws to about the same amount of body float. No tweaking was tried to optimize setup.
My conclusion from this is that the cars are close enough as is, especially if the coupe runs with wider rear track, so I stand by the rules as written. When new cars come out, they will need to be checked against existing cars.
Marty
I have not noticed an issue with tire rub with the original wheels and tires. It could be possible that the Slot.it tires and wheels are wider and might rub. The chassis to body spacing can be adjusted with the outer front grub screws, pushing the body upward from the chassis. I would like to check further to investigate this, but my initial feeling is that spacers would be allowed, but unnecessary, on the front posts.
The coupe track can be widened 2mm from the spyder track. As the coupe is ever so slightly slower than the spyder, this could be an equalizer. If it gains too much advantage, the maximum track width could be specified but my initial inclination is not to spec it. I will test this also.
Shawn said in an email that the Mr. SlotCar McLaren must run the angle winder. I don’t know if this is an issue to be discussed.
I am curious to hear the results of Mark’s testing of the rear side-to-side weight balance on the RevoSlot car to see what difference it makes on the increased wear to the rear tires on the left side of the car. There is a difference in rear weight left-to-right but I suspect it may not be the cause of the difference in wear. I think it may have more to do with driver technique and the layout of the track. The RevoSlot cars are heavy and increased wear can be expected. I think it may be that drivers may generally drive harder through the turns on the north end of the track, putting more wear on the left side. It could be, though, that weight balance is a factor.
In any case, it would appear that, at least, changing the rear tires left to right between races would be recommended. Measuring diameter and truing the larger tire would be an even better idea. I did not check my rear tires before the race, and only after the race did I discover that my left tire was 20.49mm and the right tire was 20.68mm. The car was unstable during the race, wriggling from side to side. The differential in gearing between the rear tires was undoubtedly the cause.
RULES CHANGE: THE THUNDERSLOT SERIES WILL BE RUN AT 12 VOLTS
After the RevoSlot race today we tested the Thunderslot cars with multiple drivers at both 11 volts and 12 volts. The cars were stable and driveable at 12 volts and the decision was made to run the series at 12 volts.
I was able to run a lap of 3.740 seconds at twelve volts in my #21 spyder. I took the chassis out of that car and put it in my coupe body and ran a lap of 3.744 seconds. It was slightly more difficult to run regular laps as fast in the coupe. Regular laps were 2 to 4 hundredths slower in the coupe. Try to measure .04 seconds with a stopwatch! David ran a lap of 3.798 seconds but had not yet added weight to the front.
My chassis has the original, treaded front tires which had been trued on the original plastic wheels, with tread still visible. The optional, slick rear tires had been trued on the original rear wheels. I adjusted the front axle height, installed grub screws on the edges of the chassis to adjust chassis to body clearance, and added a small weight between the front axle and the guide post. With the testing, it appears the spyder and coupe were very close in time. A little tweaking of the chassis to the coupe body may have helped. The coupe body is slightly wider at the rear, which would allow a rear track 1 or 2 mm wider. Driver skill should make more of a difference than choosing between the coupe and spyder. Speeds on the various cars running were close.
Expectations are that this will be a fun series to run. If you have not purchased your car yet, there is still time!
Detailing the interior of the Thunderslot Lola T70
I detailed the interior of the Thunderslot Lola T70 Spyder white kit. The back panel of the interior should be body color, so I masked the interior and painted it with the same DupliColor paint as the body. Then I painted the rest of the interior with Model Master Non-buffing Aluminum Metalizer. The restored Gurney car was dual black seat inserts but most of the cars in period only had a driver’s seat and the other side was left bare aluminum. I painted the driver’s side flat black. The filler covers on the top of the side fuel tanks are just blobs on the vacuum interior, so I cut some .002″ Stainless sheet to the oval shape, dimpling around the edges to simulate the bolts, and using a hole punch in the middle where the filler cap is. The stainless was a little too shiny so I brushed a coat of flat clear on top and then glued the covers in place. The “dash” cross member is painted in some of the Lolas; in others it is left in aluminum, so I painted it with the metalizer. I painted the instrument panel flat black, then used a #11 blade to scrape the paint off of the instrument bezels and the numeral bumps inside. I topped it off with some red detail paint and a drop of canopy glue for the dial lenses. After painting the driver figure, I decided to make some seat belts. I put a length of blue masking tape on a piece of glass, cut it into narrow strips, and blackened it with a Sharpie. I cut small pieces of the stainless sheet and bent it around the tape, and putting a drop of black in the middle with a Sharpie. The strips are glued to the back side of the bottom of the driver’s torso, run up over the chest, and into holes in the back panel of the interior. None of the roll bars in the kit were correct for the #21 car, so I used a bent paper clip. Finally, I added some wiring to the front of the instrument panel, using some wire from an old wired “mouse”.
My intention for the series was to run the cars as stock as possible. The cars are nearly a 4 second car out of the box and I did not really see a reason to change anything. I wanted to minimize cost and have equalized cars in a driver’s series. The natural tendency with a slot car is to do everything you can to make the car quicker. Setup skill and parts selection play heavily into this. I only wanted to allow changes due to erratic behavior or problems with the stock parts. An example of what I did not want were independent front axles. This would probably make the cars faster, but if it was allowed, everyone would need to do it to be competitive.
In hindsight, I should have said that the original, treaded tires and original wheels would be required. Even without truing, the two cars I had ran well. But…..we usually allow hard front tires, and there were slicks available for the rear, so I went along with allowing them. Then, some members had trouble with truing the Thunderslot front tires and Slot.it ZeroGrips would not fit, so I said OK to the Slot.it 15 X 8 aluminum front wheel, figuring this was an easily available and cheap alternative. Now, if we allow the Slot.it plastic wheel, this brings a third wheel and third tire into the mix. Undoubtedly, one of these setups will be quicker than the others, so to get the fastest car, members may need to buy all the options and try them out, which defeats the purpose of a simple, driver’s series.
By the same token, allowing the Scale Auto quide may result in the same situation. In the past we have generally allowed Slot.it wood guides in nearly all series as the guide of choice. This guide is nearly 2mm. deeper than the Thunderslot guide. I don’t have a Scale Auto guide so I don’t know it’s dimensions and performance, but it could be a situation where it is faster. Then everyone may need to switch. As an alternative, I will make all grub screws on the ThunderSlot car open, so you could use a different screw in the Thunderslot guide.
I am sorry that there have been problems; it seems to be typical for a try-to-be stock series.
Proposal:
Allow Slot.It 15X8 alloys (SIW15808215A) with SIPT-15 17×10 Zero Grips in addition to stock plastic wheels and treaded tires or optional THTYR003FR X8 zero grips. Magnesium wheels not allowed. Tires can be trued and edges rounded.
For
Against
I just trued two sets of the original treaded front tires and did not have a problem. I took it slow, did not use any lighter fluid. It is not necessary to completely erase the tread; you only need to true until the tire is round. My preference is to run these tires, but we can vote by Saturday about allowing the Slot.it 15X8 standard aluminum front wheel with Slot.it Zero Grips as options. Please vote either in this forum or at the race on Saturday.
Also, I believe that Thunderslot no longer uses the #4-40 sets screw and instead uses the M2.5X3 grub screws for everything. Care must be taken with rear wheels to see which screw the wheels take. My earlier ones were #4-40 but my white kit came with all M2.5X3 screws, which fit the wheels that came with the kit.
Russell
Marty
I have trued both the stock, treaded rear tires and the standard slick rear tires with no issue. I was surprised to hear that you had trouble with the stock fronts. In my cars, the stock fronts were already pretty round and I have not noticed any issue or bouncing of the front end. I have not yet tried truing the stock fronts.
The Thunderslot McLarens would be welcome in the series, pending a check of the cars for differences. If there is a difference in width, we would need to have a track spec. I was hoping to get by without one, just using the rule about extending past the body. I have noticed that the roadster Lola body may be slightly narrower in the rear than the coupe. In my swapping of chassis between the coupe and the roadster, I did not adjust the chassis when I went back and forth. The roadster was just slightly faster, a factor that may be mitigated if it can has a slightly narrower rear track.
Do the NSRs fit the wheels OK? What is the part number? If the Thunderslot hard tires are so bad, it looks like it it will either be the NSRs or the stock treaded tires. Anyone else tried the optional tires?
I will extend the date for final Thunderslot rules to this weekend.
This is the car that I will be running:
