Pimp Your Scalextric Cars
admin | October 16, 2009
Racing Scalextric cars is growing in popularity as each new generation discovers the fun and excitement of slot car racing. Scalextric and slot car hobbyists soon start to look for ways to get the most speed from their systems. Here are just a few simple tweaks that will help make your cars fly around the track.
The same principles apply to slot cars as well as F1 racing cars and rally cars. To get more speed you can install a more powerful engine, optimise the tires and lower the weight. Optimising Scalextric cars can be very educational.
Let’s first think about the Scalextric cars engine. Your Scalextric cars use tiny electric motors, not super enhanced petrol engines, and these are easy to change. You can readily find high performance Scalextric car motors that provide higher revs per minute (rpm) than those that are fitted as standard in most cars. Upgrading your cars motor will give you an immediate improvement in speed.
But increased speed can mean that your car will tend to fly off the track when it encounters a bend. Your car is held on the track using a magnet. Upgrading the magnet will help to keep your car on the track.
A further enhancement is to fit a new set of tires. Improving grip will improve traction and increase overall speed.
So your Scalextric car is fully pimped and ready to break the world land speed record. But what about your Scalextric track? There are a few simple tweaks that can make all the difference. I suggest that you try this on just one of your two tracks first so that you can compare with the unmodified track.
Start by cleaning the Scalextric track. Dirt, dust and moisture on the track will inevitably result in low friction and maybe even some wheel spin. Next, clean out the slot. The slots in your Scalextric track will inevitably become clogged with dust and dirt. This will inevitable impede the movement of your car. Keeping your slots free of dust and debris will make major improvements to your system.
The final aspect of your system that would benefit from some attention is all the electrical connections. Clean all the electrical connectors, the slotted track and the contacts on your car.
By now your car should be literally flying around your Scalextric track. Now you’re ready to find a worthy opponent for a race.
