Derby Talk

I wanted to find out where during race day other groups are doing the presentation of the Gospel message. We always plan to to do it as an intermission in the middle of the race, but it always ends up being done at the beginning, after our opening ceremonies. It has been taking us longer than planne...

RandyL, this gets back to the fact that a scout (and his parents) should be trustworthy. Yes we all know some who are not but bascially you could skirt most of the rules. This is true for scouts and even the races sponsored by faith-based organizations, like Awana, Royal Rangers and so on, but stil...

Randy, the answer we get from our District Race Chairperson is that the track owners don't want a mess on their track from wet lubricants. Also, there is the issue with the level of technology that is available to all scouts and not just to those who have relatives that are engineers. I've tried to...

As most rules prohibit shaped wheels and state that a light sanding is permitted, but that can be vague and subjective. How do some of you race coordinators deal with this issue? Do you actually measure the wheel diameter and width and somehow determine that the tread is not rounded?

Gotta ask the question. Why limit the choices?

6. Track imperfections
7. Track not level
8. Too little weight on the front wheels

Though, #8 probably wouldn't be an issue if #6 didn't exist.

Stan Pope wrote:Hmmm. I've been holding my breath on this for about a day, but I hear no "Ah-Hah!" exclamations. Let's finish this before I turn blue.

Stan,

Sometimes it is just easier to spill your guts

but why make the effort, if we think that it is not a smart way to run the races? I'm with you. To me, it seems an ego thing. For what you gain in the number of racers that race at one time, I think you end up with a lot of other problems to deal with (staging cars, race charts, track storage, find...

In fairness, perhaps you could ask them how they conduct the races now. Find out how they deal with the equities issue. Might be illuminating. But, then, if they had a good solution, I suspect that they would not be asking you to provide a solution for them. I don't recall what scheduling method th...

A couple of organizations have approached me about having my software support 12 lane tracks, and they were also running into difficulty finding a timer to use with the track. Even without software and timer issues, with concerns over fairness, generally you'd want each racer to race in each lane, b...

Personally, I think it would be easier to tweak the axles until the car rolls straight than to work the math. And even after you work the math, you still need to tweak the axles until the car rolls straight anyway. :-) Theory is great, but I agree, unless you account for all of the variables, somet...

With 3 wheels on the track vice 4, you have friction acting on two axles on the one side, but only on one for the other side. Wouldn't this itself tend to steer the car to that one side, assuming no other variables are coming into play?

All unfinished wooden tracks must be, at least sealed. The sealing process is easy and doesn't need an expert to do it. Even the urethane coating, steel wooling between coats, is reletively simple. All my straightedges, in my shops, constantly "grow" overnight, in humid conditions. Using ...

Nice point. It seems like a problematic idea. If you have .8 ounces on your front wheel and generate .2 ounces of down force, you may be able to get .2 ounces of weight further up the hill, which may over come the greater air resistance. You basically want to achieve performance something like a 5....

Ever thought of putting a spoiler on the front to create a down force at speed so you could maybe put a little more weight in the back to generate more energy? Perhaps this is just another bad idea to be crossed off and put into the flawed concept pile. Still you might be able to get away with .8 o...