2009 Line-Up

[Nitro Dan]

Here's some pictures of our cars from this year's derby held back on Saturday, March 14th. This first car is my son's car that he raced against the other kids in his pack. He wanted a car that looked like a lightening bolt, so this is what we came up with.

Unfortunately, we discovered that the design has a flaw in it. With the grain of the wood going front to back, the area he cut out in the middle was weak. He wound up breaking the car in two while testing it a week before the race (you can see the black line in the paint where it broke at).

He made the same design for his entry in our Renegade Race, but unfortunately he broke that one in the same spot as well. Here's a picture of it:

He still came in first place for his Den, but only managed to take 5th place for the Pack. The car for the Renegade Race came in sixth place.

These next two are my two younger daughter's cars. Unfortunately they wanted to attend a birthday party on race day, so they raced them for fun on the test track at our workshops. The first one here is the faster of the two:



This next one is my Renegade Race entry. It's a PineCar Batmobile made mostly from blue insulation foam. The idea was to make a car that looked like a car, but light enough to compete with wing and wedge type cars.

If you want to know more on how I built this car from foam, check out this link over in the Car Construction category:

viewtopic.php?t=4671

The Batmobile proved to be very fast, and beat all the other racers... except for one... my wife's car. The guys at the pack have been giving me a hard time about since. Here's a picture of my wife's car:

It toasted the Batmobile everytime it went up against it. So my wife got 1st Place with her "Green Machine", and I took 2nd Place with my Batmobile.

I made three other cars during the year, but since the Batmobile was beating them on the test track, I entered it as my car for the Renegade Race. This first one is a truck I designed:

The truck is built-up with balsa wood and is hollow on the inside of the cab and trailer.


This car was also built up with balsa, but isn't hollow on the inside. I made the BSA razor wheels myself.


This was my first attempt at using a body skin. I was surprised at how good they look once applied. This car was cut straight from the pine block. I lightened the wheels myself using the low-tech methods described here at Derby Talk and used an engraving tool to remove more weight from the inside of each wheel. The wheels came in at about 2 grams per wheel, which I was very happy with.

-Nitro Dan

[Fatdaddy]

I love the lightning bolt cars! I built my 4 year old a wow wow wubbzy car, bendy tail and all, and it too broke in almost the same spot as your son's cars. Super glue took care of it, and it was still pretty fast. Nice lineup, thanks for sharing!

[millettbbc]

Very sharp lineup! Just think... you've got a good enough lineup here you could have your own car company and operate without a bailout! Good Job!

[derbyspeed]

Very cool cars, you spent a lot of time getting your team together, always nice to let the wife win also!

We are getting ready for an open race put on by our Council to raise money for scouting. Race is tomorrow March 29th. Then next weekend we are going to Indy for the big race over there with the 2 story high track, can't wait to try that one out.

Here is a pic of our car racing tomorrow.



I race this for my business for a little advertising. We have to have all 4 wheels on the track so I narrow the front end on both sides and that way I don't have to adjust the front wheel in too far to make it ride the rail. Didn't have to spend too much time adjusting this one either, just turned the nails a few times and it dialed in very nicely!

Hopefully it will make some good runs tomorrow!

[derbyspeed]

Took the Gold!

45 cars in the race, OSK 1 took 1st by only .005 of a second faster than the 2nd place car. Cars were all run by time down each lane once. Had 3 tracks set up and took the top 4 from each track to run in the finals. My son ran his Bullit car as well and came in with 5th place.

His car has the death rattle and I couldn't get it out, tried moving weight and adjusting axles but couldn't make it quit. He still did well but I'm sure he could've done better if I could have cured it.

Here's some pics:





It was a fun race but a little disconcerting as many people stepped over the tracks and they grabbed up all the cars to move them to a different table, made me cringe a few times, as most of you know - you spend a lot of time on your cars!

Here's a video that I was able to capture as well:

https://youtu.be/

[Nitro Dan]

Congratulations on the win! Nice looking cars! Are they kit cars from Maximum Velocity?

-Nitro Dan

[derbyspeed]

Congratulations on the win! Nice looking cars! Are they kit cars from Maximum Velocity?

-Nitro Dan

Thanks!

Built them from the bare block with Max V's plans.

[Rod Turnbull]

Grass... I see grass out the window in that photo... It's been such a long time since I saw grass (only about 6 feet of snow left in my yard now).

Congrats, nice trophies... time to build a trophy room onto the house

[derbyspeed]

Congrats, nice trophies... time to build a trophy room onto the house

Ask and you shall receive!

I built this last year to put in my son's room, of course it is full, may have to start on another one.





Wanted to display the cars with the trophies so I decided to put them underneath. Didn't stain the wood or anything just wanted that natural pine look Pack trophies on the left, larger council trophies on the right.

Even got a best of show one year, wasn't even trying. It was an American flag theme, seems like anything to do with America is a big hit at our pack, which I think is great!

[Rod Turnbull]

Sweet! and the wife is going to let you put the next one in your bedroom?

[derbyspeed]

That would be the last straw! As this is what my wife's expression would be -

Although she might after this weekend as we have built her a car to race in the big race in Indy, where the 2 story high track is. That will be interesting. So far her car is the fastest of the 3 we are racing!

[Nitro Dan]

Mike, I like the shelf! Especially the underhang for the Derby Domes. I found that displaying my son's cars in Derby Domes and including them on the shelf with his trophies took up an awful lot of shelf space. Since his room is small I designed a separate shelf for just the Derby Domes/cars in a vertical line-up. Here's a picture of it:



I was worried that a vertical shelf would create to many shadows and not let enough light onto the shelf so the cars could be easily seen inside the Derby Domes. My solution was to use four 1.5 inch furrowing strips as risers between the shelves. I got the idea from a CD case holder that I had for my computer CD's. It let's the light in just fine and gives the shelves more of a floating look.

-Nitro Dan

[derbyspeed]

Hey Dan, you better get a patent on that! Nice setup, especially for the derby domes. I'm not much of a woodworking guy, although I do love it, I just kind of throw boards together.

Was talking to one of my friends I went to High School with, told him I was doing Office Education classes when everyone else joined the woodworking class. Wasn't into it then, but now I have developed a taste for it.

Maybe you could add a pre-engraved plate for each shelf and put each scout rank from bottom to top for each year they race and market that to the derby dome people.

Thanks for sharing!

[TOU]

This first one is a truck I designed:

The truck is built-up with balsa wood and is hollow on the inside of the cab and trailer.

Hey Dan...I really like this truck design, nice job...on it and all the others. I actually think it might work for something I have in mind.




So...What do you think? Kinda of a hybrid design between yours and Randy's "Screaming Mimi".

Few questions if you don't mind. You mentioned it was made out of balsa, how much did it weigh? What was the total length of it? The Cub Pinewood Derby Box is about 7", no? Looks like you put panels on the side Correct? Did you have a pinewood base first that you glued the cab and box on to? Have you found any great ways to paint balsa with out the normal problems?

Thx so much in advance?

TOU

P.S. Do you have any other pictures of it? Close ups of the cab from different angles?

[Nitro Dan]

Hey TOU, I started off with a 90 gram pinewood block, drilled my axle holes and cut a 3/8" plank for the base off of it. The cab was created using the official BSA Pickup Truck template. I took off for the 3/8" planking from the bottom of the cab and traced that onto some Balsa wood sheets that I had glued together (I may have also shortened the cab a bit from the back of the cab). I then hollowed out the cab from the bottom using a Dremel engraving bit in my drill press. To make the fenders stand out, I glued the cab down to the plank exactly 1/16" back from the front of the plank.

The total length of the truck is only 7 inches. The tralier was created using 3/16" thick Balsa wood sheets with four 1/4" posts in each inside corner to glue the sides to. I designed the trailer to be 3/8" taller than the cab and left 1/4" spacing between the cab and the trailer. The length of the trailer was determined by the left over space from 1/4" behind the cab to exactly 1/16" from the back of the plank, in order to make the rear fender stand out as well (length was about 4.5 inches). For some added strength, the top of the trailer is cut from 1/8" hobby plywood (recycled from the small wooden crates that clementines come in around christmas time). If you'd like some exact measurements on the cab or the trailer, let me know and I'll post them for you.

To solve the wood grain problem when working with Balsa, I coated all balsa exterior areas with some thinned out wood putty. After it dried I lightly sanded with a 400 and 600 grit sandpaper to make everything smooth, then primered with Zinsser Bin Shellac Based primer, and lightly sanded again. Had no problems with painting over the Balsa after that. Also a gloss coat of Future Floor Wax was painted over the entire truck after it had been painted. I find that Future Floor Wax self levels itself and will fill in any minor low areas that might have been missed.

The picture of the PWD box was scanned into my computer and then resized via standard MS Paint so that the printed image would fit exactly to the side of the trailer. Before gluing the picture to the trailer, I lightly brushed a thin coat of Future Floor wax over the picture. The paper wrinkled slightly once dry, but was able to apply four more coats after that, giving the picture a glossy look. I then used 3M Super 77 spray adhesive to glue the picture to the trailer (which straightened the slight wrinkling of the paper). Same process was applied to the other images glued to the truck. The truck windows were cut from the black window decal material (water transferred) that come in the Pine Car body skins packages. That stuff is great for making perfect windows! I only wish I had a source for buying just it without having to purchase the body skins.

The wood plank weighed in at 26 grams, followed by about 2 grams for the cab, two more for the box trailer, and two more for the 1/4" dowel rods used for the exhaust pipes. Overall weight was 32 grams; however, this was made before creating my concept of the foam Batmobile. If I was to do this again, I would cut out the centers to the wood plank and fill it in with blue insulation foam. This would reduce my plank weight to somewhere around 10 grams, and bring the total body weight to about 16 grams. The wheels were cut down to BSA razor wheels and even with the body being 32 grams, this truck was very fast. When running it on the test track against the Batmobile, it was only losing by an inch to an inch and a half. I didn't move the rear wheels as far back on the truck as possible, because the position didn't make it look estetically pleasing. Had I done this and lightened the plank, I think the truck would have beaten the Batmobile hands down (and given my wife's car a good run for her efforts).

Of course if you add that fan from the "Screaming Mimi", it is sure to be a crowd pleaser! Below is the truck from some different angles, along with some links to the close-ups of the cab, from the right, left and head on. Most pictures with a digital camera come out huge and have to be reduced to be seen properly on a forum, so I'll just provide you with the links to those close-ups. You should be able to see all my "minor flaws" in the cab that way.

Close-ups of the cab links:







Some different views of the entire truck:





-Nitro Dan