Teamslot Factory Visit

By Gareth Jex

Following on from my trip to the German Toy fair, I had the opportunity to arrange a visit to the Teamslot factory in Barcelona whilst on a business trip. I had wanted to meet with Teamslot for some time to get to know them a little better and see how they do things.

A little background information to set the scene; Teamslot was formed in 1993/4, under the Kayak-2 company and then in 2005 was taken over by Dracotoys (it’s present company). The company is a small family run operation with Oscar Fuentes Guell in charge. His father Eduardo used to work at Exin (at the time Scalextric in Spain) and he designed slotcars (including the Renault 5, Ford Fiesta, Brabham and Tyrrell P34 amongst others) and Madelman (like Action Man), his mother, Isabel, owned a hobby shop in Barcelona for 18 years. Toys and models have always been in the family and so it continues today with Father, Son and Mother all still working at the factory along with a few other locally employed staff.

Eduardo assembling, testing cars.


Isabel, packing kits ready for delivery.


Final assembly of Renault 5 Turbo.

In the early days Teamslot only made resin slot cars the fist cars being the Citroen ZX and Seat Toledo. They still continue to make resin cars to order, but all resin production will stop within the next twelve months. You can still order resin spare parts for any of their models. Most of the resin cars are limited to 1000 units, there is an extensive back catalogue including many rally cars (Citroen Saxo, Renault 8’s, 5’s, Dauphine, Seat Toledo, Leon, 124, Panda, MG Metro, Ford Escort Mk2, RS Cosworth, Sierra, Audi Quattro, Simca 1000, Lancia Delta S4, Fulvia, Opel Manta, VW Golf & Beetle, Fiat 131 and a few more). Production now is all injection molded plastic with high quality tampo printing (see the latest Toyota Celica for an example of the recent improvement in quality). Typically they produce 2-3 new models each year with approximately 15-20 different liveries.

Finished Toyota Celica's after tampo printing

After convincing the taxi driver that I really did want to do to the address I had been given (it’s not easy to find!) I arrived at Teamslot and meet Oscar. Upon entering the factory you immediately realize that this is a place of work and they actually make stuff rather than a slick marketing front.

Showcases in the meeting room.


Spares and accessories display in the entrance area - Oscar is planning to open a small outlet for the public to by spares direct.

Showcase with recent products.


Showcase with latest and greatest, including the very limited edition SlotRallyGB prize cars from last year.

Currently everything apart from the motors is made in Spain, and the only operations not made directly in the Teamslot factory are the injection molded plastic parts. Oscar plans to produce his own motors from 2012. All original metal masters, painting, tampo printing, assembly, parts are all in-house.

New tampo printing machine.


Part finished Audi Quattro Gold Edition (you can imagine how tempting to borrow one!)


Spray booth.

Spray painting masks.

Kits being packed.


Older resin cars


Wheel/Axle assembly


Motors awaiting fitting


Parts


Smaller parts still on the spru


Older resin cars looking for a home!




Collectors heaven


Pug 205 T16 Master (for resin) - hope they make this in plastic.


Resin masters and moulds








Limited Edition (for Spanish TV company) bodies awaiting assembly

Alpine A310 Prototype


Alpine Chassis


Alpine chassis showing space and fixings for Slot It angle winder adaptor.

Over the last twelve months Oscar has begun to implement improvements to his range of models and improvements to chassis and running gear etc. He intends to continue development and with each new car released new methods are being introduced. The latest car, Toyota Celica (ref 11707), features a new chassis the front and rear axles are a new design and have a new gear with aluminum insert and grub screw fixing. New tires have been developed especially for rallying and feature both horizontal and vertical ribs (especially useful for snow/flour type slot rallying). The wheels (a long time bug bear) have been redesigned and I’m told, are round! As mentioned previously the tampo printing is a massive improvement on previous releases and Oscar explained that he deliberately chose this livery to demonstrate the steps forward he has taken. To give you an example of the complexity of this model, it take 20 days from start to finish to tampo print the Celica!

All future Gold edition cars will now come with aluminum wheel s and plastic inserts; in fact all new models will come with new plastic wheels as standard, but with an option of aluminum and detailed inserts.

Plans for new models this year are interesting and welcome, but sensitive so you will have to wait. What I can tell you is a little more detail on the next few cars to be released by Teamslot this year.

Alpine A310 Group 5; This is in the very final prototype stages with Oscar making final tweaks to the master prior to production. The correct versions of this car will be made, in both slim and fat flavors with changes to the model being made to correctly represent the rally and endurance versions. This model will also be the first to include a new chassis concept but Teamslot. Designed with the racer in mind the chassis comes as standard with inline motor, but is produced to directly accept a Slot It HRS2 angle winder insert. Due for release within the next month the first livery will be a blue road car, closely followed by Gitanes and Calberson liveries.

Opel Ascona; In the prototype stages and due for release in November.

Another New car; In prototype stage, but secret for now, I’m promised a Slotforum Exclusive when it’s nearly ready.

I would like to thank Oscar and his family for seeing me and wish them all the very best for the future. As we all know the slotcar market is a tricky one to be in at the moment and competition from China produced models is massive. They are keen to improve and welcome feedback.

Gareth Jex.

February 2011