NEW SureChange guide for SSD - never miss a lane change again!
What happens when two SlotForum members with too much time on their hands start collaborating? Two hobby traders with something that promises to remove some annoying SSD track design constraints.
Over the last few months Richard Perry (aka Mr Modifier) from Route1Racing has been working with Gareth Jones (aka Choc-Ice) from Chase-Cars to make a game changing guide for Scalextric SSD digital.
Gareth and Richard first worked together when Richard did some work for Gareth moulding tyres for the Chase-Cars "Fall Guy" truck. Richard had this idea to solve a problem with his digital racing but not the
3D skills needed to bring it to reality - skills which Gareth has in abundance. SSD racers all know that a lane changer straight after a curve can be problematic. Racing with magnets it's not so much of a
problem but quicker cars with magnets still slide out of corners and miss the sensor. Richard's club races all of its classes magless and there are lots of incidents with cars sliding round the corner before the
pit lane entrance and missing the sensor; thus entering the pits at full speed. This punts any refuelling cars out of the pits thus ending their refuelling prematurely. Lots of home users have this issue with missing
sensors and layouts are constrained by having to have a full straight in front of any lane changer. In a loft or spare bedroom this is an issue that limits where you can put a lane changer and severely restricts
your design options.
Working entirely through the medium of SlotForum (they have only met once face to face), Gareth and Richard have designed a guide with a retaining ring at the front that accepts the Scalextric SSD LED. By
putting the LED on the guide, immediately in front and above the guide blade, you are guaranteed that; whatever your car is doing at the rear, as long as you are in the slot - the LED will hit the sensor. The new
guide works every time on a sensor placed immediately after a bend - even an R1 hairpin! Because tooling for injection moulding is mega expensive (£6k-£8k typically) there was no way this could be produced
conventionally. So the guys are 3D printing the guides using sintered nylon which produces a hard wearing guide in small enough volumes to make the project possible.
The guide is now robust - prototypes were tested with lots of cars and a few independent SlotForum SSD experts were sent sample guides to try them out. Some changes were suggested and the final product is now
ready, tested and working on all sorts of cars. An independent review is due on SlotForum shortly. The guide has already been shown to work on Scalextric (cars with the classic guide like the C7 Mini, C125 Porsche,
C128 BMW, and more modern Ford Taurus and Merc CLK etc.). It is also currently working on modern Ninco1 and Slot.It HRS chassis. Anything that will accept a classic Scalextric guide or a Ninco sprung guide can
use this guide. Of course Gareth's Chase-Cars all accept the guide and it even has a hole moulded at the rear of the blade for the steering pin.
The guide stem is long enough to be a direct replacement for a Ninco sprung guide and is easily cut down to fit many makes of slot car. The guide is provided with a screw and washer fitting and works well in many
slot cars without any modifications required to the car's guide mounting. The guide is available in white and black. You can also order a replacement IR LED, copper braid and a ferrite man.
The guide is called the SureChange guide and can be found at Route1racing and Chase Cars The guide will be on show at Gaydon on the Chase-Cars stand and a small number of guides may
be available for purchase on the day. Pre-orders are now being taken on the www.route1racing.com website - simply order and pay via PayPal and you will be allocated your order from the initial production run
which will be posted out no later than May 15th. You will also be able to order via the Chase-Cars website very soon. See the video HERE