[tDI_Fahrer]

Guys...

At the end of next month it's my birthday, and my girlfriend wants to buy me a good laptimer as a present. At the moment I use the standard timer from scalextric and it juist measures to a tenth of a second. But I want a timer that counts more precise, with a light-bridge (for two lanes) that I can put on my permanent track within a few months. I also have a laptop (pentium 4) available for connecting the timer to a computer program (if this is neccesary).

Can you recommend me something good?
Is a lightbridge good or not?

Thanks in advance

Gunther

 

[GRAH1]

check this out the program in the lap counter article is good and free also he doe the light bridge at a reasonable cost .ho slot car racing

 

[fouldsc]

try the carrera one , its real good but I don't know what the timer precison is.
Its on Getslotted code is : 71590

 

[fouldsc]

Ah , went looking - here is the link to it on the carrera website :
carrera lap counter link

it measures down to 1/100th - pretty darn good for £37 !

 

[astro]

personally I would go for a different birthday pressie, and have scalextric world as an xmas pressie (assuming u r not planning to dump gf before then)

Has an optical sensor, thou second (i think) lap times, telemetry etc etc. Check it out on the scalextric website, think it will be awesome.

 

[mtucker666]

Have to say agree with Astro and if you are looking for something now to get sportsworld later then you should be able to pick up RMS for much less that RRP. However if you want to splash out the the DS lap timers are good but reading Grah thread they are not infalable.

Matt

 

[fouldsc]

just taken a look at that and it seems pretty impressive , one probably dumb
question - does this mean we all have to get rid of our old controllers and use
these new ones ??

It seems that the controller will vary amount of voltage on the track (very much
like my Prof. Motor one) so will be pretty much spot on for all cars.

am I reading this right ?

 

[astro]

that is my understanding of the system, fouldsc. Tried it out at a toy fair in january, and the early version was already looking very impressive

 

[mtucker666]

Sportsworld is not the digital track development - consider it a greatly expanded and enhanced RMS with loads more functionality

the controllers are part of the digital package and are the only ones that work with the scaly digital products.
Matt

 

[peter]

What I think about the Carrera lap-timer.. since I have one..

1) It does work well...
2) I do not like it at all...

It is awkward to use I think... simple but still not very user friendly. I think that who ever designed it 'outsmarted' themselves. What I mean is that it has some nice functionality, it also has a small number of multifunction buttons. The thing is not very complicated - but its functionality is combined in an almost provocatively stupid fashion. The designers would not get a job at philips or apple - that is the overall impression I get - and I do not mean the 'looks' of it when saying that.

Summary and verdict:
At the end of the day that the functionality which I think is great has been given a solution which is intimidatingly thoughtlessly implemented.

A great shame - because it could quite easily have been such a nice product and intrinsically simple to use!

//peter

 

[astro]

i think sport world uses digital controllers, the cars are not controlled directly as in normal analogue racing. The controller talks to the world unit, and the world unit puts the appropriate voltage to the track, as well as sensing back emf off the car on that lane, and noting when it crosses the dead-track pieces.

Not positive on this point, but in the pictures, the controllers for world LOOK the same as the digital controllers, and it is definately a viable system to have low ampage 'controllers' rather than high ampage throttles that we now use.

 

[Tropi]

Peter
Thank you for the interesting comments on the Carrera lap counter.
Could you be persuaded to write a more slightly more detailed description of its operation as a separate project?
I am sure that many people would value more information - I certainly would.

 

[peter]

Tropi - ok it is a possibility - but it will not happen the next couple of weeks - am drowning in work and have not my track up at the moment.

//peter

 

[Tropi]

Cheers Peter - no urgency and absolutely no pressure, but we'll look forward to it as and when you can fit it in.

 

[Harry Porsche]

If you want precision and ease of use, look into the Trakmate system. It doesn't need a pentium(how much power is needed to count/time laps?). Runs on any PC all the way back to the earliest. I have been running this system with great success, now instead of arguing tenths, we argue thousandths! The system can be optical or (even better) dead strip. The cable plugs into a printer port. The whole rig ran me $ 71.00us delivered. they have a relay set-up for controlling power to the track, too. I've no connection to the company other than satisfaction with the product.

Cheers!

 

[tDI_Fahrer]

First off al, thanks for the may replies!!!

For the moment I'm working with the Scalex Classic counter, on a Ninco track.
I use the old timer from a friend (with the changeover tracks from Ninco to Scalex Classis and a few Classic straights).

I think I'm gonna stick with Ninco (I have over 18m Ninco track) and make an entire ninco permanent track. So I don't think scalex world will help me a lot! What I can do... is keep the Ninco track... and expand with Scalex Sport... and then use Scalex World.

But the thing is... won't this be much more expensive than a good laptimer-counter? Because there is the digital system included, two new controllers... and I like my parma's for the moment!!! I think with 150 euro's I have a decent counter... but what about Scalex World? I haven't seen prices on that... I'm gonna look into that.

G.

 

[astro]

tDI - at the toy fair scalextric said their aim was £70 rrp for the world system. If they meet this target, it will also be an absolute bargain