Goodwood Circuit

QUOTE (uksqueezea @ 6 Aug 2009, 07:07) <{POST_SNAPBACK}>Nope no rain. Its the middle of Rep footy so I'm all over the country with my kids at the moment. Costs about $3500 each trip. ( God I wish they played the piano) so cant justify extra money for slot cars just now.

I've completed the frame work for the roadway down to Lavant and including the bend at St Marys. Its all raised up and looking good for weight and I hope structurally safe as I have our 4 cars parked under it. ( lets hope it stays up there or Yikes am I in trouble if....)

Only the run back to Woodcote to finish, lay in the boards and we're good to set up a lane and trial run it.

Excellent work buddy....................

We're all eagerly anticipating the next installment.

Tally Hoooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo

Andrew

Cant believe its been six months since I started this track. A few problems occurred with the original design. One problem was the space around the outside which forced us to push the track against one side of the shed. My boys and myself managed to get away proper at race start, but every other "expert" slot racer seemed to be constantly having an off exiting Madgwick and end up in no mans land on the run down to Fordwater. This part of the circuit was quite hard to access given the position of the track in the shed and my pursuit of the longest Goodwood circuit possible making me reluctant to throw up the white flag for a 6.5 metre main straight and reduce it to 6 metres. Thus, to retrieve your car you had to walk the track backwards starting at Woodcote, down the 8.5m Lavant straight past St Mary's and then 10.5m back to about halfway between Fordwater and Madgwick.

So scenery was put on hold as we began to redo. I really need this to be a circuit that anyone can drive well on, I hope. So I figure rip it out and start again so all track sections into the skip bin, go from 4 to a potential 5th lane for a pace car which peels off as we enter the main straight. ( Can you imagine the temptation to nerf the pace car from Master 6yr old ) I can also potentially use this lane much the same as the 3rd lane on the little track which gives me two very marginal overtaking spots but you have to be patient. So no 'squeeze' sections apart from the chicane itself and perhaps a bit more anger into St Mary's which turned our to be a little easier drive fast into than I wanted. Perhaps you could argue to leave it like it is because no carnage and all cars pretty much in one piece.

Also redid the structure itself while the opportunity presented itself and put in a little bit more stiffening. Still very light given its size....

Hopefully some fine weather tomorrow so I can cut the MDF board outside. Really getting some rain here at the moment.

made some great progress today. Went and bought about 10 new boards and began the redo. This time I also wanted to try something different. I used a power saw to cut in the slots because I wanted to straighten out some of the corners and a router is so clinical and takes so long to reposition your centre of Radius all the time. besides, going down the back straight riding holding on to something that has 13000rpm, you cant help but straighten out a few corners. I couldn't recommend this to anyone who doesn't use a power saw every day. The little ones are the deadliest of all. I did start with a brand new saw blade that cuts about 3.5mm. They dont jump around much when the blade is new. So I basically used the router on the entry into Lavant and Madgwick and St Mary's I cut about as tight as the saw would let me. Very happy with how it turned out this time. routing time on this track about 4hrs.



The run along Fordwater should now be fast and open but tricky just the same. The corners are much more open this time. It will give me a chance to try out the new perfected track surface which has been great on the little track. Little grains of rubber in the 'paint' and oh so easy to apply. Not too sticky not too slippery. Should be able to move the grass onto the track edge and with a large something( dont know what yet) pulled over the infield and airstrip it should look pretty good. Plenty of 1/32nd scales planes will grace the infield. The chains by the way, should just drop to the ground and out of sight. But the airfield will be another day.



Primed 1st coat and thats enough for today. Should get 2nd coat and then track surface onto to it tomorrow.

With any luck one lane working by tomorrow night just to shut master 6 up. He's has also convinced me not to go with the pace lane. I did leave some squeezes in because the entry into the Goodwood chicane I always liked.

That's not a garage, it's an aircraft hangar....!

I wish my garage was that size

Nice to see the progress on the track, looks like it will be superb to drive.

Cheers
Dave

And if only I could have convinced the missus to let me use the whole garage for a slot room...

Just about finished the actual circuit now. Got an early start, painted the track, taped all the lanes, done some wiring and placed a few boards around the outside so we can get some of the cars going flat out... we thought. As I mentioned, I think in our attempts to take away a little of the sterile environment created with a router, we managed to make this circuit soooo much faster through Fordwater. Just fantastic. If you get a good run out of the first corner you now have to lift to go through the Fordwater kink. Actually, it does really depend on which car you are using at the time. The Scalextric Classics ( Maserati, Cooper, Ferrari Sharknose) go through with a lovely bit of oversteer. The Lotus 49, one has to be brave and it will depend on exactly how fast you arrive at this kink if you have made a good job of the previous exit. Then all the more modern one just howl through this part of the circuit.



The car gets one more bend to go through yet so this next bend ( The corner before the St Marys entry) is taken heart in your mouth flat out, and really sets you up for the run through St Marys and on to the Lavant double right hander. Comes up quick now..... make me think to get a controller with adjustable brakes...



..this photo I'm sitting about 8ft away from the Lotus. So some good length in the track in certain areas...



The rest of the track is good. Still disappointed about the chicane not being realistic enough, but we've been enjoying the run through Woodcote which we decided to leave as an ever increasing squeeze and the crashing is about as much as expected because of this. It would be more the braking distances that keep everyone apart as the littlies seem to brake very early. Maybe they are just giving me a false sense of security..YOU know break out some of those old cars up in the house.

Track Times about 9.5 for the really quick cars and about 10.5ish for the classics....

It's not very often you see such fast corners, and i think its excellent you stayed faithful to the real track instead of trying to squeeze some more lap length out of it. I'm very enveous, top job so far

Not much done today. The kids just belted cars around today day and I sorted a few things out with the track. Very interesting how the speed had increased a little.
The above photo was just me trying a few things out with the chicane. Its very hard to find a photo of the chicane from the 60's. ( IF some one wants to plonk one in here for me that would be great)

Below is an overview and it gives everyone an idea of the size of this track.



The photo is taken looking along Lavant straight. I still think the fastest part is the run along fordwater. I notice I tend to lift off most of the time, but the kids are happy to crash at top speed still. Especially when Miss 4 just says" this cars not any good, Can I have another one!!?? Have you got any faster ones??

I'll need to get up on a ladder to get a photo of the chicane straight. So perhaps tomorrow.