[howmet tx]

HI

I've been haunted for years by the idea of building decent looking 1/32 scale F1s of the sixties and seventies. Fitting a motor that has enough performance to make the things worth racing into those cigar tube bodies has always been the problem. The funny little Pink-Kar motors do actually fit some of the cars I have in mind (Lotus 49s, Cooper-Maseratis, H-16 BRMs, that sort of thing), but they have the torque of a sponge pudding. I notice though that some of the US HO manufacturers make 'hop-ups' for these little cans. Does anyone out there have any experience/thoughts about this, before I shell out on some unknown bits and pieces? Is there a problem getting pinion gears that will fit and mesh with the usual contrates? I even thought about building the cars with a gear train- an idler gear on a lay shaft between the motor pinion and axle, so that you end up with a small enough crown gear to fit discreetly under a 1/32 scale Cosworth engine. Is it worth the sruggle? I love the cars of this era, but hate seeing top-heavy models with bulging bodywork as much as I hate spending hours of work on a car that performs like a wet fish.

Any suggestions welcome.

 

[Mecoprop]

For authoritative answers, we need people like Prof Fate, BWA, PdL, Larry LS, Russell Sheldon and others on hand. I know that Russell in particular has often used very potent HO motors in competition winning 1/32 cars.

In the meantime, I'll hazard a few comments.
Some of the specialized HO motors are immensely powerful little beasts that will knock the average home set Mabuchi into a cocked hat! My understanding is that they use a 1.5mm motor shaft as opposed to the 2mm used in the larger motors. If HO gears were used, the possible incompatibility might be shifted to the axle/wheels - this I am not at all sure of. The 1.5mm shaft can be sleeved with something like hypodermic needle tubing in order to fit standard 1/32 pinions. I hope some of those other guys can expand on this.

In another direction, the 1/32 Monogram F1s of the time used a slim Mabuchi FT13UO motor which, to my eyes, produced some fine looking cars with no obvious bulges. My recollection is that their gears wer a little smaller than currently used and equivalents might be still available from US sources. I think the current SCX motors are equivalent in size and might be worth investigating as an alternative route.

I am not too sure of any of this, but I hope it will stimulate discussion.

EDITED on the basis of Russell's later post in order to correct motor shaft diameter originally misquoted at 1.6mm.
It is 1.5mm

 

[vfr750]

i believe Beardog are working on producing 60's F1 stuff soon. It migt also be worth looking at the Monoposto chassis made for Mac Pinches Pre Add bodies although they're for front engined GP cars and might be a bit wide. I'm just waiting for pay day to order a couple so I'll let you know

Cheers,

John

 

[Dennis David]

Reprotec uses very slim motors in their F1 cars. These look like the Slot-it Boxer motor only slimmer.

 

[ddyke]

Electronics Goldmine has a motor like this with a gear for $1.25.

Small Motor

Dan

 

[howmet tx]

Wow- Thanks everyone for your quick responses. This is great fun. The Electronics Goldmine looks fascinating- I'm going to spend a good time trawling through that site. As to the 13UO Monogram motor, I remember devoting many frustrating hours to trying to get that one to go. Hopeless magnets seemed to be the real limiting factor. I've tried sliding other mags into the case without success.
If I had a digital camera I'd love to be able to post pictures of work in progress, but have any of you got any nice F1s to show off? I'd love to see them and pick up any ideas.

Thanks again. This is a great forum!

 

[Tropi]

Welcome, Howmet!
This just shows how one enquiry can produce a ton of useful info - we are often informed of really useful things that we never quite got round to asking about, along with the original question!
That Electronic Goldmine link has to be put in MY favourites. There is an awful lot of stuff available in USA that is not commonly available in Europe, sometimes not available at all or is is considerably cheaper from USA, even taking taxes etc into account. This is how forums really show their value.

 

[vfr750]

Another motor/chassis that might help is the MRRC brass chassis used in the Eagle weslake, BRM etc.

Cheers,

John

 

[ddyke]

At electronics Goldmine they have a whole section on motors. Some are way too large or small but there are ones that work sizewise. I got a bunch of different varieties but have not tried all out yet. They also have power supplies at times.

Dan

 

[Larry LS]

Sonic gears available in the US at many tracks and distributors. They make very nice gears that will fit the HO motor shafts and the gears are most likely 64 pitch and mesh with standard 64 pitch gears for 3/32nd axles.

Check with Foamy on the SCI board or OWH and he works for Sonic and knows them very well and what you would need. The guys in the Marconi D class or Mini class have used them there I know.

Have not used them yet myself, I have not needed that small a motor yet but I may soon.

Larry S.

 

[Russell Sheldon]

I've built a couple of very small motors, based on the Mabuchi FF030PA/PK, although admittedly all I ended up using was the can and magnets!

The FF030PA/PK is only 15.5mm wide (just over 1/2 an inch and 1/4 of an inch narrower than the FA-130RA which is the standard Scalextric, Fly, et al motor) and is therefore suitable for most 1/32nd scale cigar-bodied 1960s F1 cars in an in-line configuration, although I used it in a sidewinder set-up under a Hawk Lancia Ferrari body:

as well as under a Monogram Lola T70:

Because the cars needed to compete with others that were Cheetah-powered, it required some modifying to make it more powerful. I used an Alpha "Thor" endbell, reduced slightly in diameter to fit the can, and a BSRT armature. I've never raced HO scale, so know nothing about the characteristics of the armatures, but figured that given the small stack diameter, 7 feet of 34 gauge wire would be about right for the track power.

The Alpha endbell uses 36D-size brushes and since the commutator of the HO armature has a very small diameter, I had to use 16D brush-gear. I silver-soldered K&S 3/32" i.d. brass square section to the brush-plates to house the brushes. In terms of driveability, proxy race driver Greg Gilbert commented that it drove just like his 1/32nd Eurosport cars.

For size comparison, the motor is on the extreme left, with a Cheetah on the right in the picture below:

Here are the exact dimensions of the FF030PA/PK motor:

As Larry has mentioned, the HO armatures are 1.5mm in diameter and Sonic makes both 64DP and 80DP pinions that fit.

Kind regards,

Russell

 

[Dennis David]

Russell can you make me a couple dozen of those motors?

 

[howmet tx]

Well I'm gobsmacked! Thanks everyone for the input, especially Russell. I'm going to set to work on one of those little mini-cans immediately, well, as soon as I can get hold of one. And maybe start on carving a little Lotus 25 to celebrate! Can I go on to ask what the SCI board is, as it sounds very useful, and does any one know how I might go about getting little windscreens vac-formed? Do any of the companies that do vac-formed bodies take on little jobs like that? I'm getting a bit bored scouring through waste bins for suitably shaped bits of packing. Or perhaps I'm being greedy here! Thanks for helping, anyway. This really is wonderful! If Santa brings me the digital camera I asked for, maybe I'll be able to show off the results.....

 

[Phil Kalbfell]

These small diameter cans can often be found in old computer CD drives,operating the draw,they are longer (25mm) and the brushes are the wrong material but make a very cheap source of cans to build with. most computer repairers just trash them.
Phil

 

[Alaskaracer]

The SCI board is the US board Slot Car Illustrated at www.slotcarillustrated.com. It offers lots of great resources.

 

[hiline2]

As for the 13D's in the mongram GP cars and even some later cox cars (LaCucca type , saw one just the other night !) We were all excited till we punched it and saw, "nothing" Homey Cars could pass it ! They were workeable in rewinding andsuch but the MAGS dictated powere mostly, But now you cant touch one for under $100 US. As for Bear Dog , go for it ! He is using TSRF type motors (foxes, Rabbits, rippers). As for exotic motors I ahve no idea, Doesnt Sheldon just make you want to CRY !!! I have aguy who is going to sup up some of the SCX F1 motors I had, so they in a scatch chassis could be interesting too !

paul

 

[howmet tx]

I seem to be asking a lot of favours here, but Russell, do you have a source for these 'FF030PA/PK' motors? I got all excited about trying your suggestions, but a search of the net has drawn a blank so far.
But thanks for all the advice so freely given so far!! If there's any one out there who's having trouble making an absolute pig's ear out of a scratchbuild, I have plenty of expertise to offer in that dept.

 

[BeardogRacing]

Stay tuned guys, 'tis I Beardog, got the chassis got the motor got the wheels...full lenghth driver etc.....yes it uses a small mini motor...yes it will accept a
hot H.O. armature...but does your home track have the amps. Al from BWA will show pix any day now.

I've been working on the problem for serveral years, yes the Monogram 88 motors fit...well sorta, but they ain't very fast, and are too high, the old Atlas motor fits...but heavy, if you keep everything very light, a Micro motor works great, it'll run a car with a magnet, and has a good turn of speed.

I have several with BSRT armatures, they are very high reving, have even less tourque and generate heat, plus the don't like normal wall-pack power supplies.

We'll be showing pictures, and have product available within the next 10 days.

Stay tuned.......Chris
Beardog Racing

 

[howmet tx]

Can't wait!
But I'm still going to try and get my dream Lotus 25 going first!

 

[BeardogRacing]

villagephotos.com

Picture...mybe

Chris