What makes a good circuit?

1762 Views 7 Replies 8 Participants Last post by MrFlippant, Feb 17, 2017

Del

Discussion Starter · Feb 15, 2017

I'm almost ready to sit down with a copy of SlotMan and design my track, which will be a 2-lane on-the-floor Scalextric Classic. I've had a surf through various threads here and have found some plans that I definitely like, but I was wondering what features you guys and gals think make a good circuit?

I definitely want a 90deg chicane, and probably a straight along as much of the 8' length as I can get. I'm thinking I'll avoid bridges, because the room needs to be used for other things and I'm wary of kicking it as I step over!

It's not going to be massive, about 8' x 5', and at the moment I only have straights and R2 curves, and I won't be using pits. Any suggestions that I might not have come across?

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GRUNZ

· #2 · Feb 15, 2017

to start with avoid using scalextric classic....unless you are using some old cars, the slot on the classic is too shallow.

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Merc_A

· #3 · Feb 15, 2017

A long straight is good, so cars can stretch their legs for a few seconds. If room is limited, and one overpass is ok, you might consider laying the main straight diagonally over the 8 x 5 feet area - you might win some distance there.
I would try to make different curves, so not only R2's but all radii possible.
One section with wider curves, and one tight/tricky part. A bit like this (rough sketch)

Merc

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tlbrace

· #4 · Feb 16, 2017

If you were setting this up for quasi serious club racing, I'd say key features are:

1. Try to get as equal lane length as possible, which means an overpass. In club racing, everyone runs on all lanes so in fact it winds up being even once all the heats have been run, BUT when actually racing, a car that always has the inside lane of the curves has a real advantage.

2. Line of sight for the drivers.

3. Ease of turn marshalling, which usually means trying to keep a lot of twisties out of reach in the infield.

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UshCha

· #5 · Feb 16, 2017

Lots of different curves. Seach the forum for "show me your curves" R1's are a must. Soerts the men from the boys. If you can't drive an R1 you can't drive. ;-) (ducks for cover). More seriously if its digital (which is should be) chicanes are not ideal. There is enough complexity with lane changes not to need crossovers. Analouge or Digital there is a good thread on 8 by 4 designs (none of which are mine so no bias there).

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plingboot

· #6 · Feb 16, 2017 (Edited by Moderator)

I've just been through this process - designed the track on screen then built it.

The on screen bit did save a little time, but in the end I spent hours building, testing and re-building. I than had a couple of mates over for an afternoon of racing and all the flaws of what I thought was a good layout were quickly exposed.

I subsequently spent another couple of long afternoons re-working the layout to fix those issues.

Firstly the crossover, while useful for layout purposes, was a nightmare in a 50 lap races - causing several collisions. I also had an R1 turn, but for novice drivers this just meant a string of yellow flags as cars were put back on the track.

During the re-build I also discovered that I just don't like flyovers - until I can fully support the track with a thin board underneath it and proper graduated risers - I'll be leaving them out.

I also found that on some fast corners, borders and rails were not enough, so I've added a mix of ninco armco and ninco high barriers. These are great and definitely stop cars from flying off all over the place.

Purists will scoff, but the idea is to have some proper racing fun and not spend all afternoon putting cars back on the track - so I'll keep them on until we're all better drivers, then I'll swap them out for borders again.

With judicious use of lane changers, self built racing line changers and corner changers, you still have to concentrate and drive well to hit the correct line and get quick laps, so there's quite a bit more to it than just squeezing full throttle.

I've also designed my final layout so that I can drop the R1 section back into it at a later date too.

The whole process did make me wonder how I'd ever settle on a BLST layout - when I win the lottery.

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300SLR

· #7 · Feb 16, 2017 (Edited by Moderator)

tlbrace said:
If you were setting this up for quasi serious club racing, I'd say key features are:

1. Try to get as equal lane length as possible, which means an overpass. In club racing, everyone runs on all lanes so in fact it winds up being even once all the heats have been run, BUT when actually racing, a car that always has the inside lane of the curves has a real advantage.

2. Line of sight for the drivers.

3. Ease of turn marshalling, which usually means trying to keep a lot of twisties out of reach in the infield.

Agreed, those are important design points for club tracks, indeed I've seen a few club tracks where thinking through those points would give considerable scope for improvement. Those points become more important with larger tracks with more lanes which are used with marshals, (that is a typical club track).

The original poster is contemplating a 2-lane on-the-floor Scalex Classic circuit about 8' x 5' and wants to avoid bridges, so it doesn't seem those points are as important for his purposes.

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MrFlippant

· #8 · Feb 17, 2017

plingboot said:
Purists will scoff, but the idea is to have some proper racing fun and not spend all afternoon putting cars back on the track - so I'll keep them on until we're all better drivers, then I'll swap them out for borders again.

The scoffing is because they won't learn until you make them drive those tracks. Come up with a suitable penalty for crashing so that they SLOW DOWN for the turns rather than crash and go right back on. Right now, you'll have guys that can ride the rails and go flat out when they're on the outside of a turn. They'll only be able to drive as well as the smallest radius turn with no guardrail to ride. But, if they have a more challenging circuit soon, they'll be able to do any track because they'll know to slow down even more the tighter the turn is, especially when there's no rail to ride on.

But, there will always be turns that catch people out, even if you came up with a track that's all R3 and R4. ;-)

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