WOW! Some instant feedback. I'm impressed.
Thank you all for the nice comments, it has been a labor of love for sure.
You might find some tidbits of construction methods on the blog. I suggest if you are truly into the project, read the blog backwards with the oldest post first so its in the correct order of construction.
ronMcRain: Yes not even a year yet. I used to work with the creator of Legends International here in the Detroit area and saw his track just before Christmas last year. Instantly hooked! He and I have become good friends and I have since helped him with his Lemans Pitbuildings. I had started my plan that very same weekend of my first encounter with the infamous Legends. The end of February 2007 I received my CNC routed panels and began construction. Honestly I have really only slowed down recently what with the holidays and all, but I still have more planned. Honestly it will probably never end! I may have to build a second track someday... A BIGGER ONE
Thanks for your kind Welcome!
Swissracer: I am working with RacerX (BT) on a timing system. I expect I'll have that installed in the first month or so of 2009.
Pit Entry is activated by a doorbell switch which triggers a custom bell crank flipper I made using a magnetic Solenoid. Details of the orginal one that the creator of Northline built can be found at ac2car.org. A secondary doorbell switch activates the actual pit stop entry. There is no stop timer or anything as of yet, just the ability to do drive-through penalties and pit stops.
Savage: The lake bed was filled in with random scraps of MDF, 2 and 1 inch foam etc. With the large organic shape it was difficult to have a singular material covering the entire basin. I recommend that whenever possible you use a single sheet of material with no seams. Upon close inspection you can see some areas of my lake that are a bit uneven and such, but the grandness of it hides that fact and eventually driver boats will cover the most extreme goofs. After the basin was filled I spackled and sanded all the gaps. I used medium size landscape stones to create the transition from track to lake, the intent being it is a man made lake for specific access to the track. I also made a viaduct from 1/4" blue foam for an entry point to the distant ocean somewhere. From there I painted an original shade of blue even creeping onto the rocks a bit... in other words, sloppily. Many months later I came back to the project and mixed my original blue paint with gradually increasing amount of black to start painting in the depth. Mix a big cup of the blue, add a little black, paint with that just off shore, go add more black and paint just inside of the last painting (Towards the middle of the lake) and repeat until you reach the center areas. I had maybe 5-6 sessions of adding black and painting (All over the course of an hour maybe) The key is trying to make it gradual as possible. Wetter paint can help here. An airbrush would be fantastic, but too messy with the state of my track in other areas. Then I used medium size florist pebbles to apply along the shore line for a more gradual transition. Train ballast can work too but would be a smaller scale. From there i was going to buy the EZ Pour Water stuff, but I would have needed 15-20 bottles or so so faaaaarrr to expensive. I found This 60 coat poly/epoxy stuff at Home Depot in the Varnish area. Its a two part mix and is about half the price of the EZ Pour Modellers Water. I used four boxes mixing one box at a time, then pouring into the bed, mix the next and pour. working time is about 20-30 minutes so you need to work quickly. You can pull the stuff around with a squigee to get it into the nooks and crannys. I totally blew the recommended thickness of 1/8" and is more like 1/4" in areas. This is because of the uneveness of the overall lake bed. Even and Flat is best! Anyway I needed that thickness to cover the 'blemishes'. I also poured right over a lot of the medium sized pebbles so they look partly submerged. I guess thats about it other then I will be making some speedboats in the future moored up to the pit box docks. Hope that helps, keep in mind I am a beginner when it comes to lakes too and it wasn't that difficult, besides if you screw it up you can always go over it again with new paint etc.
White Lake Formula One Ring:
http://wlf1ring.blogspot.com
