Track

[Phil]

A few weeks ago i heard some talk about the track. and this got me thinking...

As it is, it is quick and easy. But there are some problems.

* it looks a bit scruffy
* the sand is leaks out
* moves a lot
* cars can easily get over it

I have had a look at some of the purpose make tracks, and although they are ok, they are way too expensive for what they are. Someone mentioned that to have enough of that stuff to do a track of our size, it would cost in the region of two grand!

I understand square section plastic stuff has proven to be very good as a track. You can stick Velcro to the underside to keep it in place and it copes well when it gets a bashing.
I personally think this is the best solution and have come up with some ideas for bend sections and packing solutions.
Had come up with various ideas for bend sections but have reduced them down to just the one for the sake of simplicity and pack-ability.
Also a packing idea that i think will work well. basically its a couple of brackets that go on top of the carpet rack and a long box.

I have no idea if the club would consider spending money on a new track, but if it did, something like this would cost around £500.

please take a look at the pics and let me know what you think.
(the straight pieces are 65mm down pipes for drainage. these can be connected with down pipe connectors (not in pics), come in white and in 2500mm lengths.
the yellow bits are lumps of wood.
the bendy bits are 6mm thick bendy stuff.)

Phil.

[George Haining]

Hi Phil, and happy new year!

That looks really good the storage box keeps it nice and tidy and the box section will lay out nice a quick. I take it the wooden bits go inside the drain pipes and then hold the bendy stuff, (say one side of the drain pipe). I certianly would look better than what is used at present and I think it may have some use down the raod for the off-road track, I'll show Dom to see what he thinks.

George

[Team Spiller FEB's]

(07-01-2009 01:06 PM)George Haining Wrote:  Hi Phil, and happy new year!

That looks really good the storage box keeps it nice and tidy and the box section will lay out nice a quick. I take it the wooden bits go inside the drain pipes and then hold the bendy stuff, (say one side of the drain pipe). I certianly would look better than what is used at present and I think it may have some use down the raod for the off-road track, I'll show Dom to see what he thinks.

George

+1 I like the look of it as well.

[burn92]

it's got my vote

Stephen

[keiran]

It does look good but my concern is that it will take more time to set-up. At the moment we take between 20-30mins from getting in to having the track ready to race. The problem I see is the lengths of the pipe we use at the moment are quite good in that it only takes 2/3 to make an entire straight. With the piping we are limited by the size of the pipe which could cost us time, looking at your drawing it shows a fair amount of piping to make just the straight, not sure if that's too scale of our carpet?

One of the ideas I had a little while back was temporary kerbing that could slot between the carpet and piping. The only reason the piping moves is because people turn in too tight continuously which obviously eventually knocks the corner further over. The kerb would also save damage to steering knuckles and wishbones from the point that there isn't anything solid to hit.

It's a nice idea but something we'd really need to look into to make sure it was viable to keep build time down. We have to remember at the moment our numbers are growing, last meeting I think there was 5 races? If we get a few more people coming along the rounds will take longer and with 4 heats + final to be run we've a lot of racing to achieve in a small amount of time.

One point on the pipes, it might be worthwhile if we really start trying to cut the lumps of duck tape off it to try tidy them up a little bit.

Keiran

[Phil]

(07-01-2009 07:24 PM)keiran Wrote:  It does look good but my concern is that it will take more time to set-up. At the moment we take between 20-30mins from getting in to having the track ready to race. The problem I see is the lengths of the pipe we use at the moment are quite good in that it only takes 2/3 to make an entire straight. With the piping we are limited by the size of the pipe which could cost us time, looking at your drawing it shows a fair amount of piping to make just the straight, not sure if that's too scale of our carpet?

One of the ideas I had a little while back was temporary kerbing that could slot between the carpet and piping. The only reason the piping moves is because people turn in too tight continuously which obviously eventually knocks the corner further over. The kerb would also save damage to steering knuckles and wishbones from the point that there isn't anything solid to hit.

It's a nice idea but something we'd really need to look into to make sure it was viable to keep build time down. We have to remember at the moment our numbers are growing, last meeting I think there was 5 races? If we get a few more people coming along the rounds will take longer and with 4 heats + final to be run we've a lot of racing to achieve in a small amount of time.

One point on the pipes, it might be worthwhile if we really start trying to cut the lumps of duck tape off it to try tidy them up a little bit.

Keiran

yes there is a lot of sections of pipe and i think its safe to say, it may take a bit more time to set up.
yes it is to scale. the blue carpet bit is 32 x 16 meters. Nine 2.5meter sections of pipe make up the main straight.

i will give kerbing some thought and see if i can come up with a cheap way of manufacturing some.

[keiran]

Just noticed, love the car on its roof on the main straight

To add, if we get enough interest then it's definitely worth talking about it as a club.

[George Haining]

The other thing to remember is that the hoses you use just now are the same colour as the carpet (apart from 1 or 2 bits that are yellow) so it is hard to pick out your line and maybe one reason why so many people keep hitting it.
The track plan you have is quite good however I think you should remove the final cut back and make the track slightly wider every where else, remember if you make the track wider it will be easier for people to drive plus the new box section will prevent people jumping over the markers so giving more space will help, and it will make set up time come down also.

George

[Phil]

(08-01-2009 09:43 AM)George Haining Wrote:  The other thing to remember is that the hoses you use just now are the same colour as the carpet (apart from 1 or 2 bits that are yellow) so it is hard to pick out your line and maybe one reason why so many people keep hitting it.
The track plan you have is quite good however I think you should remove the final cut back and make the track slightly wider every where else, remember if you make the track wider it will be easier for people to drive plus the new box section will prevent people jumping over the markers so giving more space will help, and it will make set up time come down also.

George

And a Very Happy New Year to You George.

Yes i agree, i find the blue pipes quite difficult as you cant see them well in your periphery vision.
it is a complicated track layout (round7). i used this one as a guide to designing one as it would cover all track building eventualities.

there are some things i'm not sure about with the design i made.
don't know how well Velcro will perform on the that fluffy carpet. although there are a couple of different sorts of Velcro and I'm sure there will be something that works ok.
and not sure how the bend sections will perform either.
I guess to consider something like this seriously, a little experimentation would be essential.

Anyway. If the club decides that it would like a new track, it should know that i would be happy to make one.

Phil

---

the cad program i used to draw up the track draws a line half way down any surface.. as such it looks like there are twice as many bit of pipe than there actually is.
hopefully this pic will make it more clear.


Note. you can also get 65mm square pipe in 4meter lengths but i have gone with 2.5meter for ease of packing.

[Dan]

Looks good!!