Tuesday, March 31, 2009

New Sloting Plus axle stoppers

From Sloting Plus:

SLPL 2400 red is the same than old aluminium ( 0,22g ) EXCEPT color and reduced friction
( 6,20 mm diameter x 3,24 mm wide )
SLPL 2401 purple is more thin ( 019g ) with M2 screw and not Sloting Plus M2.5
( 6,20 mm diameter x 2,48 mm wide )
SLPL 2402 gold is in thin brass ( 0,54g ) with M2 screw for applications where more weight than aluminium is necessary
( 6,20 mm diameter x 2,48 mm wide )
SLPL 2403 purple aluminium ( 0,38g ) is for axles 3 mm, particularly 1/24 . Screw M3
( 7,15 mm diameter x 3,65 mm wide )

Sunday, March 29, 2009

LeMans Miniatures Peugeot 905 back in the US


This Peugeot is back in stock in the US at REH Distributors.

Thursday, March 26, 2009

New SCX distributor in Australia

The new Distributor for Austalia for SCX is B & B Hobbies Pty Ltd

t: 1300 857 883
f: (02) 8569 1838
e: frikkie@bbhobbies.com.au

Unit 4, Dural i Park, 280 New Line Road, Dural, NSW, 2158

w: www.bbhobbies.com.au

SCX Digital car disassembly

Tuesday, March 24, 2009

Slot MiniAuto #54-April



SLOT MINIAUTO 54 – APRIL

Lotus is the great protagonist of the magazine in April. Lotus Exige of Ninco, Ostorero’s Lotus 79 and Lotus 28 (Lotus Cortina) of Scalextric have an interesting story inside. In addition, the track test of the new SCX Ferrari 599 GTB, Peugeot 908 HDI FAP of Scalextric, AutoArt Jaguar D, and the new Citroën 15-6 of Hobby Classic.
The Triumph Spitfire Le Mans by Ocar also has their role.
It also contains an interview with David Cosculluela of Ninco, explaining the new XLot reasons.
This issue informs the readers, the model chosen to offer to subscribers. A great surprise!
(More information on www.revistasprofesionales.com)


SLOT MINIAUTO 54 - ABRIL

Lotus es la gran protagonista de la revista del mes de Abril. El Lotus Exige, de Ninco, Lotus 79 de Ostorero y Lotus 28 (Lotus Cortina) de Superslot tienen un reportaje destacado. Además la prueba en pista del nuevo Ferrari 599 GTB de Scalextric, el Peugeot 908 HDI FAP de Superslot, El Jaguar D de AutoArt, y el nuevo Citroën 15-6 de Hobby Classic.
Los Triumph Spitfire de Le Mans realizados por Ocar tambien tienen su protagonismo.
También se recoge una entrevista a David Cosculluela, de Ninco, explicando las razones del XLot.
En este número se da a conocer a lo lectores, el modelo escogido para regalar a los suscriptores. ¡Una gran sorpresa!
(Más información en www.revistasprofesionales.com)

Monday, March 23, 2009

New Abarth Fiat 1000 by SCX


A link to a few shots of the new SCX Fiat Abarth 1000 I shot recently. This car is lots of fun to drive no-mag even with the stock tires.

Sunday, March 22, 2009

Sebring Flying Lizard wrap up-spoiler alert!

March 21, 2009 -- Sebring, Florida -- The Flying Lizard No. 45 and No. 44 Porsches finished their sixth consecutive Sebring race fourth and fifth in GT2, respectively. The twelve-hour race was another contest of will and endurance: nearly half of the starting cars were no longer running by the end of the race.

With Joerg Bergmeister in the No. 45 starting second and Seth Neiman in the No. 44 starting 13th on the GT2 grid, both Porsches ran into trouble within the first ten minutes. The clean race start quickly turned ugly for the Lizards when on the fourth lap the No. 45 was hit by another GT2 car, causing rear suspension damage to the No. 45. The Lizard crew made the repair in the pits but the lengthy stop dropped the No. 45 from third to 13th. Meanwhile, the No. 44 had its own issues with an early race spin which sent it back to the pits for an unscheduled pit stop and fresh tires.

Over the next 10 hours, both Lizard Porsches cycled through their drivers, who patiently worked their way up from the back of the field. The 12-hour race had only three cautions, making it more difficult to find opportunities to regain lost laps or gain time in the pits. But by hour 10, the No. 45 Porsche was in fourth (Bergmeister, Patrick Long and Marc Lieb) and the No. 44 (Neiman, Darren Law, and Johannes van Overbeek) had recovered to fifth, with the No. 45 (Marc Lieb) having set the fastest race lap of 2:02.494.

At hour 10, the No. 62 Risi Ferrari was in the lead (having led most of the race) and the No. 95 Advanced Engineering Pecom Racing Ferrari was in second. The No. 21 Team PTG Panoz in third. The No. 45, with Marc Lieb at the wheel, was running a faster pace than the No. 21, and worked over the next hour to overtake the No. 21, putting pressure on in the corners, but losing ground on the long straights and to traffic. Taking an opportunity to pass, Lieb moved past the No. 21, but was not able to complete the pass, and the two cars made contact, with the No. 45 spinning into the tire wall. Although the radiators were not damaged and Lieb was able to make it back to the pits, the crew had to adjust bodywork, replace all four tires, but then was unable to fuel the car because of the damage to the hood. With Joerg Bergmeister behind the wheel, the No. 45 went out on track again, then pitted one more time for additional repairs and refueling. He was back on track again quickly, having lost just one position to the No. 44 with Johannes van Overbeek at the wheel, which moved to P4.

With the car nearly undrivable, Joerg was able to maintain a fast enough pace over the final hour to keep fifth and stay ahead of the No. 61 Krohn Racing Ferrari in sixth. The No. 44 was in fourth, but lost time in the pits with a late race pit stop, and finished fifth, just behind the No. 45 which took fourth place. The No. 62 Risi Competizione Ferrari won in GT2, the No. 95 was second, and the No. 21 third.

Team principal and driver of the No. 44 Porsche Seth Neiman said, "This was another classic Sebring -- a race where you have to give it everything you have just to finish. A podium spot was not in the cards for the Lizards this year, but I'm proud that both cars finished the race in the top five. It was unfortunate that the No. 45 was knocked back so far in the field so early in the race, but a testament to the crew and to Joerg, Patrick and Marc that they came back not just once, but twice during the race to finish fourth. The No. 44 also had a rough start, but together with Darren and Johannes we were able to climb back up to fifth. Congratulations to Risi Competizione on their well-deserved win and seamless race."

News and photo used with permission from Flying Lizard Motorsports, no reuse for any reason.

Saturday, March 21, 2009

Voting!

http://www.scxworldwide.com/ipb/index.php?showtopic=1232

Click on the link above to be taken to the poll to vote for the RX42B for all SCX Nascars, GT, DTM, and LMP's. Voting will close at the end of this month, SCX needs to know that the faster RX42B is the motor we want!

If you'd like to vote but are not a member of SCXWorldWide's message board please email me at slotcarnews@yahoo.com and I can set up an account for you to vote for the motor. Random voters will win the SCX Hobbytown Nascar.

DaveK

Thursday, March 19, 2009

Sloter Opel Corsa 1600

A review by PeteN95:

The entry level rally car in Europe is the S1600 class which consists of small, FWD hatchbacks made by most manufacturers and seen commonly on roads all over Europe. This is the stepping stone rally class to the faster S2000 class and eventually the mighty AWD turbo cars of the WRC, the World Rally Championship. The smaller cars of the S1600 rally class are already well covered by other slot car manufacturers, with the Citroën Saxo, Fiat Punto, Ford Festiva, VW Polo, and SEAT Ibiza all available. Sloter enters the class with the Opel Corsa 1600.

The Sloter Opel Corsa is an aggressive looking, but small car with a spoiler at the rear and an air scoop at the front of the roof panel. It is covered in a factory rally livery of silver, blue, and yellow with a large Opel logo on the roof. The paint and striping quality is pretty good, but the yellow on the scoop and spoiler is a little thin and there are places where the stripes are not as crisp as they could be. There is a fairly well detailed, full depth interior with a full roll cage and driver and navigator figures. The Corsa is also available in a “roll out” livery, as well as a plain white version if you’d like to do your own livery.

The reason the Opel has a full depth interior is it’s a sidewinder (SW) drive train, which I believe is a first in it’s class and unusual in slot rally cars in general. It also has a very unique and innovative motor pod design. The pod looks a bit like a Slot it type at first because it has four screws near the corners, but it is not designed to float. Instead, it is made to be modular, allowing different types of motors to be mounted in different orientations using the same pod! They do this by using some very clever inserts which simply snap into the main pod. The inserts are then locked in place when the pod slides into the chassis. The pod actually slides up into the chassis about ¼” into a very tight fitting cavity, eliminating any possible movement or flex required to remove the inserts.



The motor is a standard Mabuchi (18k) similar to other RTRs mounted in a bell drive SW configuration, but the pod also allows a long can boxer style motor to be mounted in an inline configuration. This is done by removing the front insert in the pod, after removing the pod assembly from the chassis. The rear pod screws also function as the rear body mount screws, so after removing the body with two screws in front and the two rear pod screws, all that is required to remove the pod from the chassis is to remove the front two pod screws. The pod then slides down out of the chassis and the front insert, which contains a thick Fly/Ninco sized button magnet, can be snapped out. After the motor is removed, the extra pod insert that comes with the car can be snapped in place of the SW motor and you have converted the pod to a long can inline set up. Of coarse you will have to change out the SW spur gear for an inline crown gear (not included), but a very clever design!



I ran the car straight out of the box, with the magnet, and it went very well. Not too stuck down, but very stable. It read about 180gms on the Magnet Marshall total, with a weight of about 79gms, so about 100 grams of additional down force. The car did have quite a bit of gear noise from what turned out to be a slightly tight gear mesh. It has quieted with additional running and I would prefer a little tight out of the box, as opposed to too loose to begin with. It was now time to remove the magnet, as I believe all rally cars should be set up, so I lubed the bushings while I had the body off. This is where I ran into problems. The tires are rather soft and although there was no problem running with the magnet, the tire spin when the magnet was removed caused the tires to expand and come off the wheels. I had a similar issue with the Sloter Opel, so I got some glue to fix the tires to the wheels.

Unfortunately, a bumbled and hurried attempt at using fast Superglue resulted in destroying the stock tires. Slower glue gives time to seat the tires correctly, for future reference! Normally this would not be a problem, but the Corsa uses a strange size tire, about 20mm x 8mm?! Even in my large collection of spares, I had nothing similar. Fortunately, the wheels were a standard size and some Ninco ribbed rally tires in 19x10 size fit just fine. A little Dremel work in the rear wheel wells was required to give clearance for the wider tires, but just a bit. The stock tires are pretty soft and I think they would work fine for non-mag running if glued to the rims, but be careful and use a slower adhesive, unlike myself.

With new tires installed, we were ready to do some real rally drifting! And drifting is what this Opel excels at! I was amazed as I got up to speed by the degree of control afforded by this very small car. The more I drove it, the more I liked it. Most of the smaller slot cars tend to be rather tricky to control at the limit because of the short wheelbase and narrow track, but the Corsa was very easy to drift in a nice controlled arc, all the way through most turns. The standard 18k Mabuchi motor is plenty powerful for this small car, but an NC-2 might also work well in the long can, inline configuration. I just can not imagine the car being any better balanced than it is now. Sloter still could work on making the wheels more concentric, as the car vibrates a bit, but overall this car is an improvement over their first rally car, the Opel Manta, and probably the fastest S1600 class slot rally car available at this time.

Monday, March 16, 2009

New Racer 312P-NART


A new Racer 312P to show today, photos from AmazingSlot.com.
RCR49 - 312P N.A.R.T - Le Mans 24hrs 1970 - T. Adamowicz/ C. Parsons


Wednesday, March 11, 2009

New Sloting Plus gears

From Sloting Plus:

Here are some photos of our new crown gears AngleWinder in duraluminium alloy :

Z27 ( purple ), Z28 ( blue ), Z29 ( green ), Z30 ( yellow ), Z31 ( orange ), Z32 ( red )

Z27, Z28, Z29 and Z30 Normal diameter 15.70 mm. Mod. 0.50

Z31 and Z32 SRD ( Special Reduced Diameter ) 16.90 mm. Mod. 0.50

Nascar vs. F1... a tired argument taken to new... um.. heights?

Tuesday, March 10, 2009

Spirit SxXx/LeMans motor testing

Rob's updated the motor list with Spirit SxXx and LeMans motor tests. Here are his results:

I happened upon a Spirit SxXx long can in my mailbox, and immediately proceeded to the test lab (basement).

This is a long can FK-180, with open slots, which resembles a Slot.It Boxer 2. The performance turned out to be nearly the same:

RPM at no load, 12v, after a few minutes of warm up: 20,745 RPM. Factory spec is 20,640 RPM/12v, 25,380 RM/14.8v, 57g mag downforce. Motor is revving very close to spec.

Torque at 12v, based on three times the average of nine 4v readings around one rev of the armature, measured against a scale with a torque arm and push rod: 329 gcm.

Power output wattage computes to 17.1W at 12v. This is one powerful motor. The test sample was not balanced, and felt a little buzzy in my hand (but not bad). I would call it typical quality for a slot car motor.
_____________________________

I was then blessed with a Spirit Le Mans motor, out of Dave's new BMW 635. Another long can, FK-180 type.

Rating on the Le Mans wrapper is 24,000 RPM at 14.8v, which would convert to 19,459 RPM at 12v. At one point, Spirit released these specs:
20,100 RPM/12v, 23,500 RPM/14.8v, 39g mag downforce.

I believe Spirit considers the LeMans to be a milder motor than their earlier long cans.

In any case, the rating of 39g magnetic downforce cannot be, as it is a solid, closed can, with approximately zero downforce on a Magnet Marshal.

The tach showed 20,926 RPM/12v running no-load. Just a little faster than spec.

The torque tester showed 280 gcm at 12v. A little bit lighter torque than the SxXx, but not much. This motor is still a powerhouse, pumping out 14.6 watts.

New Dale Jr. Camo Nascar-newsletter

Monday, March 09, 2009

New MRC/Ninco tools

From Ninco Bob (www.modelrectifier.com):

We're introducing NINCO precision hand tools in the most popular metric hobby sizes designed for Slot Cars and Radio Control hobbyists.
These are beautifully made, with quality and precision equaling or exceeding any similar tool available. The handles have a rotating top piece, perfect weight, grip texture and 'feel'. These comfortable hand tools give you sure grip for the most precise adjustment or 'muscle' when needed.

Comes in 0.9mm, 1.5mm, 2.0mm, 2.5mm, 3.0mm Allen tips, 2.0mm Phillips and 3.0mm flathead, 4.5mm and 5.5mm socket head drivers.

*Available individually.
*Designed for Slot racing and RC.
*Engraved aluminum handles and CNC precision machined.
*Interchangeable heads, flat, Phillips, Allen & Socket
*Hardened tips.
*Handles easily identifiable.
*Precise adjustment for all kinds of screws.

MSRP for each hand tool is $16.98, and replacement shaft/tips are only $7.98.

www.modelrectifier.com

Saturday, March 07, 2009

Area 51 SCX 24 Hour Enduro-live coverage



See coverage of the Area 51 SCX 24 Hour Enduro race at this link.

Thursday, March 05, 2009

New SCX-D switch track pieces

Bryan's video showing the new SCX-D switch track.

Tuesday, March 03, 2009

New website for Fantasy World Hobbies


Check out the new website for Fantasy World Hobbies by clicking on this link or the photo above.

Fellows/Pilgrim Corvette photos

Click on the photo above to be taken to photos of the new SCX Corvette C6.R Andy Pilgrim/Ron Fellows decoration Vette.

New MRRC cars next month

The following cars will be available next month.

MC0043 Chaparral 2C (car3 white/brown body)

MC0044 King Cobra (car97 orange body)

MC0041 Porsche 904 (car37 silver body)

Monday, March 02, 2009

Slot MiniAuto - March 2009 Edition


SLOT MINIAUTO 53 – MARCH

The month of March is almost dedicated to the 60th Nuremberg Toy Fair. Everything that was there, we know and see, in the pages of the magazine. The 36 brands exhibition, in the Fair, in an extensive report.
In addition, Slot MiniAuto includes the track test of the Scx Hummer H3 SUV, the Ford GT 1:28 of TRP / PN Slot and the Saoutchik Xenia Hispano Suiza of Hobby Slot. Besides, a beautiful story of the Bentley Embricos in Le Mans made by TRRC.
(More information on www.revistasprofesionales.com)




SLOT MINIAUTO 53 - MARZO

El número del mes de marzo está prácticamente dedicado a la Feria del Juguete de Nuremberg. Todo lo que allí se vio se puede leer y ver en las páginas de la revista. Las 36 marcas presentes en la Feria en un extenso reportaje.
Además Slot MiniAuto incluye la prueba del Hummer H3 SUV de Scalextric, el Ford GT 1:28 de TRP/PN Slot y el nuevo Hispano Suiza Saoutchik Xenia de Hobby Slot. Además un bello reportaje de los Bentley Embricos de Le Mans realizados por TRRC.
(Más información en www.revistasprofesionales.com)