Saturday September 18, 2004

Scalextric Goodwood Revival Meeting
1957  Maseratri 250F and Vanwall
By Rich McMahon

I was lucky to go the 2004 Goodwood Revival Meeting. This is a truly fantastic vintage motorcycle and auto racing event.  If you ever get the chance to go you should not hesitate. Scalextric has made two fantastic slot cars to celebrate this event. A small quantity of these slot cars were available and I bought them as mementos of my participation in this wonderful event.

These two cars are the Maserati 250F and the Vanwall two of the last front-engine Grand Prix cars. These Grand Prix icons from the fifties are modeled after specific cars at specific races. The Maserati is based on the car that the great Juan Fangio took to his greatest victory-the 1957 German Grand Prix. The other is Sterling Moss’s Vanwall the winning combination at the 1957 European Grand Prix.

These cars came in brown cardboard boxes for shipping as these were flown in to Goodwood. The cars come in a special Goodwood Scalextric Sport boxes that have a dark green checker board pattern. A sleeve with photos of the drivers bust surrounds the box and says Grand Prix Classic. Opening the box reveals the beautiful cars and a short history of each car is on the inside of each box lid. 

My first impression is that these cars look great!   Bright paint with an excellent clear coat may not be true to the real cars but should stand up to the rigors of racing. I am not an expert enough to comment on the shape and proportions of these cars but I would think they would satisfy all but the most fanatic modelers. Vents and rivet detail are molded into the body.   Other details are added such as the prominent black exhaust pipe, fuel caps, metal front grill, mirror and wind screen. Large drum brakes and suspension detail are also well modeled. Overall it makes for fantastic looking models.

The driver and cockpit modeling would be hard to beat and really adds to the look of these slot cars. It would take me forever to detail an open cockpit car this well. The full driver figures are holding onto large wood rimmed steering wheels and looking at the gauges on the dash. The frames of the car are visible along with the gear shift levers.

One detail that can make or break the appearance of a slot car is the wheels and tires. The spoke wire wheels are modeled with two prong knock-offs adds to the realism. The same wheels are used front and back with larger tires on the rear. To me the rear tires look a bit too small but it doesn’t detract from these cars.

Looking at the underside shows the odd Scalextric guide with the quick change braids. Scalextric still utilizes a rather shallow guide, for some reason they do not take advantage of the deeper guide of their Sport track. The guide is surrounded by a lip projecting from the body, this is a good attempt to hide the guide so it isn’t too obvious under the nose of these cars, overall a good attempt. The front mounted motor is visible and so is the round traction magnet which mounted directly under the driver.

Removing the small Phipps screws I noticed that the screws are different lengths, actually three different lengths! So be careful putting these back together as you don’t want to put a long screw where it doesn’t belong and split a body mounting post. Opening these cars up reveals the standard Scalextric motor with Sport label and gearing. The engine is mounted in the front of these cars with a drive shaft running to the rear crown gear. The Sport versions have brass axle bushings.

How do these car run?  Right out of the box these run very smooth and quite. They obviously have round and concentric wheels and tires. These cars are quick with good acceleration and braking making them feel very responsive. The strong traction magnet gives good handling in the curves. The car can be drifted through the faster turns but only to a point, once the magnet which is mounted on the centerline of the cars is not over the power-rails of the track the car has “snap” over steer but rarely de-slots. This gives an overall effect of being able to drive these cars aggressively but if driven too hard you will lose time- overall very rewarding slot car to drive.

These are fabulous looking and running slot cars which are models of significant Grand Prix cars.  What more could I ask for? Well I was lucky to have Sir Stirling Moss autograph my Vanwall!

- Rich