3B Garage Speedway

By: Robert Brindamour

12/08/03

This is the "3B Garage Speedway".  It sits on two 4'x8' tables placed end to end.  The layout is 100% Scalextric Sport track.  Since it takes up half our garage the legs of the tables can be detached so I can lean the tables up against the garage wall and still park in the garage.

We have a small group of friends (between 8-15 people) racing with us every other Wednesday night.  Even my wife races with us.  On race nights we set up a third 4'x8' table in a "L" configuration (making it 8' wide at the near end) and convert the track to 4 lanes using track that other racers bring with on race nights.  It's usually a bit different each time we set up the 4-lane which keeps it interesting.  We are currently using a Scalextric RMS system for race organization and timing.  So far it's been a blast racing with friends.  I don't race much on my own so the race nights are where the investment really pays off.

Power is provided by two 10amp Pyramid 13.8 volt power supplies.  One power supply for each set of lanes.  We built 4 modular driver stations that use banana plugs and have switches to turn breaks on/off and a switch for forward/off/reverse lane power.  You can see them to the right in the 2-lane track picture.  Each driver station is hooked to the table with bolts and wing nuts and can be placed anywhere along the right side of the two tables using the predrilled 6" on center holes.  3 of the for driver stations have a 25-ohm Parma economy controller and the 4th is still a Scalextric controller.  Everybody hates racing on that lane but it adds a twist to the driving.  The Scalextric controller doesn't even move the magnate cars until the last couple millimeters of trigger travel so it's almost like an on/off switch.  Makes driving the magnet cars very hard.  We label the lane on race nights with numbers on masking tape at typical crash points and then make the racers put their lane number on the top of their car with masking tape so marshaling is much less complicated.

I'm not sure what the lane length is.  Stock Scalextric GT3s are lapping the 2-lane layout at about 9-10 seconds.  The same GT3 with a Black Neodymium N45 disk magnet (1/2" diameter x 1/4" thick) is lapping at about 6.8-7.5 seconds.  But these magnets are a bit too strong and the stock motor doesn't push them around the track very fast... not much fun since it takes almost no skill to get them around the track at that speed consistently.  Lap times on the 4-lane layouts tend to be in the 4-5 second range with the magnet cars but the lanes are definitely not all equal.

The blue stuff at the near end of the 2 lane layout picture is 1.5" thick gardeners kneeling pad (found at Lowe's in the garden center) sliced up to
use as a crash guard at the end of the 13' straightaway.  Ugly but effective.  It's saved a few mirrors and wings since we added it.

Unfortunately we didn't add it until I had beat up the Scalextric kit cars pretty bad going off the table or hitting the hard-wood walls around the track.

Future additions to the track include - donations gladly accepted :-)
4th 25-ohm Parma controller
360º of Scalextric Sport R4 Turns
360º of Scalextric Sport R4 Black Outer Turns
360º of Scalextric Sport R3 Black Outer Turns
Set of 4 matched non-magnet cars - any suggestions
That way we can race all 4 lanes w/ the same car
New House so I can make a large 6'x20' permanent layout :-)

Send any comments or suggestions to 3BSpeedway@cox.net