Project Car 914, Pinewood Derby That is.......... Options

[IronHillRestorations]

Your son does nice work (IMG:http://www.914world.com/bbs2/html/emoticons/laugh.gif)

[ken914]

I would recommend putting the weight as far to the back as possible without making it tip over backwards.

The reason for this is that the track starts out sloping and ends up flat. The further back the weight is the further the weight will fall from the start to the finish. The further the weight falls the more energy is unleashed.

My father was a Mechanical Engineering professor and a model airplane enthusiast. I grew up in a college town and the pine wood derby was the great proving ground of the engineering department.

Good luck!

[type47]

VERY nice!!!!! (IMG:http://www.914world.com/bbs2/html/emoticons/smilie_pokal.gif) great father sun project and indoctrinating into the P-car world. but you know, yellow cars are faster! (just kidding) also, did you apply POR-15?
one year, i ground down the inside of the perimeter of the wheel to reduce the rotational mass/moment of intertia of the wheels. my son didn't like that so i changed back to kit wheels.

[Andy]

QUOTE (ken914 @ Mar 16 2005, 06:52 AM)

I grew up in a college town and the pine wood derby was the great proving ground of the engineering department.

Been there! My second year entry as a kid was one I tweaked on until I got it reasonably fast (all the weight on the front axle, though I see why the back axle would have been better) I got to take it to some western states regional thing... In the first heat, I think mine was the only racer that hadn't spent time under a computer operated mill, half the fathers there wouldn't let the kids touch their cars. (IMG:http://www.914world.com/bbs2/html/emoticons/dry.gif)

Some parents...

Sweet pinewood 914 BTW! Those kind of father-son projects almost make me want to have kids! (IMG:http://www.914world.com/bbs2/html/emoticons/biggrin.gif)

[Aaron Cox]

it needs flares (IMG:http://www.914world.com/bbs2/html/emoticons/biggrin.gif)

[Qarl]

Yet ANOTHER way 914club is like Elisetalk.com

Someone over THERE built a pinewood derby Elise...

http://www.elisetalk.com/forums/showthread...6562#post166562

Sheez... I have found two parallel universes.

[djm914-6]

Sean, my 7yo, just brought home a derby car from his Awana meeting. Time to plan. Aside from wat was posted here, any other tips, tricks, or cool designs. I'm kinda thinking of doing a 928.

[Aaron Cox]

QUOTE (djm914-6 @ Mar 26 2005, 09:32 AM)

Sean, my 7yo, just brought home a derby car from his Awana meeting. Time to plan. Aside from wat was posted here, any other tips, tricks, or cool designs. I'm kinda thinking of doing a 928.

do a 914 with handcarved flares (IMG:http://www.914world.com/bbs2/html/emoticons/biggrin.gif)

[Garland]

(IMG:http://www.914world.com/bbs2/html/emoticons/smilie_pokal.gif) Well we ran well. Finished 5th place overall. Our pack size is 26 boys.
The fun is watching a boys face as his car is about to run down the track.
The race lasted 2 hours. The awards lasted 20 min. They have so much fun competing and thats where we put the focus for the boys.

[Garland]

He got 9 as his car number!

[JohnM]

Congrats on your race. My son's pack ran its race last week and we took 3rd out of 30 cars. (IMG:http://www.914world.com/bbs2/html/emoticons/smilie_pokal.gif) Do you see any Porsche design influence here? We sort of modeled it on a Carrera 6/907/910 (the proportion of the block of wood just kind of spoke to me). This was our first PW derby and I thought we would have time to paint after the weigh in but they took the car from us! He had to win quite a few races and boy did he love it. Many were very close with his car carrying its speed in the flats better, so he might have been slightly behind for 3/4 of the race and then just pull off the win at the line. Good thing the had an electronic finish line or many races would have been too close to call.