My son is racing in his last pinewood derby tomorrow. He's brought home a best of show trophy each of the past two years. Here's a few pics of this year's entry. He's getting pretty good with the airbrush. Wish us luck.
Great looking car. Really captures the HAMB spirit. Best of luck to your son on what should be a winner. My 8 year old grandson built his 3rd car for this years event. In addition to best paint he won fastest for his age group and will race in a district event in a couple of weeks. He has won best paint/ best design for his two previous cars also.
That is the coolest pinewood derby car I've ever seen!! I got best design award when I was like 8. Still have the car and the award. No where near the level of that though.
Now that's what I call auto design!!!!!! Boy, my pine wood doesn't look that cool!!!!!!! We have a fine young HAMBer moving up in the ranks !
That's the coolest pinewood derby car I've seen. I can't wait until my son is old enough for scouts ... only 4 years to go.
Wow. Pinewood racer development has come a long way since I was a kid. My son is showing some interest in scouting so I need to go check the local troops out
Man that is one of the coolest things I've seen on this board! One of the best memories I have in life is winning third place in the Florida statewide pinewood derby races forty years ago. My Dad sat with me at night after work and we whittled, carved, and sanded out an old style Indy car racer. We painted it a dark metallic blue and it was my first real hot rodding experience. Good for you and good for your boy, best of luck!!!
We built a few cars last year. This one was our for fun car. It was'nt fast at all but it looked good going down the track. We usually go for speed and stay with some sort of thin wedge. This year my son got 2nd overall in the whole pack. I think we can take home first next year
Thanks for the good words! I'm off to the practice session now. Racing takes up a good part of the day tomorrow. I'll post some results Monday. I'll try to get some pics of our past entries too. Last year Jesse made a t-bucket with Rat Fink drivin'. My daughter's car was a dark purple custom with monster tail fins. It must have worked because she was second fastest in the open class.
Super cool cars for the little guys! My dad & I built one in the mid 60s & it looked like a SCRA sprint car. Nothing near as nice as the ones above. He drilled a big hole where the seat was supposed to go,,,melted some lead fishing weights & poured the lead in the hole & we painted over it.I guess it was his Bonneville roots coming out at the time. We lost lol.
One last thing before I go racing. Here are a few shots of my daughter's entry in this year's open class. No fins this time.
Very nice work!!! When I was a scout years ago my dad and I built a Shelby 427 Cobra. Complete with Blue metal flake paint, white racing stripes, aluminum rollbars and windshield frame, cast side pipes, and custom balsa fenders that covered the wheels! I know its kickin around here somewhere...I'll put up pics if/when I find it. And it screamed!
Not sure what you lubed your wheels with but graphite-molybdenum is the best I've found. It is so much better than your regular graphite. You can tell who has it on there wheels because when they polish the wheels with it, it is very silver. Makes the wheels look like a dull chrome. I think that and our weight placement was the biggest part of our success this year.
These derby cars are so far ahead of mine back in the day, but mine were fast - won three years in a row & the fourth year, they wouldn't let me race because I had missed too many meetings playing football...they let me represent the pack at District though politics even back then... Mine was weight placement too - whittled out a clean shape & inlaid a number punch longitudinally & centered. Then used thumbtacks to sneak up on the exact weight - easy to make adjustments for varying scales too...and loads of graphite on polished nail axles!
I seem to recall that you had to work from a standard derby kit which provided a uniform sized block of wood, 4 thin, hard, plastic wheels, and 4 black tack/axles. That was about it. Those wheels stunk. They had parting lines and a sprue on the tire edge and you had to carefully trim to avoid adding a flat spot but this was the early-mid 60s before "Hot Wheels" came along and changed everything.
In previous years we shot for Appearance trophies, and built cheater cars for the unlimited class. This year, we went for speed with his legal car. I don't know why I didn't think of it last year, but after you detail the axles (remove the parting lines, etc), we chucked the axles up in 1/4-inch drill, set it in the vise to hold it, and then fired up the Dremel tool with a polishing buff on it, and ran the buff against the axles, spinning in opposite directions. We took second fastest in the entire pack this year, and he's going to districts in a couple weeks, and I think it was mainly from the axles. Oh, and we took First and Second in the open class. Again. -Brad
Oh man! That brings back great memories! My Dad didn't know much about cars, but he was the king when it came to scouts and wood working! I still have one of my cars in a box somewhere. We did 3: The first was piloted by Darth Vader - dates me a bit - to the first and ORIGINAL Star Wars. We lost big time, but won the beauty contest. The second was more aerodynamic and it was painted candy apple red. we worked really hard on the weight by adding molten lead to the cockpit, and spraying all the wheels with graphite. The last one was inspired by Indy cars and had a hand carved front spoiler and a rear "whale-tail" with racing stripes. I don't think any of them won other than on looks, but those are some great memories! My son is 7 now, and it won't be long before he gets to make that trip. Thanks for the thread!
Brad, after you detail the axles and smooth slightly, degrease and coat axles with a dry film lube(molybdenum),several coats, heat cured between coats in (shhhhhhh...., moms oven), this dry film lube polishes up NICELY with an ultra fine Scotch-Brite pad. Then with detailed wheels,they can be lubed on race day and as needed with dry powdered graphite,(lock lubricant). The graphite against the molybdenum is "slicker than two eels F-------n in a barrell of snot". This system resulted in consistent winners with all three of my boys! Except for the baked on finish part in moms oven........ no winners there!
WOW that thing is flat out cool. Our race is next weekend. We don't even have ours done yet. Here's a couple of pics of our entries for the past two years. The Indy car didn't even place, but the "Snakester" took a trophy and then went to the regionals and won the whole thing. Man was that fun.
In my last 2 years of cub scouts my dad and I went all out. The blue, twin engine dragster was done in 4th grade and the green funny car was done in 5th.
The Jalopy Journal
