Rally Triumph TR7's
I've always wanted a decent running slot Triumph TR7, probably because I was one of the poor unfortunates that had one of the very first 1:1 cars produced, the infamous "Speke" cars. It was without doubt one of the most unreliable cars I have ever owned...the engine dropped a piston after 800 miles, it had three new gearboxes, two radiators, four attempts at preventing overheating by fitting replacement heads and to cap it all the main Leyland dealer managed to drop a grinding machine on the bonnet!..............All this in the first year of ownership, needless to say I got my money back from a very embarrassed British Leyland.
Anyway back to the slots!....The only model of the Tony Pond Rally cars I ever found was made by Scalextric in the Eighties, not Scaley's best period for sure, but the shell had fair detail, the proportions look right , however the car does look a little larger than 1/32nd but I can live with that.....
As Britian, (and the rest of the World) is currently experiencing a severe downturn in it's economy, and slot car manufacturers have decided the best way to sell more cars is to increase prices significantly when every other commodity has reduced prices!..I have decided not to buy any new cars until the situation is resolved and to build "Credit Crunch Specials".........
The idea behind this article is to build a great running non-magnet car for a Home wooden track as cheaply as possible.....so the first thing to do was to source a bodyshell.
The Scalextric Triumph TR7 was available in a variety of colours and liveries, some authentic and some fantasy. I really wanted to model the Tony Pond Rally Trumph TR7 V8's so I had to source either the white bodied car or the red bodied.....in the end I managed to win both on Ebay.....hence this article turned into building two cars.
The Scalex shell, unfortunatley requires the chassis to make a complete car as details such as front and rear bumpers and lower side panels are moulded to it. Therefore, you need to purchase a complete car. I managed to buy one car for £6.50 and one for £7.20, pretty good as it gave me two spare Mabuchi motors for future projects...the rest of the parts I threw away.
Mount the chassis onto the body and with a dremmel tool remove all of the chassis except the lower side panels, rear bumper and front bumper....You can leave it pretty rough for now as you will need to trim to fit the new chassis at a latter stage.. Glue the remaining parts of the chassis to the bodyshell, I used superglue to hold the parts in place and then secured with a two part epoxy, (JB Weld or Areldite)........Easy now all you need a chassis.
Once again Scalextric have come to our aid.......They produce a range of cars caleed "drift" cars featuring a guide that can turn through 360 degree's. These cars obviously don't sell very well as they get dumped on to Ebay retailers and you can pick them up very cheaply. The car you want is the drift Nissan 360...I bought two complete cars for £10...see how cheap this is.....Please note I also managed to sell the bodyshells back on Ebay for £5 for two so each running chassis only cost me £2:50. These chassis, (with a proper guide and suitable tyres are great performers on home tracks).
The donor chassis is the exact width you require but the wheelbase is too long so you need to cut it to the correct length.
It's best to use a Dremmel with a cutting disc for this task, just mark where you want to cut, (I used the magnet slot) make your cut and trim off a few milimeters until you have the correct wheelbase....There is no need to remove the front or rear axles providing you support the chassis clear of the ground.
Once you are satisfied you have the correct wheelbase and all is square, join the two halves of the chassis together with JB Weld, (I use a reinforcing strut accross the join), and allow to dry.
Add acouple of sections of thin plasticard accross the top of the join to hide the JB Weld and paint black......Here's a photo of the chassis, showing the join area with the unpainted plasticard added:-
The next job is to replace the guide......The Scaley one isn't a lot of good on wood and it is much better to fit a replacement. Remove the existing guide holder, guide, circuit board and all wiring, including unsoldering the motor connections. I fitted a TSRF Guide with Parma racing braid, which I got from AB Slotsports. The total cost of the guide was £4. You need to trim the area around the guide to ensure free movement, secure with the nut provided. Now you can make up 2 No. new motor leads and solder them to the motor. The TSRF guide has it's own unique method of securing lead wires which can be found on their website.
Next job is to cut down the rear body mounting posts, flush with the chassis, the holes for the fixing screws will now be too big, so you need to add 2 No. M2 washers to stop the screws pulling through.
Now you can secure the bearings with superglue and fit the your choice of tyre to the rear wheels. For home use I use tyres from Pauls in Canada, (via Ebay), they are very fairly priced and provide great grip on wood tracks, (cost of tyres £2).
The chassis is now complete.
You now need to secure your chassis to the shell. I always use mounting tubes. They are very easy to make and provide a secure fixing method. I use Plastistrut tube, of the same diameter as Ninco body screws......Cut a length of tube, (about 50mm long), hold in one hand and screw in the Ninco body screw with the other, it will force the Plastistruct tube to expand and you end up with a nice tight fitting mount. Next remove the screw and place the tube on chassis over the fixing hole and screw tight. It should look like this:-
You can now repeat this for the number of securing tubes you require. I use three, two at the rear, and one at the front of the chassis.
Place your chassis onto a tech plate or similar and make sure all is square and then place the body on top of the mounting tubes.....Don't worry it won't even get close to fitting properly :-
You now need to carefully trim the tubes to the correct height so that the body sits squarely on the chassis, without touching the wheels :-
OK..that's pretty cool....the secret is to take a little off the tube each time and then replace the shell until you are satisfied.....I use a Dremmel with a cutting disc for this operation and a file to square the top of the tube. When you are satisfied secure the tube to the body with JB Weld or similar.....Allow 24 hours to cure.....
You should then end up with :-
The cars handle great and are pretty fast and make a great racing pair.......OK the wheels are not "period" correct and they might look better painted silver, but I'm happy with them. The spotlights on the original car are pretty puny and I "beefed" them up a little with some over size plasticard roundels and home made Cibe decals.
So what about the cost of one of these cars:-
Scalextric Donor TR7 - £6.50
Scalextric Donor Chassis - £2.50
TSRF Guide & Braids - £4
Rear Tyres - £2
Sundries - Say £2
Total Cost - £16........I say no more.
Anyway back to the slots!....The only model of the Tony Pond Rally cars I ever found was made by Scalextric in the Eighties, not Scaley's best period for sure, but the shell had fair detail, the proportions look right , however the car does look a little larger than 1/32nd but I can live with that.....
As Britian, (and the rest of the World) is currently experiencing a severe downturn in it's economy, and slot car manufacturers have decided the best way to sell more cars is to increase prices significantly when every other commodity has reduced prices!..I have decided not to buy any new cars until the situation is resolved and to build "Credit Crunch Specials".........
The idea behind this article is to build a great running non-magnet car for a Home wooden track as cheaply as possible.....so the first thing to do was to source a bodyshell.
The Scalextric Triumph TR7 was available in a variety of colours and liveries, some authentic and some fantasy. I really wanted to model the Tony Pond Rally Trumph TR7 V8's so I had to source either the white bodied car or the red bodied.....in the end I managed to win both on Ebay.....hence this article turned into building two cars.
The Scalex shell, unfortunatley requires the chassis to make a complete car as details such as front and rear bumpers and lower side panels are moulded to it. Therefore, you need to purchase a complete car. I managed to buy one car for £6.50 and one for £7.20, pretty good as it gave me two spare Mabuchi motors for future projects...the rest of the parts I threw away.
Mount the chassis onto the body and with a dremmel tool remove all of the chassis except the lower side panels, rear bumper and front bumper....You can leave it pretty rough for now as you will need to trim to fit the new chassis at a latter stage.. Glue the remaining parts of the chassis to the bodyshell, I used superglue to hold the parts in place and then secured with a two part epoxy, (JB Weld or Areldite)........Easy now all you need a chassis.
Once again Scalextric have come to our aid.......They produce a range of cars caleed "drift" cars featuring a guide that can turn through 360 degree's. These cars obviously don't sell very well as they get dumped on to Ebay retailers and you can pick them up very cheaply. The car you want is the drift Nissan 360...I bought two complete cars for £10...see how cheap this is.....Please note I also managed to sell the bodyshells back on Ebay for £5 for two so each running chassis only cost me £2:50. These chassis, (with a proper guide and suitable tyres are great performers on home tracks).
The donor chassis is the exact width you require but the wheelbase is too long so you need to cut it to the correct length.
It's best to use a Dremmel with a cutting disc for this task, just mark where you want to cut, (I used the magnet slot) make your cut and trim off a few milimeters until you have the correct wheelbase....There is no need to remove the front or rear axles providing you support the chassis clear of the ground.
Once you are satisfied you have the correct wheelbase and all is square, join the two halves of the chassis together with JB Weld, (I use a reinforcing strut accross the join), and allow to dry.
Add acouple of sections of thin plasticard accross the top of the join to hide the JB Weld and paint black......Here's a photo of the chassis, showing the join area with the unpainted plasticard added:-
The next job is to replace the guide......The Scaley one isn't a lot of good on wood and it is much better to fit a replacement. Remove the existing guide holder, guide, circuit board and all wiring, including unsoldering the motor connections. I fitted a TSRF Guide with Parma racing braid, which I got from AB Slotsports. The total cost of the guide was £4. You need to trim the area around the guide to ensure free movement, secure with the nut provided. Now you can make up 2 No. new motor leads and solder them to the motor. The TSRF guide has it's own unique method of securing lead wires which can be found on their website.
Next job is to cut down the rear body mounting posts, flush with the chassis, the holes for the fixing screws will now be too big, so you need to add 2 No. M2 washers to stop the screws pulling through.
Now you can secure the bearings with superglue and fit the your choice of tyre to the rear wheels. For home use I use tyres from Pauls in Canada, (via Ebay), they are very fairly priced and provide great grip on wood tracks, (cost of tyres £2).
The chassis is now complete.
You now need to secure your chassis to the shell. I always use mounting tubes. They are very easy to make and provide a secure fixing method. I use Plastistrut tube, of the same diameter as Ninco body screws......Cut a length of tube, (about 50mm long), hold in one hand and screw in the Ninco body screw with the other, it will force the Plastistruct tube to expand and you end up with a nice tight fitting mount. Next remove the screw and place the tube on chassis over the fixing hole and screw tight. It should look like this:-
You can now repeat this for the number of securing tubes you require. I use three, two at the rear, and one at the front of the chassis.
Place your chassis onto a tech plate or similar and make sure all is square and then place the body on top of the mounting tubes.....Don't worry it won't even get close to fitting properly :-
You now need to carefully trim the tubes to the correct height so that the body sits squarely on the chassis, without touching the wheels :-
OK..that's pretty cool....the secret is to take a little off the tube each time and then replace the shell until you are satisfied.....I use a Dremmel with a cutting disc for this operation and a file to square the top of the tube. When you are satisfied secure the tube to the body with JB Weld or similar.....Allow 24 hours to cure.....
You should then end up with :-
The cars handle great and are pretty fast and make a great racing pair.......OK the wheels are not "period" correct and they might look better painted silver, but I'm happy with them. The spotlights on the original car are pretty puny and I "beefed" them up a little with some over size plasticard roundels and home made Cibe decals.
So what about the cost of one of these cars:-
Scalextric Donor TR7 - £6.50
Scalextric Donor Chassis - £2.50
TSRF Guide & Braids - £4
Rear Tyres - £2
Sundries - Say £2
Total Cost - £16........I say no more.
