TTAC Inspires Small Scale Project Car Build
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When TTAC reader and slot car enthusiast John Kit showed his daughter Emma my post about the Lotus Cortina, she said, “we have a Lotus Cortina slot car don’t we?” In fact they had two 1/32 versions of Jim Clark’s Team Lotus cars, one made by Revell/Monogram and the other by Scalextric. John likes the exterior look and detailing on the Revell version but it doesn’t have a full interior, which the Scalextric car does have, including a scale version of Clark behind the wheel. Kit decided to take the best parts of both slot cars bodies and mash them up into a single more realistic slot car, which you can see above. The results look very impressive. We’ve featured project car builds before but I think this is the first slot car build covered on the site, though we’ve featured some of John and Emma’s slot cars before. I guess it goes to show just how multifaceted car enthusiasm can be. You can see John’s account and photos of the build over at slotforum.com.
One of the best parts of writing for this site is the interaction with our readers and it’s gratifying when something we do inspires you folks in your own enthusiasm. By the way, an interest in Lotus Cortinas isn’t the only thing that John and I share. I still have the four-lane 1/32 Monogram “Sebring” slot car set my parents gave me as a Bar Mitzvah present. I’m pretty sure that John and I aren’t the only slot car fans on this site. It’s possible that the hobby may be even bigger today than it was in its supposed heyday back when I was 13. While there may have been more public tracks back then, nobody spent tens of thousands of dollars on home or corporate tracks in 1967, like Dave Beattie’s Slot Mods builds for folks like Jay Leno, Jim Farley and Audi.
Ronnie Schreiber edits Cars In Depth, a realistic perspective on cars & car culture and the original 3D car site. If you found this post worthwhile, you can get a parallax view at Cars In Depth. If the 3D thing freaks you out, don’t worry, all the photo and video players in use at the site have mono options. Thanks for reading – RJS
Ronnie Schreiber edits Cars In Depth, the original 3D car site.
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I also remember the 1/32 scale public tracks; one was set up for a while in a storefront in my hometown. And my brothers had a TYCO 1/87 slot car track; they bought and painted their own bodies for them. TTAC has also expanded my enjoyment of diecast and paper car models. When I saw the Cosworth Cortina article, I went in search of a 1/64 scale Cosworth Cortina; but all I could find was the Matchbox/Lindsey Cortina. Thanks for the article on minitures, Ronnie; it would be nice to see more of them. Die cast collecting is another realm that is as much for adults as it is for children these days.