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AS A FOLLOW UP ON MY "HISTORY OF SLOT RACING" STORY, BELOW ARE SOME PICTURES YOU MIGHT FIND INTERESTING....John Ford
NOTE: While I am collecting these pictures, there is no real order to their their placement on this page. Later, I'll set them in a more organized manner....jf
From the '60's this is an AMT Indy car.
In the early years, mass produced slot bodies
were not available.
Balsa wood was the modellers friend.
With the popularity of Big Daddy Roth, and
other custom car designers of the day,
the demand for what would later become called "Thingies"
arose in hobby shops.
This is the BZ Banshee.
Another was this Classic "Stinger" with working wing
in the back which would
flap up under breaking. Slot's first air brakes.
Classic had a lot of "Thingies" including this 26D powered Serpent.
Cox tended to stay with the Scale appearing slot cars like this
Cheetah.
Of course, one of Cox's most popular cars
was the Jim Hall Chapparal 2E
with working wing.
Chapparral's were available in every brand. This kit had Jim Hall's picture.
Dynamic later became one of the hobby's
leading innovators, but in the
beginning, their ready to run's looked a lot like Cox.
Monogram started almost from the beginning
with brass chassis. This
Ferrari 275 is shown here with the 36D motor.
A popular car in the '60's and still coveted today is the Cox Ford GT 40.
Parma really shook up the slot racing industry
in the early 80's with the
release of the Flexi chassis, the first mass produced entry level
slot chassis. It was competitive with many of the custom built
chassis of the day and is
the grandfather of all modern day entry level chassis.
Home tracks are available today that will accomodate all scales
at the same time.
1/32 scale home tracks are growing in popularity today.
The smaller scale allows the tracks to be
set up in the home and many
of the manufacturers of the 60's are coming back to produce ready
to
run cars in 1/32 scale.
Cox finally got on the "thingie" bandwagon with this lightweight, overpowered but very popular "La Cucaracha".
I don't remember where this picture came from, but it could be any slot racer's box in the 60's. Even today, a wooden slot box is coveted.
HO scale racing is the smalest form of Slot
Racing. This tri-oval is really decked out
with scenery. It even has a "real" lake in the middle
with live goldfish. It was built by Brad's HO tracks and is located in
Mt. View, California at the Shaunadega Raceway owned and operated by
Shaun Lee.
Grass roots modellers are still out there as is shown in this cover shot of a home made modified, looking very good.
Slot Cartoons have always been popular. Above is one from the 60's and below, the popular "EsCarGo Bros." made popular in the 80's and still around today.
Monogram had a real loser when they came
out with this small underpowered Midget Racer in the 60's. Today,
every collector wants one and the price is more than 5 times what
they sold for originally.