Brookie Pinewood Derby Car

[MathFish]

So last year was my son's first year in Cub Scouts, he started in the bear den in the fall. Fast forward to last December and he and I were facing our first Pinewood Derby competition. The troop we are in has a really good group of families who are very involved in helping out their scouts, and the leadership of the troop, in an effort to appease parents who want to be VERY actively involve in the derby, has instituted an "outlaw" pinewood derby. If a family decides to partake in the outlaw format, they (or nutjob dads - like myself) are encouraged to go a bit overboard with the cars... Last year, my son and I decided to participate in both the regulation derby and the outlaw class. We had fun making both cars, my son's car finished in 7th place overall and our outlaw car took first place.

I was looking forward to this year's derby because I had an idea of making our outlaw car into a "trout" car... So yesterday, my son and I sat down and sketched out a car that will be his regulation entry, and I sat down to create the Native Brookie-mobile... We worked on his car first and I got him settled with the task of sanding so I could begin working on cutting out the basic fish form from the pine block. When we broke for lunch - he got a call from a buddy who invited my son over to play... I allowed him to him to go and after I dropped him off, it was me, unhindered in the workshop, to get back to the business of making this fish car.

A coping saw, five cheap files, a rasp, a DeWalt orbital palm sander, a dull chisel and one sheet of 150 grit sand paper were the tools I used to make the form of the fish. A heck of a lot of luck in mixing colors of the 12 assorted colors of the acrylic craft paint that we have is what it took to get the fish painted. I topped it off by tying a size 12 bead head olive nymph pattern that I've had luck fishing with and hooked it into its mouth...

I haven't done much carving before, but I'm happy with how it turned out. I for sure haven't painted much of anything before though! It took a heck of a lot of time to pull this silly little car off, and I just wanted to share this with the PAFF community. I have learned an lot through this site - it is the best!

Lastly, I'm not hopeful that this car will be a contender, but I'm not too sure that was my intent in making it...

 

[LetortAngler]

Very cool. Don't underestimate the aerodynamics of the brook trout form.

 

[GenCon]

That is pretty great. Nice job.

GenCon

 

[dc410]

That is a really cool idea. Nicely done. Now that I think way back to my son's pinewood derby building days, tungsten beads would have been perfect to insert under the car at those strategic spots to get that weight and the displacement just perfect. I don't even think I knew about tungsten beads back then. Awesome job on the brookie derby car.

 

[laszlo]

Excellent job I wasn't expecting it to resemble a fish. But you nailed it.

 

[geebee]

very cool. i would like one of those for my desk at work, lol.

 

[turkey]

Looks wild to me

 

[MKern]

That's awesome.

 

[steveo27]

Awesome

 

[DaveKile]

That's great. We had fun making a shark one time, but not nearly as nice as your trout.

 

[MathFish]

Thanks for all the compliments! The "it looks wild" comment is too funny!

I will post the performance results from the competition, but that won't be for a while - the event is at the end of January. I still have to add weight to it, I currently have 3 oz of tungsten weights that are sold for derby cars to put into it, but I still have to figure out how to get probably another 5 oz into it on top of that! Regulation cars can weigh up to 5 oz and the outlaws up to 10 oz... The tungsten weights are small (which I need them to be) but every 3 oz cost $23.00! So I still have some engineering to do. The 3 oz I have already were bought with a 50% off coupon - and I'm not sure about dumping more money into it...

Next year is my son's last year in Cub Scouts, so I'm already thinking what fish will be next year's racer. I'm leaning toward a brown trout.

 

[pcray1231]

Very cool.

FWIW, we were pretty good at pinewood, and I think that'll race pretty well, assuming the axles and wheels are aligned well. Run it tail first, of course.

Alignment is a key. Put on a flat surface, make sure both front wheels are firmly on ground. Then push it and make sure it goes straight. You can either remove the axle and re-attach, or use pliers for small adjustments. They even make tools to do it perfectly.

Weight: Drill shallow holes in the bottom near the rear. Fill with fly fishing putty weights. Effective and fits the theme!

We always did that to get it "just" below the maximum weight. Then we added flat head wood screws to take it "just" over the weight. At weigh in, take a screw driver. Guy weighs it, says it's too heavy, remove a screw, weigh it again. Till he passes it. A good scale is a necessity, reloading scales work well!

The placement of weight is important. You want the balance point to be 1/2 to 1 inch in front of the rear wheels. It can't get too close to that axle or it'll have a tendency to lift the front, a wheely, and that ain't good. But assuming the track is a ramp and then a flat, then being farther back gives you the extra split second of "push" where it straightens out.

Polish the nails and wheels. Take a nail file to the inside head of the nail where it hits the wheel to remove any burrs and so forth. This is important.

Graphite lubrication in the wheels. Not just a puff, really get it in there and then turn the wheels a lot to work it in.

And one for your son. Our track was a raised center type. Most kids just put the car on there. But tell your son that when he does, get in line with the track, and make sure the wheels aren't touching the raised middle. Halfway down the track the wheels will hit anyway. But you'll get a slight head start that way, and the better aligned the car and his placement, the longer that advantage lasts. Lightly sand the inside of the wheels as well so that when they do hit, there's no roughness to catch. A little graphite there won't hurt either.

And, umm, make sure the clearance is sufficient. LOL. One year I thought we had the best car ever. But I didn't have much clearance. Technically departure angle, lol. Took a big lead on the ramp, but where the ramp meets the flat, it came to a sudden halt, haha.

 

[FarmerDave]

turkey wrote:
Looks wild to me

LOL, you beat me too it, but I was going to say stocked.;-)

 

[PennypackFlyer]

Great job! May it not swim outside its channel on Darby day!

 

[Six-Gun]

Super cool idea!

 

[poopdeck]

As long as nobody shows up with a sailfish car the race is in the bag. Looks great. We never had an outlaw class when I was in the scouts. Great idea.

 

[MathFish]

Well, the results from the pinewood derby are in...

No sailfish cars showed up and there were only two other competitors in the "outlaw" class that the brookie car had to compete with. All three outlaws raced one time per lane of the four lanes on the track. In each of the four races, the brookie car took 1st place.

It was disappointing that there was such a low turnout for the outlaw class, so the victory wasn't all that satisfying. In the end though, I was happy with its performance and I enjoyed putting the car together. I am attaching a photo of underside of the car that shows the how the weight was added into it. I drilled holes and dropped in some cylindrical weights that I had and I also added in some lead by dropping fishing weights into the holes and then I melted them in using a soldering iron. In adding the lead, I heated the car up so much that the clear coat started to bubble a little on the finished side of the car! I was lucky that it didn't ruin the coat of paint...

The car is destined to have a reserved spot on a fly tying desk that I will make/get in the future. Perhaps next year, I will see if I can pull of making a brown trout car.

 

[salmonoid]

Congrats on creating the winning c[h]ar.

 

[poopdeck]

Nice. I think it's a great addition to the pinewood derby. Damn I want a 10 year old around again. No wait, let me think about that some more.

 

[STONEMAN]

Advice from a 5 year veteran: come in second place. Your son scores the excitement and a trophy but you don't move on to districts held at an inconvenient time and in a far away place full of over zealous fathers.