Australian Slot Car Racers Association

Hi guys and Gals,

Well,..First up, my sincere apologies for Not having been 'On the Case' regarding the writing up of the Race Reports for Both Plafit and Retro of late.

For Most of this year, I have Only been racing in the 1/24th 'Historics' class, as Both my 1/32 cars needed some 'attention'.
To be honest, whilst the numbers of racers has been particularly small, they are made up from the 'Usual Suspects',..lol and Have ALWAYS provided for both Very Enjoyable and 'Spirited' racing !!!

So, after having re-fettled my Ferrari F40 for the previous round, I was Keen to give it another run, especially as I was hoping for More Div'2 cars to have a run this time, (mind you the F40 does OK against the Div1 cars anyway !!,..lol), plus we have had John, one of HSC's Main Scalextric guys Join us of late, so we atleast had 1 x relative Newcomer interested in competing in the 2 x classes.

I guess it MUST be said though, that generally and unfortunately Usually, we have Only had at times 3 or 4 racers in the 1/32 class and invariably Only 4, 5 or 6 racers for 1/24th 'Historics'. All a bit Sad really, although it Must be said, as is usual with that assembled Group of Locals, both the racing and Social atmosphere has Always been Very enjoyable !!

LAST NIGHT though,..was in fact THE FIRST Time I have turned up for a Race,..for it to NOT Eventuate,..due to 'Lack of Interest' !!!

When I arrived, Only Joe and Steph were there (apart from James ofcourse), but They were packing up and preparing to leave,... AND Did so,..not long before firstly John and eventually Dale arriving,..which realistically did Not really provide for enough Humans to both Race, marshall and Run the race.

This 'Situation', along with the previous and continuing Poor numbers, would appear to be "Sounding the Death Knell" for Plafit racing in General at HSC !!!

The Next Round probably will Also Not be Raced/Run, due to the Scheduled Track Maintenance/Re-Braiding, that was partly completed earlier this year and will allow for the re-braiding to be fully completed, (which Will be Great !!), so am assuming that realistically the upcoming State Titles will be the Next and (Who Knows,..Possibly Last), Plafit races held at HSC !!! an arguably Sad situation.

Might be quite a few Plafit cars and stuff appearing on eBay and the relevant Forums for Sale soon,.....sigh,...

Must add that I also 'Feel' for James, having made a more than reasonable commitment to Plafit in general, who still has a Wall filled with seemingly unwanted Plafit parts.

Hey!,..Just think How Much better it Could have been, had we made the Rules even Stricter and Enforced and made Wheel Inserts 'Mandatory' !!!
Sorry,...couldn't help myself,...

All in All,..a rather Sad situation,....

I hear you Stoo.. Trouble is, everyone except Hornsby is running the new 1700 "can am " chassis. It's a bargain at around $100. Comes with drilled lightweight wheels with glued and tried tyres, really robust front axle blocks and weight where you want it. Best of all it's a very good chassis for Mini Z so if you want have one chassis for two classes its works. The 1300 has come to the end of its production run... So, anyone serious about the APC has one of the new ones by now and as they are not legal at Hornsby they cant come and race without having another car. I bitched about this last year... I Had a really nice 1300 but as usual, Werner, only weeks before the APC released the new chassis forcing the serious racers to buy one. It immediately fractured Historics into those with, and those without.
That was a year ago.. Is time to move on, and finally i'm going to buy one. Sigh

Funny thing is locally a few of us had tried to get guys from a plastic chassis background involved with Plafit but there was really very little interest. Yet when Scaleauto released their 1/24th metal chassis cars just about everyone bought one. Even without a race program for them. Goes to show the power of RTR and the kiss principle.

I agree with Kim regarding the late inclusion of bodies or chassis for an upcoming event. Even harder if your not local and don't get to hear about them. It would be really annoying to turn up with a great car and get beaten by the new whizz bang chassis or body that you were unaware of or didn't have time to build or perfect.

The newer can am chassis is a beauty and great value to. I didn't know it worked for a mini z so that was a tip worth knowing. I hope you can resurrect some numbers as the cars are lovely to drive when they are sweet.

I think you nailed it First Corner.. RTR keeps it simple.. just as all plastic cars come. It's a bit daunting for plastic guys to mount a body on little foam block glued in just the right position to a lexan shell..
The Scaleauto's just screw on like a 1/32 plastic so its familiar territory... Interestingly, Plafit have now released body mount plates that connect a 1700 chassis straight to a Scaleauto body. Thats got to tell you something.
Up here in Qld there's good movement with a class called Modern GT. The class allows you run any screw together production chassis plafit, scaleauto, Scholer etc. Most of the racers use the Scaleauto body range, some use kit car bodies and there a few using the GFK laminates. The bodies, including pans have to weigh 45 grams to which most of the Scaleauto's come close to.

Hi Guys, Where is the APC in 2014???
Wayne

Where is the APC in 2014???

Not sure That Information has been 'Posted' Anywhere as of Yet,...perhaps Others may know,..??