Steve Lodefink's finished pinewood derby racer

Last month, I posted some photos of Steve Lodefink's unfinished pinewood racer bodies. Today, he sent me photos of one of the finished racers. I love the sparkle paint job.

Steve and I have started talking about holding an all ages pinewood derby race at Maker Faire. Why should Cub Scouts (or, more likely, their dads) have all the fun?
Pinewood Derby 2011

Mark Frauenfelder is the founder of Boing Boing and the editor-in-chief of MAKE and Cool Tools. Twitter: @frauenfelder. Come and hear Mark speak at the ALA conference in Chicago on July 1.

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http://pulse.yahoo.com/_QN6WUG7WMBDAGUPFVSJ6HJAS2A Darth

Looks a little bit like Racer X.
http://twitter.com/openfly ǝɔʎoſ ʇʇɐW

I’d love for there to be a powered race track =P
http://www.flickr.com/photos/stefan_e_jones/ Stefan Jones

Oh, man. Just hearing “pinewood derby” fills me with bitterness.

I was one of those kids who didn’t get any help from Dad building his racer. My mom tried, but model building isn’t a Mom forte, you know?

My racer turned out looking shameful, and dragged along.

I don’t think I’d build & finish an adult-class racer, because I’d feel I was doing it out of spite rather than the joy of creation.
- knoxblox
  
  I had to make mine myself, also. It was functional, and at least somewhat aerodynamic.
  
  HOWEVER…there needs to be some quality control amongst the track assemblers.
  The reason for the Great Pinewood Derby Tragedy of ’76 was that the depth of the guide rail on one side of the track was gauged too thick, and rubbed on the bottom of almost half the cars that raced that day. It was a matter whether you could beat the other kid to the track first that added another variable into whether your car could beat his. Somebody’s dad finally pulled out his pocket ruler and figured out the problem, but the judges wouldn’t allow anyone to redo.
- http://deansli.st/ Dean Putney
  
  As a Tiger Cub, I made my pinewood derby racer with no parental help at all. Mostly because I was hugely hostile towards it.
  
  I showed up and creamed everyone with my shitty block of wood. And then the big kids complained I had help and my dad was like “Look at that horrible thing, seriously?”
irksome

Porsche 904? Lola Mk 3?
- steve lodefink
  
  Well, it’s not a model of any particular car, but it has strong influence from Lola t-70, Lotus 40, Mclaren M1, and Chaparral cars of the early 60′s
lavardera

I just love this classic 60′s racing car.
David Sanders

My son’s pack does host an adult and sibling race so that the dad’s don’t interfere with the son’s cars as much. seems to work too. You can definitely see the difference in the cars.
obeyken

prefuckingtty!
hugh crawford

Looks like it’s supposed to be Bud Morley’s McLaren Elva Mark II (chassis #M1B-30-05 constructed by Trojan cars ) 1967 Can Am car , but I don’t think he ever ran it as #26 . The individual exhaust pipes and left hand drive are kind of wrong come to think of it.
- steve lodefink
  
  Hugh, I got the decals from a place called Patto’s Place that sells slot car supplies. They were supposed to be for an M1A. I mixed and matched sponsors and numbers from 3 different cars / drivers. The driver figure is a COX slot car driver.
Senor Wences

As a Cub Scout I had a friend in a different Troop. Rumor was that his dad, a lawyer, represented some dude who threw in an unbeatable pinewood derby racer design as part of a payment for a case. My friend would enter variations on this theme year after year and piss us off as he progressed through the stages to an eventual grand champion trophy time and time again.

My dad helped me a lot with my racers. However, the year he let me design my own was the one I managed to clinch third place!
mejohnson

An all-ages pinewood derby sounds like a really fun idea! If anyone is interested in a similar event at the California State Fair in Sacramento (July 12-29, 2012), please contact me, Michelle Johnson, at mejohnson@calexpo.com
hugh crawford

Now that I think about it , it looks a lot like a Huffaker mk10 Genie
nickelrocket

my dad and i (mostly dad) built a sweet racer that had the best look but not the best race time. We won design the first couple years and kept tweaking on it. added weight to the side skirts and used lubricating powder on the axles. by th third year we had the champion. Then some kid sent his ’56 Ford sailing down the track after a race and smashed the rear end. We can rebuild it!

P.S. I can’t wait to see Lodefink’s Talbot all painted and pretty.
http://twitter.com/bbulkow brian bulkowski

I think you are sentimentalizing the pinewood derby experience.

The car I built was disqualified. Why? It was too heavy. Why? Because the organizer’s scale was improperly calibrated. I had used a very good balance from the local university chemistry department, removed 5%, and created the heaviest possible car.

It turned out one of the tracks was the fastest. Cars with lower numbers won, because they were in the right hand tracks.

Winning a pinewood derby depends almost entirely on axle design. The amount of shake and the rolling friction is key. According to rules, you can use any lubricant, but you must use a certain kind of nail. You must also use the lousy stamped plastic tires, but some kits had better made tires.

The pinewood derby was, for me, an anti-maker experience. Instead of debating nail torsion, I saw a car with a low number win when it was a simple block of wood with no paint. A lesson that technology did not win; instead, luck.

My advice: create a new effort or category. Don’t reuse a mythical sentimental experience.
- AboutTheNumbers
  
  It’s not about the destination but instead the journey. I spend quality time with my son (and now daughter as her Girl Scout troop is building and racing) in the build of and on race day. No matter how we come out in the end, all the kids are winners for having that experience.
- cajunnsaudi
  
  The track our Pack uses has four lanes and each car runs one heat on each lane to eliminate track bias. We also mandate that each car be made new each year, no reusing/tweaking cars from years past. The only lubricant allowed was dry graphite. WE also use three scales and cross check them anytime a car is over the limit to ensure the scale hasn’t drifted.
  
  For our Webelos last year we had a workshop and made all the boys make their own cars themselves with minimal parental involvement. You wouldn’t believe how many parents complained that wasn’t fair and that their kids car wouldn’t be competitive that way. There is a bigger push for kids to be ‘winners’ than for them to learn how to make things on their own.
- Ito Kagehisa
  
  The triumph of the uncarved block.
Nicky G

My buddy busted out his pinewood derby race cars from childhood last week at a get-together. One of them got number 2 in Maryland, it was a pretty slick car.
Cruxx

As a Cub Scout I had a car that won both 3rd place speed and first place design, I was so proud!

As an adult I entered a pinewood derby in Williamsburg about oh 12 years ago? It was awful. All these funbusters became so anal about winning the speed contest, it got pretty embarrassing to watch.
Vanwall Green

You forgot the miniature tennis balls you have to remove from the Weber intakes just before starting it.
- Ito Kagehisa
  
  I seem to recall I used ping-pong balls and orange juice cans to tune multiple webers, back when dinosaurs still roamed the earth.
Jeff Crocker

Not sure if they’re still doing it, but the Bigfoot Lodge in Los Angeles does a monthly Pinewood Derby for boys and girls of legal drinking age. You race for glory and drinks. It is a blast. The cars are well-designed and usually pretty well-made, adding to an exciting and boozey evening. I believe the Bigfoot’s “Knotty Pine Derby” (The BSA are a litigious group) was the last Tuesday of every month, last time I checked.