6 replies to this topic

[UncleWaldo]

Wow, there sure is a lot of interesting information posted on this site. I am a resident of Carpentersville and was twelve years old when this track opened. My only experience at the track was in 1968 when the track opened the dragstrip. I raced my 1968 Plymouth Sport Satellite there on oping day. I still remeber my ET's. 15.30s @ 89 MPH. My stock tires were having a real hard time hooking up off the line and I was getting a lot of wheel spin.
Two weeks ago I started an excercise program that involves a lot of walking. The new RaceWay woods is a great place to walk. Lots of up and downhill paths can really get your heart pumping. Walking over all this historic and new pavement is really a lot of fun. New pavement has been laid from the north end of the straight around the mini monza and all the way around the east side of the track up the uphill stretch through the eses to Stephans straight. The south end of the main straight has new pavement from the area of the old Monza Wall to just befor the short couse cutoffs. Today when I went for my walk I noticed surveyors working around the washout on the north portion of the staightaway. Possibly laying out plans for the bridge over the washout. The track has been cleaned up since being purchased by the forest preserve. There is still a four cylinder engine block laying in the bottom of the wash out. All the old cars and junk have been removed.
I plan on building a scale model of the track. I will being using a scale of one inch equals sixty four feet. This will allow the use of 1/64th scale diecast model cars to represent the race cars. I haven't done any figuring on the dimensions I need for the layout. I hope to build it on a 4 by 8 foot plywood base. The hard part will be building in the elevations. I am looking into getting copies of the original blueprints for the track. As of this post I have nothing but copies of maps posted on the meadowdale racetrack website. So as of now I am just starting the planing process. I hope I can get past the planning stage on on to the building stage by the end of this year. What I really need is acurate dimension.

[D-Type]

I think you've got your scales mixed up. 1:64 scale is 1 inch = 64 inches or 1 foot = 64 feet. 1 inch = 64 feet is 1: 64x12 ie 1:768.

If you try and do what you suggest your cars will be way too big for the track. If you make the track in scale with the cars you'll need an aircraft hangar to accommodate it!

[LittleChris]

I think you've got your scales mixed up. 1:64 scale is 1 inch = 64 inches or 1 foot = 64 feet. 1 inch = 64 feet is 1: 64x12 ie 1:768.

If you try and do what you suggest your cars will be way too big for the track. If you make the track in scale with the cars you'll need an aircraft hangar to accommodate it!

I feel a Spinal Tap moment coming on

[UncleWaldo]

I feel a Spinal Tap moment coming on

LOL Like I said its still in the planing stages. I have the map set so it will fit on a 4 by 8 sheet of plywood. So I guess my scale wiil be a lot smaller. My son is a lot better at math than I am so I am going to enlist his help. I know the straightaway is supposed to be 4000 feet long. So a scale that uses 1 foot equals 1000 feet would fit the track on a 4 by 8 sheet of plywood. If I use this scale 1 inch would equal 333.33 feet. I may have to give up the idea of placing die cast cars on the track!! Oh by the way, if I used the 1:64 scale it would need to be (gasp) 62 feet long just for the straightaway. I think my math is correct this time??

[Geoff E]

So a scale that uses 1 foot equals 1000 feet would fit the track on a 4 by 8 sheet of plywood. If I use this scale 1 inch would equal 333.33 feet.

No, 1 inch would be a 1000 inches - 83.33 feet ... and a car would be about 0.2 inches.

[UncleWaldo]

No, 1 inch would be a 1000 inches - 83.33 feet ... and a car would be about 0.2 inches.

Thanks I stand corrected!!

[Aero426]

Strombecker slot car plans from circa 1962.