Product Reviews

Tomy HO Track

It always amazes me when I see people doing something different or trying something new based upon something they read on Slots New?.  I do not claim to be a persuasive type person or a great writer.  However, I do claim to be passionate about slot car racing.  I do not even claim to be an especially talented racer, just someone who has fun doing it.  That being said, I have seen a pattern of people, shall we say, being exposed to new items or ideas, or items and ideas they just haven't thought about before from reading this blog.  Maybe they have thought about them in the past but haven't thought about it in a long time.  In my recent foray into HO scale cars, tracks, and racing I have come to realize this is a nostalgic aspect of the hobby to many people.  I am seeing people who hadn't thought of HO in a long time actually thinking about getting involved with these little cars.  So, with that in mind I thought it was time to write a review on what is considered by most people to be the gold standard of home sectional HO tracks today.

I do not claim to be an expert on HO tracks, but then most people who are looking to buy an HO track are not experts.  In fact, they probably know less than my limited knowledge on the subject.  I will therefore be writing about my own experiences with the Tomy sectional track pieces.  Disclaimer....anyone who buys a track, or not, based upon my opinions is a sucker and doesn't deserve to have a nice layout at home.  Do your own research before you buy.  Only use my opinions as what they are, one person's opinions.

The Tomy track I have was bought online as an incomplete Tomy Super International set.  This set was the Super International set which came with the Super G cars instead of the Mega G cars and it had the single voltage power packs.  It was obviously bought by someone who got a great price on an older unopened set.  I believe this person bought this set with the intention of breaking it up and selling off the pieces.  What I received was all the track pieces, guard rails, bridge supports, power packs, and three of the four controllers (still in plastic bags).  What I did not receive were the cars and one of the controllers.  I bought this set for $55 knowing the cars were missing.  After all, I was going to be more interested in the old T-Jet cars, so why did I need the new magnet cars.  It sounds like a great deal, but remember the cars that come with the new Super International set sell for $40  each.  That means $160 of the value from the set was gone.  The power packs were not the Tri-Power packs, so more value was gone.  All in all, I think I got a fair deal and not a super bargain.  I have no complaints as I intended to use a variable power supply anyway.  So, the missing cars and lower grade power packs were not an issue to me.  If you are buying a set, be aware of what you want.  If the cars are important, definitely buy a complete set.  You will save on the cars this way.  If you do not want to buy a variable power supply and would like to use the power pack that comes with the track, I highly recommend getting a Tomy set because of the versatility of the Tri-Power.

The thing that sets Tomy tracks apart from the other brands is the variety of straight lengths and curve radius.  The Tomy system gives you more flexibility in creating a layout than any other brand I have found.  You can get curves all the way from a 3" hairpin to a whopping 18" radius.  You can get curve sections in 3" increments, so you have 3, 6, 9, 12, 15, and 18 inch curve sections.  The 3" hairpin only comes as a one piece 180 degree turn.  I couldn't imagine trying to attach 3" quarter turn sections!  The 9" curve does have the option for a 90 degree turn as well as a 45 degree turn. All other curves only come in 45 degree sections.  It would be nice to have other curve radius options in the 90 degree curves, but there is no need in wishing for something that isn't there.  After all, two 12" 45 degree curves equal one 12" 90 degree curve so you just use two of them.  This does mean more connections for the electricity and for the racing surface, but more on that in a minute.

The thing I remembered about old HO tracks was the difficulty of connecting the sections.  Or should I say the difficulty of taking them apart to change the layout.  The problem I remember was having the connecting tabs on the individual sections breaking off.  I cannot tell you how many times I have connected and disconnected the track sections of the Tomy track I bought.  It shows no sign of wear or breakage.  The joints are well designed and the plastic seems to be more flexible than the old tracks I remember.  Thus far, not a single joining tab has broken.  The versatility and the durability of the Tomy brand is a value and can be recommended for that reason alone.  However, there are some issues you need to be aware of.

I mentioned the curves are mostly 1/8 turn sections with very few 1/4 turn sections (45 degree and 90 degree).  This is important because of the amount of track connections there are.  Each one of these connections is a possibility for a weak point in the layout.  The electrical connections seem to be a lot stronger than I thought it would be and the current flow seems to be very good.  These rails are made from spring steel and the engineering behind the connections seems to take advantage of that strength.  The joining of the plastic sections is also strong, but there is an issue.  At least there was an issue with the sections I had.  Note...these were older sections of track and not the ones you would buy in a set today.  I found out talking with the AFX people there was an issue with the track many years ago.  The molds had gotten worn and a flaw had been detected.  AFX spent a lot of money retooling to correct this issue.  The issue was with the 6" radius curve sections.  In the Tomy Super International set this is the smallest curve section you have.  You also get more 6" curve sections than any other piece in the track.  You get a total of 28 6" curve sections in the set.  To put this in perspective, you get a variety of straight sections in 3, 6, 9, and 15" sections totaling 28 pieces.  In addition, you get a total of 28 pieces of other curves in various radius.  You get as many 6" curves as you do total combined straights and total other curves.  1/3 of all the track pieces in this set are 6" radius curves.  Understand, if you build a four lane track, which is what this set is targeted towards, most of your turns WILL have a 6" radius curve on the inside.  This will be a tight layout suitable for smaller spaces which could be a good thing unless you are wanting a lot of high speed corners.  So with this in mind, you can see this was a critical area.

The flaw in the 6" curve sections was in the rail height and in the alignment of the slots.  This flaw occurred in the track that was put out at the time the Super International set had the Super G cars and not the Mega G cars.  I commend AFX/Tomy for recognizing this problem and correcting the issue.  The problem was if the turn is to the left the slot seemed to be offset a little.  It is offset just enough to allow the pins on the cars to get hung in the joint.  The problem is that on the outside part of the slot when turning left, the leading edge of the slot is a little more to the right than the trailing edge.  The result is, if you are going slow, the pin is pushing out in the turn and hanging on the leading edge of the next corner section.  Also, the height of the rails seemed to be more critical at this point also.  If the curve is turning to the right it did not seem to have the same issue.  I partially remedied this by sanding on the outside part of the slot to match the outside of the previous section.  This worked to some extent, but did not completely alleviate the situation.  After talking with the people from AFX I replaced the 6"curve sections that were giving me a problem with the new pieces that are currently being sold.  I can honestly say this helped tremendously.  I even ran T-Jets around the track with intentionally low speeds in the turns trying to get them to hang up and they wouldn't.

Before this issue was resolved and I received the assistance from AFX, I was going to recommend looking to other track brands and dispute this as being the current gold standard for HO sectional tracks.  Today, however, I cannot dispute the Tomy tracks being the best track to buy.  The quality is excellent, the engineering behind the product is brilliant, and the service cannot be rivaled.  Knowing the people from AFX are behind you if you buy their product is enough reason alone to buy this product.  In my case, an email to the company was answered in less than 4 hours and they communicated with me until the issue was resolved.  You do not get that kind of customer support many places with any type of product!

It is the common thought that a sectional track needs an extra power tap every 15 sections.  This would mean on my particular layout I would need a total of 3 power taps.  With only one power tap in place you do not notice any power drain at any part of the track.  I believe this is due to the engineering of the rail connections.

Final analysis....If you have the opportunity to buy an older Tomy Super International set, put out a few dollars more and get the newer set.  It is well worth the money.  The accessories available for the Tomy tracks are incredible.  If you do not intend on having club type racing on your track I wouldn't even change out the Tri-Power packs.  If you plan on club style racing, I would go with a variable power supply and a commercial lap counting system such as the Viasue photo cell set-up.  Other than that, the Tomy tracks offer far more than I ever expected.  They indeed ARE the gold standard of sectional HO scale slot car tracks.

Parma Super Braid Conditioner

What amazes me is how a product review on a item that we may take for granted is often the most popular.  This blogs' first product review was Body Armor.  It was an item that surely most people knew about already.  What we discovered was, it had massive views.  We also saw people start buying body armor and start using it with great frequency.  Even the local slot car track, who I don't think was even aware of Body Armor at the time, started carrying it because there was a demand for it.  We did a review on dial calipers and were surprised at how many slot car boxes turned up afterwards with calipers as one of their tools.  I guess you can't predict what will actually be of use for slot car racers.

This is a product tip about the Parma Super Braid Conditioner, Parma #665A.

by Chuck Hendricks

I have used braid on my slot cars until it was almost gone in my slot car career. That was until I learned how much braid affected how well the car ran. Braid would burn at the end, fray, and would need the ruined ends trimmed off. I even got a steel brush to comb the braid straight if I could. When I got really competitive, I realized that if I switched braid every race, the car would maintain a quicker pace throughout the race. I would then throw the used braid in my box to be used for “practice”. Now, my feeling about replacing braid every run has changed a little because of a product I am using. When I started using Parma Super Braid Conditioner, I noticed that the braid remained cleaner and the fraying was less prevalent. Soon I was applying the braid conditioner every rotation, even if the braid looked perfect. When racing cars with less amp draw, such as the super modified cars that have the Hawk 25 motor in them, I have gotten up to 3 races on one set of braid and it still looked good. The only slight issue was that if you looked closely, you could see that it had worn a little thinner, even though the surface was still clean, straight and hardly damaged. When I am practicing, I keep track of the times my car is turning on each lane. If I stop the car in a mid-practice run, I have noticed that the next laps would be between .03-.05 seconds faster with the conditioner applied. I would recommend you use this product liberally on your new braid every rotation as it will keep the braid running like new all race long.

 Editors Note:
This product should be used LIBERALLY.  Do not just put a little on your braid and let it go.  We have found the braid should be wet on the reverse side of the braid because of the amount used.  The price is cheap for the performance upgrade and the longevity of your braid.  While I am still a fan of "replace your braid before EVERY race", I do have to concede this product will extend the life of your braid.  If you look at it from the view point of cost, it will actually save you money.  The bottle of Braid Conditioner will last for many sets of braid and many races.  Let's say you actually get a 50% increase in the life of your braid.  You thus will save many times the cost of the bottle of Braid Conditioner in braid you do not have to purchase.  If you are not currently using this product, we recommend it highly.  Get on the bandwagon and start saving money on your braid while increasing your performance.

Product Review - Dial Calipers

Contemplating the 'product of the month' to review this month I found myself with a lot of choices. Should I do a review on a Difalco Fanatic controller? Maybe I do a review on a certain type of pinion gear. Some people might like to read about the Pro Slot PS 4002 FK motor. I was having this conversation with another person and they mentioned an intriguing idea. I will not mention this person's name here as I don't want to give them the credit. Plus, I believe he is suffering from dementia and would not remember suggesting it anyway. So, I take full credit...or blame...for the idea of the topic this month.

This month I will be writing about an underused tool and one that some people probably don't even think about. It is cheap in cost and available almost everywhere. I am talking about a dial caliper. That is right, a dial caliper! How many pit boxes can you look in at a slot car track and not find any measuring device at all except for a test plate to measure ground clearance, wheel base width, and maybe a go/no go gauge for tire diameter? For those who have not thought about this, a larger question stands before us...Why should we have a dial caliper in our box? Now, if you are an impatient person and want to get to the main use of this product and forgo my clever writing, my wit, and my insults to my brother, you can drop down to paragraph number 6. Understand, you will be giving up on some of my valuable insights on the caliper, other uses of the caliper, and the baking of a fudge brownie apple pie on top of an over-heated Hawk 7 motor.

A long time ago when I was riding dirt bikes I would always carry a pair of vice grip pliers, some baling wire, a screwdriver with interchangeable tips, some zip ties, and a roll of duct tape. With these few tools you can do an enormous amount of repairs. Maybe it wasn't a great tool kit, but it would get you off the trail most of the time. It took up very little room and it was light. In slot car racing we have limited space in our pit boxes. Let's be honest. We can't carry everything with us. We carry what we think we may need and some other luxuries based upon how much space we have available. Sometimes we need a tool that can do many jobs. One that takes up little space and gives great benefit. That is exactly what a dial caliper does.

Before we start looking at what a dial caliper can do for a slot car, let's look at what its basic functions are. A dial caliper can come with a dial with a hand that sweeps around or a digital version. The digital version allows for easy resetting of the dial to zero and it can swap from inches to metric use with a quick push of a button. Basically, the dial caliper is a pair of jaws on an extended handle. It measures the distance between the jaws as you slide the bottom jaw of the caliper down the handle. This handle can be in many different lengths. They can be 6” calipers, 10” calipers, 12” calipers, and even longer; it is all based on how long the stick is. The stick will usually have measurements marked on it like a ruler, so you have a ruler in your box also. The jaws on the dial caliper can be used to measure outside measurements and it can be used to measure inside measurements.

If you know the maximum width your tires can be, a simple measurement with the dial caliper tells you if you are in compliance. Not only does this tell you if you are in compliance, but it also tells you how much over you are or how much under you are. This means you know how much you need to adjust and not just go with trial and error. This can help you with your body height. Some classes have a rule with a maximum height for the body. You simply put the car on a test block and put the stick on the test block next to your car. You can then read the measurements marked on the stick to see what your body height is. Once again you will know accurately how much you must lower your body or how much you can raise your body.

OK. For those who were too impatient to spend time with the rest of us, this is paragraph 6. You will forever be looked at as the person who can't cook on a Hawk 7 motor. And it was all because you were impatient. So be it. Here we go. In my not so humble opinion, the greatest use for a dial caliper in a slot car pit box is this: you measure the diameter of your tires with it. Oh sure, you can measure the inside diameter of the hub also, but that is not how the hubs are measured anyway. They are measured and noted with the hub size by the outside diameter, not the inside. The outside diameter is the key. The very basic use is to find a set of tires that barely have you legal for your ground clearance and measure the diameter of these tires. Now you know what size tire is legal and what will be illegal. You can now measure all your tires and see which ones are legal and which ones will not be legal. Now....if you have more than one class you race, the tires to achieve the proper ground clearance may not, and probably will not, be the same. Knowing these numbers for all your cars allows you to use tires on one car until you need to move them to the next car for their size. You can get a lot more use out of your tires this way. Just because they are no longer legal on one car doesn't mean they are illegal on another car.

When you are measuring the diameter of your tires you need to be aware of a coning that can occur on tires. On some tracks, the tires will wear more quickly on the right side of the tire or on the left side of the tire giving the tire a cone shape. The caliper will help you find the tires that are not wearing evenly by measuring the left side and the right side of the tire. It is not uncommon to see the two do not match up. If it is not far out of measurement you might want to rotate the tires and run some practice laps to bring them back to match. Either this, or you can true the tires. There are a lot of different means of doing this, but they will not be discussed here. The article on tire truers was done last month, you can just go back and read that. It is located under Articles, then under Product Reviews.

Here is an example of the tire size use you could be looking at. I have one car that needs 0.750” tires. Once these tires wear down to unacceptable size I can move them to another car that needs 0.710” or larger. After these tires are no longer legal on this car I can put them on a car that can take as small as 0.690”. Once the tires get below that size they can only go on a car for me that will run in a class that does not check the clearance other than making sure nothing is dragging. For each step in this tire's life, it is being used to its ultimate potential. That is, as long as I don't destroy the tire with careless driving. To get this kind of life and use out of a tire you need to understand that a tire will last longer if you do not make the car “chatter” in the turns. At the same time, I can get around the turns faster if I am just under the “chatter” point. The “chattering” of the tires wears on the sides of the tires tremendously. It can also cause chunks to be torn out of the tires. So, if you want your tires to last through many uses they must be taken care of along with using the calipers to see where they can be used. The dial caliper will help you make your tires last longer, be used to their best efficiency, and show you when the tires need to be maintained with truing or rotation.

As far as cooking a fudge brownie apple pie on a Hawk 7 motor....you know it can't be done. But you can find out if someone read the entire article or not because those who jumped ahead to paragraph 6 surely are not still reading at this point. Just smile and tell them the pie was delicious.

Hudy Tire Truer

Before I tell you about the Hudy Tire Truer I want to discuss a principle in slot car racing. All tracks run with limitations on ground clearance. This is a needed restriction. If the cars are too low to the track the cars will drag on the track or the braid at times. This rule is sometimes in conflict with a racer wanting to make his car handle better. Here is the principle...the lower the car is to the track, the better it is going to handle. This is because the center of gravity is lowered. If you think a few hundreds of an inch will not make any difference you might as well quit reading this and go racing in a mud bog with a corvette. It makes about as much sense to drive in a mud bog with a car that is too low to the ground than it does to race with a slot car with higher ground clearance than you must have.

There are two ways to lower your car to the track. One is by reducing the ride height in the front with the guide flag. Reducing this end of the car is not what this review concerns. There are products we can discuss for that purpose at a later date. To reduce the ground clearance in the back you must do it in one of two manners. One is to raise your rear axle thus making your car lower. The way I want to discuss is the second option. This is by reducing your tires in diameter. To do this you have to remove rubber from the tires. I have seen people do this by running their car with the tires on and laying the rear tires on a block covered by sand paper. This does work but it can be hard on your motor and time consuming plus it is not all that accurate. The second way is with a small lathe. I have seen this done and it works quite well. It is quick, it will lower your stance and trues the tires at the same time. If you have a small lathe it is a great, but it is not a really portable tool you could take to the track with you. If you do not have a lathe you are looking a $500 or better investment to get one. The third way is with a commercial tire truer for slot cars. There are more than one brand of tire truer out there but I will look at the Hudy Tire Truer for this review.

Hudy has an extended line of products for the RC car racing industry. Their products seem to be quite well made and well thought out. The Hudy Tire Truer for slot cars is the same. It is well designed and executed. It is small, portable and looks very professional. The Hudy Tire Truer works on one tire at a time. It would be nice if you could do two at a time so the tires would be perfectly matched. This not being possible Hudy has done the next best thing, but that will come later. The Hudy works with the tires mounted on an axle that spins driven by a motor. The tire will come in contact with a drum covered with sand paper which is also spinning. You adjust how close to the drum the axle (and thus the tire) is until the two come in contact and rubber starts being removed. This is achieved by turning a screw. If the screw was not in place the drive belt on the pulley that turns the axle would pull the tire into contact with the sanding drum. The screw holds the tire away from the sanding drum. As you turn the screw the belt is allowed to pull the axle closer to the drum. This is done until the tire comes into contact to the drum. At that point you let it sand until it has taken as much rubber off and can't take anymore off. The sanding drum will remove rubber from the tire until the screw is preventing pressure from being applied to the tires. At that point you turn the screw some more allowing more rubber to be taken off if the tire did not have rubber taken off all the way across the surface of the tire. You continue letting the tire closer to the drum until this is achieved. At this point your tire is trued. Your next tire will need to be the same size as the tire you just trued so you set the position on the Hudy Tire Truer so it will not take the next tire to a smaller position than what you have done to your first tire. This is done by a second screw. First turn the truer off so the drum stops spinning. Then turn this screw in until it makes contact with the location the current tire is set at. It is important that you turn this screw until it makes contact and do not go farther. If you go farther you will be lifting the current tire away from the drum. In order to have both tires trued and the same size in diameter you must set the second screw at the point where it touches, no more and no less. Now that this screw is set you turn the first screw to back the original tire away from the drum. Remove your first tire and put your second one on. Turn the truer back on and continue as you did with the first tire. The second screw you set will not allow the axle to move closer to the drum than the first tire was set. Once you get this tire sanded down to the set point of the second screw you check to see if this tire had rubber taken off all the way across. If it did you are finished. If not then you back out that second screw and continue sanding by using the first screw to allow the axle closer to the drum. Once you have this tire completely trued you set the second screw and go back to the first tire to finish up.

This is a simple process once you start. It will allow you to have tires that match in diameter plus are true and will not have a slight wheel hop to them. Just because a tire is new does not mean it is true. Even new tires should be taken to the tire truer.

Now more about setting the ground clearance on the rear of your car. Here the purpose is not just to true the tires but to take away as much rubber as is needed to lower your car. If your car is riding with excess height you will want to measure your tires with a caliper. You then will use the tire truer to remove a desired amount of rubber. You can check the new diameter without removing the tire from the truer with the calipers. Once you get the tire where you want it set the second screw to make sure the next tire is taken down to the same size. Take your tires off the truer and put them back on the car to check clearance. If it is still too tall repeat the process over again. Do this until your car is at the desired ride height. Once you have done this you can measure the tires with the calipers and any future tires can be taken down to the proper size based upon this measurement. This will allow you to turn your tires down to where you want them in the future with no trial and error. Remember, when you are taking rubber off tires it is better to do it slow than quickly. You can always take more rubber off, but you cannot put it back on once it is off.

How well does this unit work? It is a smooth as a babies bottom covered with possum grease. It actually does a really good job at what it was designed to do. The truer does not take rubber off as quickly as a lathe, but it cost much less than a lathe and is actually small enough to carry with you. The unit comes with its own travel case and is fairly well protected unless you deliberately throw it down or do something truly destructive to it. It will work with 3/32 or 1/8 axles as it has an axle blank for both. The 3/32 is a 1/8 axle that has been turned down to 3/32 where the tire is mounted. The Hudy Tire Truer does not come with a power source. You need to connect it by alligator clips to some source for power. It is suggested that you use a 12 volt power source. This is easy enough to find and cheap enough to set up. To be transportable you may want to look into rechargeable batteries. I used one with a 6 cell sub-c battery pack from an RC car set up. This was less than 8 volts but it still worked fine until the battery pack started discharging. I was able to do some serious truing on several sets of tires before the pack discharged. When considering how small these battery packs are it makes the entire unit very portable. Due to legal issues that could occur, let me emphasize, I do not recommend using less voltage than the manufacturer recommends. I only pointed out the reduced voltage because of my own experience with one. The only problem with using one of these little beauties at the track is you might have a number of people asking you to true their tires.

Now the negative side. It is not much of a downside. It was a problem that affected the unit I tested and was easily corrected once it was discovered. The Hudy Tire Truer I tested was an almost new one. It had trued maybe two sets of tires at the most. I ran seven or eight pairs of tires through it with no problem. Then I decided to take a set of tires down to a smaller diameter. Everything worked fine until the tires got to about 0.690”. It was at this point the tire I was truing started hopping. After investigating of the situation it was discovered that one of the pulleys was misaligned from the factory. The pulley that drove the tire was bumping the pulley that drives the sanding drum. This was the cause of the hopping problem and only showed up when the tire diameter got small enough for the two pulleys to overlap. The solution was to loosen one allen screw and move the sanding drum pulley into proper alignment then tighten the allen screw back down. This then allowed the tire to be turned down to 0.63” without any problem of the two pulleys touching. The test was abandoned at this point as we felt the problem was rectified.

The clean up on this unit is a must. If you do not clean it after every use you will have rubber that is now like a fine powder all over the place. The clean up takes a while as there are a lot of little nooks and crannies the powdered rubber can get into. You simply have to be patient and do the best you can. The truer is on a base which it can come out of allowing you to clean underneath with ease.

This is a dandy little machine that will work well. It is easy to use and with a little caution in its use it is pretty much fool proof. It works as advertised and I would recommend one for anyone who is serious about slot racing. The benefits that come from using one of these is immeasurable.

 Body Armor

I know, if you are not new to slot car racing, Body Armor is probably not something new to you. However, some people have just never thought about this other than through their own complaints. Have you ever put a new body on one of your cars only to have one of the body pin holes get pulled out in the first week or two of running the car? This can be very frustrating if you have spent a lot of time taping the body off to make a really neat paint job. Then painted the body with great care. After painting, you spent time making sure the body was mounted perfectly and trimmed out properly. All this work and then your body pin pulls through your body leaving a nasty hole you must try to reinforce with tape. Have you wished you could glue some lexan on the body to cover the body pin holes to make it stronger? Body Armor is the product you have been thinking about but may have never known existed.

Body Armor, to put it simply, is a piece of lexan you use to reinforce the body at a point where it may receive damage or tear. Body Armor comes in a range of thicknesses from 0.005” to 0.010”. It can come in a range of widths from 1/4” to 1” and perhaps wider. It is a piece of lexan with adhesive on one side covered with paper. It is a peel and stick application. Body Armor will usually come in strips you can cut to the appropriate size.

A good use for this product is to cut into squares and stick over your body pin holes from the inside. You can then reinforce your body even more by applying a strip of strapping tape over the body holes and Body Armor going the length of the body. After this you can cut short strips of strapping tape and place them so the threads are running perpendicular to the other strapping tape. You now have an almost bullet proof body pin hole, especially so if you use strapping tape on the outside of the body as well.

Another use for the Body Armor is to reinforce weak places on the body. If you have a car that does not run a diaplane you can use Body Armor to reinforce the front end of your car. Right in front of the guide flag the body often takes an amount of abuse. By putting Body Armor under the body at the very front it stiffens the are which usually gets folding back in impacts with deslotted cars. In the rear fender area there usually is a weak point where the body is likely to tear or split over the rear wheels or around any spoiler you may have. By putting Body Armor in these places you can prevent a lot of these issues from appearing as quickly. You can also use these Body Armor strips to firm up an area which has already split.

Body Armor can, with the proper application, make your bodies stand up to a lot more impacts than unprotected bodies. It is not visible from the outside of the body and no one ever realizes the body is reinforced. You can even take the Body Armor and bend it to make it fit into creased areas of the body making it even more flexible in its use.

Now for the bad stuff. In some classes and rules at some tracks Body Armor is not allowed. You will have to check to see if it is allowed in your application. Also, for those who are counting the grams their car weighs, this does increase the body weight. It does not increase it by much but it does increase the weight. Weight reduces speed. Weight makes a car slower out of a turn into a straight. So, if you are at the level where you are willing to give up durability for a little edge in that lead on turn into the longest straight you would not want to use this product. However, if your driving skills are not to the point where you are hitting the lead on turn for maximum acceleration every lap, this might be a product that will keep you on the track longer.

Body Armor can be purchased through your local slot car track. If the track owner does not stock it, surely he will order it if you request it. If it is not available locally then it can be purchased from many online vendors or stores.