Backyard Pinewood derby

gergistheword · **Joined:** Tue Mar 10, 2009 9:50 am **Posts:** 6

For my birthday this past summer I decided I wanted to be 12 again. I convinced my wife to let me host a pinewood derby in our backyard.

Let me just say that it was a unqualified success. My friends had so much fun that they demanded it be an annual event.

Instead of giving them a week or 2 to design and build the cars, I decided to level the playing field. I hauled a bunch of tools up from my shop and everyone had 3 hours to construct their dragster.

Pictures are worth a thousand words, right?
http://www.flickr.com/photos/gergisthew ... 536815172/

noise · **Joined:** Mon Jan 12, 2009 10:24 pm **Posts:** 634

Awesome.

idris_arslanian · **Joined:** Tue Jan 13, 2009 12:22 pm **Posts:** 362

Can I be your friend?

Theo · **Posted:** Tue Mar 10, 2009 12:57 pm

I actually won a pinewood derby once, in Cub Scouts, my third year. My car had fins and a cockpit; it was sort of modeled after one of those salt-flats landspeed-record rocket cars. The paint was "sapphire flake". Ah, memories.

gergistheword · **Joined:** Tue Mar 10, 2009 9:50 am **Posts:** 6

Honestly the most fun I had was building the track and helping all of my friends with their cars. I will be throwing another pinewood derby party for sure. You are all invited.

Perhaps we'll need to have an unlimited class for those with pyrotechnics and robotics in their blood.

Theo · **Posted:** Tue Mar 10, 2009 1:45 pm

OMG GAUSS CARS!!! :lol:

metis · **Posted:** Tue Mar 10, 2009 2:22 pm

gauss, bah, i'm thinking LOX and LH2.

Nicholas Lee · **Posted:** Tue Mar 10, 2009 10:36 pm

holy hot jeebus this sounds like a fun party.
maybe you should have a "completely recycled materials" category too.
thatll ensure a good dumpster-diving pre-party..

darus67 · **Posted:** Thu Mar 12, 2009 6:31 pm

My son's Cub Scout pack just had their pinewood derby a few weeks ago.
I was thinking it would be cool to have an (officially) adult derby. (how many of those
cars are ACTUALLY built by the kids anyway?)

I like the "build on site" idea.

I was also thinking it would be interesting to have an "unlimited" class where you have
a month to build the screamin'est gravity powered car possible, within some set size and
weight restrictions.

wammie · **Posted:** Sun Mar 15, 2009 6:12 pm

Thanks for sharing this! What fun! In my cub scout derby I remember winning a race or two. I also remember that the paint on my car was not fully dry so everyone who handled it kind of winced when noticing the stickiness. Nowadays I suppose there's something better to use than acrylic paint. :lol:

Backyard Pinewood derby

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