Wednesday March 29, 2006 Cub Scout Pinewood Derby
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Last Sunday, as part of his Cub Scout Pack, Duncan went to the multi-purpose room at his school, to race his Pinewood Derby car. |
Beforehand, each participant starts with the official kit, which is a block of wood, wheels and axles. It's up to each boy to shape it and decorate however they so choose. Then comes the big race day, where they race against each other down a track, to see who has the best car. Small weights are also available to help improve performance.
As a parent, it's hard not to want to step in and help your son produce the fastest possible car, but it really is something the child needs to do for himself. I did offer advice though. I persuaded him that yes, the weights really would help. He finally listened there. I couldn't convince him that the body should be as aero-dynamic as possible, so he ended up with a shape that was a streamline as a brick.
His car came in third (which really means "third equal", and is a grouping of everybody else in his den -- a total of seven kids -- who didn't finish first or second). As you can imagine, he was frustrated by this.
Afterwards, I decided to google around to see just what information is "out there" that could help improve the situation. What's the best car shape? What are the tricks to help you create the fastest car? Here are some links I found.
- "It's Pinewood Derby Time", including tips for car construction from Bob Peterson [link]
- AgentZ Scouting Resources Pinewood Derby Information
[link],
with lots of other links to useful pinewood car information. - Scouting The Net Pinewood Derby
[link].
Another set of links to other related sites. - Pinewood Derby Racing Webring [link].
- Maximum Velocity, Kits, Wheels & Axles
[link].
Lots of examples of cool looking cars (several available as kits).
What I want to try to do now is get Duncan enthuastic to create a car that will perform well for next years competion.
( Mar 29 2006, 09:37:29 AM PST ) [Listen] Permalink Comments [2]
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Hey Rich,
My first pinewood derby entry finished third in my den and I was awarded fourth place. (after a mixup) My next pinewood derby entry finished first in the whole pack and I was awarded first place! Both cars were built similarly with a simple diagonal cut lengthwise. The first had a "bumper" with a height of about 1 cm and rounded corners (where the "headlights" might have been) with radius of a few millimeters. The second had no such bumper or rounded corners. The cut was made very close to the bottom front. It looked like a large silver door stop in retrospect. :)
I have a feeling I won simply because the wheel axels (the nails) happened to be glued into the wood optimally.
Posted by Ryan Lovett on March 29, 2006 at 10:09 AM PST #
Posted by Rich Burridge on March 29, 2006 at 06:50 PM PST #