Saturday, January 26, 2013

Pinewood Derby Day Results

Row was a pretty good sport about things, which is the most important lesson from today. I did a little prepping going into the Derby, and explained to him that we may not win. The light clicked and he understood that this was our first year, and next year would be better.


Red Ant with Pincers and Row had their picture taken here. This is a photo of Row that can go onto the blog since it doesn't show his entire face.


Once the cars were entered and weighed, they were put on display behind the track. Each car raced three times and each time on a different track. I weighed our car  on a scale at our house and had it close to 5 ounces, but once we went to the post office, it weighed 5.9 ounces. Assuming the post office scales were calibrated, we dropped too much weight. I'll know better next year, and hopefully have a scale that I'll be using for reloading.


There were 64 cars and almost all of them looked great. I was selected as a judge and the five of us picked out the best original car, funniest, and best representation of Cub Scouts. Row's car is #48 which is the lower right one. He finished 2nd on track 3, second on track 2 and first on track 1. His car averaged about 3.4 seconds per race. He was so excited to finish first, and I'm thankful that he did so well on the last race. It was a great way to end his circuit. He also got to race against his best friend on the last race too, and it was cool to see them both excited.


The race results were projected on a big screen behind the track and display case. It was also electronically timed to 5 digits. The fastest car this year had a time of 3.0812 - and it was burning up the track! Incidentally, the father of the cub scout car happened to be a coworker that I worked with at my very first job. We are going to catch up at one of the later pack meetings. He kinda took me under his wings so to speak, and we hung out at work and after work too. I think I got my first beer buzz with him.


These guys catch the cars at the end of the track.

I do have a few ideas for next year :-)

Keep Right On Prepping - K


4 comments:

  1. I seem to remember trueing up the wheels being important, but I'm getting pretty far removed from Pinewood derby. I do recall it was great fun though!

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    1. Yeah, that was one of the new improvements for next year. Now, figuring it out might be a challenge. More lead to wood ratio is the other improvement.

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  2. Congratulations to you and Row! That is great for your first race. :o)

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    1. Thanks, I was kinda worried about even finishing after seeing how a few of the early races. We had a good time, but he wasn't happy to hear that the car will be going into a display case.

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