GOODWOOD INSPIRED, SWEDEN 2018
(10.5 x 7′)
We were contacted by a customer to design and create a Goodwood inspired digital slot car circuit with a twist and that twist was that he wanted it to fold up into a wall space. Luckily here at Think Scalextric we were up for a challenge!!
The issues we faced were that it needed to be as light as possible so that it could be lifted away without to much muscle power, secondly from the base of the track to the tallest points couldn’t be any taller than 17.5cm so that it would fit into the wall cavity (that includes the thickness of the MDF/ply base) and thirdly, where it was going to be stored on it’s side most of its life, it needed to be securely bolted to the base and everything on and around the circuit stuck down.
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As with all our bespoke circuits we create we drew up a few design ideas incorporating the bits and pieces the customer had asked for. Once we got the go ahead on the final plans we then set to work on the base structure. Once the base was complete the magic starts and the fun and imagination begins on creating an awesome circuit. Our brief was for it to be Goodwood ‘inspired’, so not a complete copy. It was so difficult to pick out a few parts of the circuit to Imitate as it’s such an iconic track, after much debate we thought creating the famous pit building with control tower would work well, the chicane after Woodcote corner and the airfield in the middle of the circuit and the rest was down to our imagination.
The Pit building – well we love the retro way of doing things here at think but we do embrace new technology so we designed our very own pit building using CAD and after many trial and error hours on the 3D Printer we finally created the one of a kind master piece that is the pit building on this circuit.
We feel that a good circuit isn’t all about the track, it needs to have a story line. It needs to include little dioramas unfolding around the circuit so you get those “ah look at that” and “oh look what there doing” moments. So, on this circuit, we added a meandering river that almost runs from one side of the circuit to the other going under 2 bridges. Along this river, we have a little beach scene with a group of campers chilling by the river with one of them fishing in water next to the waterfall (can you spot the rabbits?!?) further along the river with have a guy fly fishing next to a fallen tree and a gentleman climbing over a style with his dog.
There is also a guy pushing his son on a rope swing in the woods, an MG that has crashed on woodcote corner with people pointing and worrying that the car is on fire, and the roar of the Rolls Royce Merlin engine in the spitfire that’s mid take off. To add even more atmosphere to this track we added LED lights to various things so the campers camp fire is flickering away, theres the electric blue glow of a guy welding his classic car in the paddock, the faint flicker of a fire brewing under the hood of that crashed MG, we also hand-built working lampposts to light the way from the grandstand to the paddock and the numerous other lights that light up the Marshall huts, paddock and the pit-building itself.
Once it was finished we had the task of mounting and securing it into the van ready for a mammoth 860 mile trip to our customer’s amazing home next to the sea in Sweden. The install took us about a day to complete. The client is going to finish off the decorating around the track with big images of Goodwood Motor Circuit.
