Category:Scalextric

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"Scalextric", Jon Mountfort, Shire Library

"Scalextric", Jon Mountfort, Shire Library [image info]

Scalextric is a classic British slot-car racing system that appeared in the 1950s and is still made today.

It was originally invented and produced by Mini Models, a company that had experimented with various types of toys, but whose main business was toy cars, which they sold under the name Scalex. While looking for ways to update the Scalex range, with electric motors ("Scalex" + "electric" = "Scalextric ) they hit on the idea of combining a "slotcar" mechanism for supplying power and steering with a racing game.

The genius of Scalextric (and the reason why the brand became a national hit) was that it turned the worst aspects of the system - variation in car characteristics, awkward and difficult controls, and a tendency for the car to fly off the track if you went too fast - into features, difficulties that a player had to overcome when competing with another racer.

While a model train system with jerky speed controls that had a tendency to crash the train if you went too fast would be considered a failure, in the context of car racing, the constant threat of crashing simply added to the excitement and realism, and the difficulty of getting the car's speed just right using the crude controllers also added an element of skill to what might otherwise have been a fairly mundane game.

Construction

The "classic" Scalextric track consisted of short, wide, sections of rubber or black plastic roadway that clipped together and included a pair of slots with metal conductors, which allowed two cars to run side-by-side. Cars had electric motors powered via pickups that protruded into the slots, and the system came with a pair of hand-held "trigger" speed controllers.

Since the cars ran along the slotted paths, there was no steering, the element of skill in racing Scalextric cars was to judge just how fast you could make a car go before it flew off the track - as with "proper" racing cars, the maximum safe speed that you could achieve on the straights was faster than on the curves.

Development

The original Scalextric cars were metal, but this changed to moulded plastic after the brand was sold to Triang, who had the clout to market the toy properly and produce it in large quantities. Later variations included Super124 (which was 1:24 scale rather than 1:32), MicroScalextric (1:64 scale), and versions with a digital control system that allowed cars to share tracks and switch between tracks remotely.

In the Museum

Unfortunately, we don't have any Scalextric on display in the Museum. We'd love to have a track set up, but unfortunately a Scalextric track would just take up too much display space.

Further reading

  • Rod Green, Scalextric: The story of the world's favourite model racing cars, (Harper Collins, 2001) ISBN 0007657811
  • Jon Mountfort, Scalextric (Shire Library, 2009), ISBN 0747807477
  • James May with Ian Harrison, James May's Toy Stories (Anova, 2009) ISBN 1844861074 pages 170-205

External links

Template:Scalextric etc

Subcategories

This category has the following 6 subcategories, out of 6 total.

A

C

R

S

T

Media in category ‘Scalextric’

The following 75 files are in this category, out of 75 total.

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