Pinewood derby video car (with suspension)

This year my eldest sons Cub Scout pack had an open division. I believe the cars that the kids race should be their own creation. So after serving as a safety monitor for the creation of the true car. I created a video car with my younger children.

Step 1 Resaw the pinewood derby car blank

The first thing you will want to do is cut the car blank down to a thin plank.

I made a mark down the car about 1/16 inch above the holes for the axles (nails).

Then I clamped it into a vice and (with a little help from the little ones) cut the car down.

Comments

[gman2000watts]

 cool build...is that camera you have wireless? the camera you have and the one on the link you put up don't match

[shevrin]

Where did you get the camera/what brand is it?

[skot123]

The camera is a JMK. I purchased it from http://www.sparkfun.com/commerce/product_info.php?products_id=616

[shevrin]

Did it come with a transmitter for the video output?

[skot123]

Yes, it came with the video camera and the receiver (with RCA video and audio out). I connected to the line in of my portable DVD player for people to watch. I also recorded a couple of races by running from the receiver to the line-in on my camcorder.

[bananafred]

So there was a cable going to your car as it went along the track?

[Thelonelysandwitch]

My boyscout troop had a derby. you could do anything. I put a model rocket engine with an rc igniter. Our track was 30 feet long. part of the way down, I fired the rocket. You can guess who won. The car somehow jumped over the stopper and shot across the parking lot. fun.

[Madrias357]

Combining gravity-racing and rockets is always fun! My friends and I used to do the same to hot-wheels cars with no-report bottle-rockets taped on and sent down the roof with fuses lit. Caused a lot of neighbors some wonder how we got cars in the gutters (we used dollar-general type cars, not actual hot wheels so we wouldn't mind losing them if things went 'bad'. (like the car landing on the roof or using a reporting rocket and blowing the roof off...)

[Thelonelysandwitch]

forget no report bottle rockets, I do the same thing with whistling dual report bottle rockets. it makes the effect more dramatic.

[Madrias357]

We did this with no-reports to avoid damage to decent cars we liked. Any others, we tried to destroy. We sent a truck down the ramp once with 2 M80's stuck to it and a single rocket. We blew a hole in the neighbor's trash can...

[FreshPineSent]

My pinewood derby car pwns your face.

[gizmomanish007]

hey buddy i jst wanna ask u a quest that can we use our cell phones camera as a spy cam with the receiver in our PC ?????? plz help me out ????

[hondagofast]

meh

[exegrec3]

We did this with a wireless camera. See the results in this video:

http://uncutvideo.aol.com/users/exegrec4/318b45098eec2b5aa1d875e0face3179?index=0

[djbadinfluence]

If you have an amateur radio license - you can get a tiny camera and tramsmitter around a hundred or so bucks (I think I paid 125.). These guys are neat because on the 70cm portion of the bands, we can transmit on cable channel 59 - no special setting. Just change the TV to channel 59 and it works. My sons derby is next month.... I just might have to add this "weight". Really neat idea.

[Crash2108]

These are the kind of instructables I like to see..