Gravity Powered - "'1932 Ford" Soap Box Derby Car
 

There was some interest in my son's Soap Box Derby racer in this thread:
http://ecomodder.com/forum/showthrea...box-32441.html
So, I'm posting a little info about it.

A year ago I took my son to watch the Red Bull Soapbox Race since it was local to us (Seattle). He was enthralled and wanted to do it. We looked around for a venue, and most places I could find were All-American Soap Box Derby™ sanctioned events that had very restrictive rules on what you can build. That wasn't going to work, since my son wanted it to look like one of his favorite cars, a '32 Ford roadster. I found a local spot (Fircrest Derby Days) that does one race a year but has lax rules allowing nearly anything you can come up with as long as it meets the minimal safety rules and is budget friendly (No more than $500). Perfect.

I have access to SolidWorks at work, so I put together some ideas on how to build it and came up with a design that looks close enough while still being simple to build.

Frame (a few thing evolved as I built it):
http://ecomodder.com/forum/member-da...tial-frame.png

Complete car:
http://ecomodder.com/forum/member-da...ypotential.png

Unfortunately, I had plenty of other things occupying my time so I was only able to get started on it four weeks before the race, and only about 6-8 hours a week to devote to it.

Two weeks before the race I had the frame "done":
http://ecomodder.com/forum/member-da...5-06-20-03.jpg

And by race day it was functional, just not pretty. I at least had enough of the body to give the impression of what it was supposed to look like:
http://ecomodder.com/forum/member-da...stderby-09.jpg

There was another racer in my son's class that had a faster car, but he was having trouble driving it, so my son ended up with a first place trophy.

My 13 year old daughter had no interest in it until about a week before the race. She let me know that I need to modify it so she can fit in it for next years race. Between that and finishing the bodywork, we have a fair bit to do before the next race, but plenty of time to work on it.

Cool looks good.

Nice family project :)

wow, thats a cool soapbox!
is that soapbox of the rear of the photo a belly tank?
http://bringatrailer.com/wp-content/...le_Front_1.jpg
something like this?

Very cool Darcane. Looks like a lot of fun.

Thanks!

Yes, exactly. The kid's grandfather helps a team that races at Bonneville and built his car for him. That belly tank car was the other racer that I referred to in my initial post that was faster but had trouble keeping it straight.

It definitely was. On his first pass down the track I had my GoPro mounted to point at his face... I've never seen so big a grin on his face.