Blue Peter challenge

[benmorg]

Hello there,

I'm posting this message on behalf of Richard Hammond/Blue Peter. I am an editor who has just produced a new book with Richard, called "Car Science" that comes out in a few weeks published by Dorling Kindersley. Richard is going to appear on Blue Peter on 4 June when the book comes out.

We are thinking of setting up a stunt on Blue Peter with radio-controlled cars. I would appreciate it hugely if anyone who has tried the stunt below, or is willing to set it up and try it, could let me know how feasible it is. Or even post a video on youtube so we can see it?? If the stunt works well, we may ask you to do it on Blue Peter.

The stunt we want to set up is the "Wall of Death":

But we want to do it with a remote-controlled car, e.g. something like a micro-T would be ideal. We'd need to build a wall of death in the studio with cardboard/lino/carpet etc. You can see micro-t's riding round biscuit tins on youtube, but we'd like to do it on a bigger scale. Doesn't have to be a micro-t - any fast car with very good grip at the tyres should do.

If you succeed in getting this stunt to work please let me know!

thanks in advance

Ben Morgan

Editor

Car Science

Dorling Kindersley

80 Strand

London

[SCARECROW.]

be interesting to do and

good luck

[benmorg]

be interesting to do and

good luck

thanks. I hope so, but not sure the car can get sufficient speed to create the G-force needed to hold it on the wall. I would try it myself but don't have any remote-controlled cars, so hoping someone on the forum might be able to help out!

Failing that BB will probably just get him to drive a posh car into the studio and then talk about science, but it would be more fun to set up some kind of fun stunt with RC buggies.

[Mr Terminator]

A micro t will do it easily in a Quality Street tin.I've done it and it flies round no problem...

[Mel]

I know someone who built a circular cage and we were running out 1/8th scale buggy's and trucks in it. BMaster would be a good person to ask because i can't remember who built it but i will try and find a video

[Mel]

Found it lol

[Mr Terminator]

I think you should just go out and get a Micro t,mines not standard and has a uprated motor and a 7.4v LiPo battery.It'll either work or not but for the sake of

[Laurence_wang]

i dont see why not if you get a good enough car you will probably need to get a truck or buggy its more about how big it has to be really and i take it you only want one car?

[HappyLad]

Ok, who's going to do the maths and work out the speeds needed and the size of the circle

:confused:

[mt2iiow]

yeah ive done the micro t in a sweets tin stunt. problem is getting it going and you need some inside trim to keep it going, but in a sphere shape it would be ok

the problem i have found is that most low stadium trucks are too long and low so the cage would have to be massive to cope with the angle between the wheel and chassis. Something like a savage with a .30 / .32 engine might do it, but it is really heavy so i dont know weather it would fall at the top.

Edited May 13, 2008 by mt2iiow

[e.thirteen]

Wouldn't RC Drifting be better? Seems more ideal to me.

[mgtuser]

as its indoors it will have to be electric surely!! good luck with it though.

[evilbert]

we dont do this sort of thing but pretty much everything else with our micro blaze ST's and if a wall was built it would be easy to do.

we have done this on the vertical, a continuous loop that we went round, about 1.5 meters diameter and we only needed to use half throttle to get it going round. i'd be interested in doing something like this as i'm sure a few other micro guys would.

let me know if you get anything off the ground

[rockers]

would using a touring car be abit easy to get to stick to the 'wall of death' ? lower center of gravity easyier handling once on the wall bit easier to see on camera as well i spose, only idea

[evilbert]

you've obviously never used a micro lol... and because of the ground clearance of the TC you would need a wall with a very large radius to it, like Mel's vid shows offroad cars can do it on pretty much any size wall...

Edited May 14, 2008 by evilbert

[benmorg]

Found it lol

brilliant, thanks. What kind of car is that? It looks bigger than the micro-t.

[benmorg]

I think you should just go out and get a Micro t,mines not standard and has a uprated motor and a 7.4v LiPo battery.It'll either work or not but for the sake of

[benmorg]

Wouldn't RC Drifting be better? Seems more ideal to me.

do you mean powersliding etc.? Can you do that with RC cars? Can you tell me a bit more? thanks

[B-Master]

I know someone who built a circular cage and we were running out 1/8th scale buggy's and trucks in it. BMaster would be a good person to ask because i can't remember who built it but i will try and find a video

The cage was made by glynn for our gotnitro events its one hell of a laugh watching a buggy rev its nuts out around that cage and the speeds they get up to is imense if your intrested i can put you in contact with the owner of the gotnitro.net cage. the car running around in there was a Nitro powerd hpi savage in the video but we have had everything from a mini lst up to a petrol 1/5th scale hpi baja man holding on to that cage with a baja running around in there full strap is a challange it took 3-4 people to hold it steedy

If you need any more info i can put you in touch with the guy that made it but the cage it will be at Gotnitro 7 event at J12 in 2 weeks time for our annual event if you want to film it in action along with the other events

[benmorg]

The cage was made by glynn for our gotnitro events its one hell of a laugh watching a buggy rev its nuts out around that cage and the speeds they get up to is imense if your intrested i can put you in contact with the owner of the gotnitro.net cage. the car running around in there was a Nitro powerd hpi savage in the video but we have had everything from a mini lst up to a petrol 1/5th scale hpi baja man holding on to that cage with a baja running around in there full strap is a challange it took 3-4 people to hold it steedy

If you need any more info i can put you in touch with the guy that made it but the cage it will be at Gotnitro 7 event at J12 in 2 weeks time for our annual event if you want to film it in action along with the other events

Would be great if you could put in me in touch, as the rig he's built obviously does the job and being transparent the cage would look good on camera. thanks in advance.

[benmorg]

Wouldn't RC Drifting be better? Seems more ideal to me.

I found a couple of RC drifting videos on youtube. They look fun and would probably work well, so definitely worth considering. The science element isn't so clear though. With the "wall of death" it's easy to demonstrate G-force/centrifugal force (actually the same thing - both fictitious forces caused by inertia, or real forces if you take a rotational frame of reference), and then use this to explain why Formula 1 drivers etc. have to endure such punishing g forces.

The science in drifting is a more subtle combination of inertia (which causes the wheels to break grip) and friction, with two different types of friction involved: static friction (when the wheels grip) and dynamic friction (when the wheels slide). I don't think the scientific content here is quite as much fun for kids.

We have a page in the book where we explain what goes on in a variety of stunts/tricks such as powersliding, handbrake turns, j-turns, doughtnuts, fishtailing, and police-chase PIT maneouvres. It might be fun to demonstrate all these with RC cars...But do you think all these can be done or would it require a huge amount of skill?

thanks again

[richhrly]

We have a page in the book where we explain what goes on in a variety of stunts/tricks such as powersliding, handbrake turns, j-turns, doughtnuts, fishtailing, and police-chase PIT maneouvres. It might be fun to demonstrate all these with RC cars...But do you think all these can be done or would it require a huge amount of skill?

thanks again

All of those moves can be demonstrated, other than handbrake turns due to the lack of a handbrake, but a similar motion could be achieved. It may need a RC driver with some drift experience, but not a massive amount of skill really. Probably not the same spectacle as a RC going around a wall of death though

[Danny-B-]

Well the gotnitro looks like the best idea here if you could make it from perspex or something ?

Anyway what i wanna know is how you get a job like this ? I really am in the wrong line of work ! payed to play with RC cars ! with Richard Hammond !!

I wonder if hammond can crash this one ...

Anyway best of luck, i'll be sure to watch it, if it makes it to TV. Ohh say Hi to hammond for me ... He doesnt know me but hey ho

[ashley b4 123]

My mini t or my xxx-cr would do that easily.

A

[evilbert]

you could do a handbrake turn with a 2wd 10th offroad car, they pivot just like that when you slam the breaks on.