HO Track - Slot Car Racing

Slot car racing has been a popular hobby for over half a century. Fans enjoy the high-speed competition and the realistic details of the slot cars themselves. Plus, there’s much more strategy to winning a slot car race than simply going faster than your opponent. The successful driver must have the skill to maneuver through the various challenges presented by the slot car tracks.

Most slot car hobbyists get their first taste of slot car racing as kids, with a relatively small set that includes only enough plastic slot car track sections to make a simple oval or Figure 8 layout. Tower Hobbies offers several affordable, well-made slot car sets like this. The AFX Infinity Set can be set up easily in about ten minutes within just a 2-foot by 4-foot space, perfect for a family room or child’s bedroom.

Most slot car racing sets come with instructions that show how to assemble the included slot car track sections into the layout pictured on the box. The instructions also often show a few other track layouts that can be made using the same slot car track sections in the set.

Even so, you don’t have to limit your slot car racing fun only to the track layouts possible with the contents of your slot car set. Slot car manufacturers such as AFX and Auto World also sell slot car track sections separately that let you build much larger slot car racing courses with lots of exciting new twists and turns.

When you buy slot car accessories to expand your slot car racing set, always make sure you’re choosing compatible items. The slot car sets available from Tower Hobbies are HO scale and feature molded plastic track sections. The sections are held together securely by reusable Track Clips for easy assembly and disassembly. You can add as many compatible new slot car track sections as you want. If you enjoy racing your slot cars at high speeds down long straightaways, pairs of inexpensive Straight Track sections are available in several lengths, from three to fifteen inches.

Most slot car racing enthusiasts also like to include sections in their track layouts that require some maneuvering skill to pass through. They enjoy sending their slot cars around tight curves and other hazards as fast as possible, hoping to avoid spinning off the track. AFX offers several different kinds of slot car track for adding more drama and difficulty to your racing course.

For example, the AFX 3-inch Hairpin is the smallest radius curve you can buy. It’s not easy to race your slot car around it, but if you can do it without flying off the track, you might well win the race!

The AFX 9-inch Criss-cross track presents a challenge for both competing drivers’ timing. Only a single slot car can pass through at a time, so this one piece of slot car track may determine who comes in first and who will be second. The same is true with the 9-inch Squeeze track. If two slot cars are racing perfectly side-by-side, both will probably be thrown off by this section of track. The advantage goes to whichever slot car driver can stay at least slightly in front.

With the many slot car track accessories available from Tower Hobbies, there’s almost no limit to the dimensions and the difficulty of the slot car racing track you design. Having a thrilling and ever-changing track layout is part of what makes the slot car hobby so much fun!

Because plastic slot car track sections and other slot car accessories are generally very affordable, you can get started in the hobby with a simple slot car set and then expand it however you wish over time. As a result, slot car racing never gets old! Just be sure to read the Tower Hobbies product descriptions to make sure the slot car accessories you order are compatible with the set you own.