Arduino vs 555 Timer - Tiny Slot Car Racers -- Episode 492

thats right, experience is a major factor!

Fun project Clem.

I have spent many hours playing with slot cars, especially the smaller scale ones.

You are correct. You have to spend a lot of time cleaning the brushes and motor contacts because they build up carbon.

These cars also put out a lot of EMF which will interfere with some electronic devices.

The issue of the 555 verses Arduino comes down to experience in the specific devices.

If you are good at electronics, you can do changes to the 555 very quickly.

If you are good at software, you can probably do the changes in software faster.

Either device will give you lots of flexibility and fun.

DAB

I only associate matchbox with Die cast toys, had no idea they made other products.
Also my last encounter with a slot car was 20 years ago, So I pretty muched guessed and tried to recal lfeatures I saw. Did not  bother to google much

I recall that the Matchbox cars had solid spring-loaded pick-up shoes as opposed to the braid pick-ups.

You can see them at around 6:36 into this video:

     Powertrack Car Service / Speedtrack

     https://youtu.be/eAlq7TnxXug?t=396

thanks, sometiomes its nice to get away from programming and build purely with descrete parts..but after troubleshooting that curcuit you remember why programming is so much easier to debug.

possibly? maybe? could be? I suspect its that the car does little hops as it is crazy overpowered, maybe if it does not loose contact the carbon buildup wouldbe not happenening

the limits of sourcing and sinking current are vastly different on the chip, that is why I did it that way the other version ended in a blwon up 555

Thanks for the tips, I built it purely from my memory of how a slotcar looks on the underside, andhad to make some changes to make it fit my desired parts.

Haven't seen a real slotcar in person foar at least 20 years.

mayermakes  I love it!  While I love the Arduino, I'm often more impressed with the elegance of a discrete component circuit.  That which looks like it should be simple rarely is as easy as it seems at first.

I also like that you went for the aesthetics of the mountain raceway first.   Great job building it all from scratch!

I wonder if an AC supply and a diode in the car would reduce sparking and carbon buildup?