Greetings and Salutations...

On Sun, 07 Mar 2004 10:13:28 -0500, Mike Patterson
wrote:

On Sun, 07 Mar 2004 04:15:00 GMT, (Dan
Valleskey) wrote:

snip
The dad's class turns out some pretty fancy stuff. The rules are.....
bent. Last year I got tromped by a guy that used wheels he turned off
a CNC lathe. Tall wheels. His frame was carbon fiber screwed to a
little bit of pine. He works for a race team here in Indy. His kid
had the winning car in the boys class. My wife asked his kid, how did
your car get such a nice paint job? He said, I don't know. Later I
heard the boy say he was not allowed to touch his car.

Sour grapes? Maybe a little, I came in second place with stock
wheels. And my kid lost to his kid.


This year, we are backing off a little, I am not building a car at
all, my kid is handling all body duties on his car, I will just handle
his axles and wheels.


Okay, maybe I need help!!!! But the boys will all have fun, anyway.

-Dan V.

snip

I remember when I was a Scout and some of the kid's dads would do that
stuff. My dad wouldn't help me out at all.

He said I would learn better that way.

He was right, I learned very well that some "men" who consider
themselves to be "good fathers" are in actuality selfish children who
are teaching their kids that the rules don't apply to "them".

Yea...I feel your pain there. My parents would point me in
the direction of where to FIND the information I needed to do a
project, It was typically a VERY rare occasion when they would do any
significant work on my project. It always annoyed me NO end
that other kid's parents would do 90% or more of the project...even
if the kid wanted to work on it.
I think, though, in the long run I was the real winner,
as I ended up a lot more self-sufficient, and resourceful than many
of these other kids.

After the second or third such race, I never did pinewood derby again.
Why waste the time?

Well, that is a hard question to answer.... One way that the
scout troops that my nephew is involved in deal with it is to
STRONGLY urge the parents to let their kids do the work...and they
have an unoffical "parents" catagory where the adults can run
their cars against each other. I know of one family down that way
where the dad has actually built a raceway of their own, to specs,
so they can tune their cars.
It has been my observation that the trick to speed is to
ensure that the wheels are straight on the body, so the car does
not scrape against the center guide. Friction is your enemy here,
and, it is amazing how quickly rubbing against that center line
will slow things down.

Boy, I'm amazed at how ****ed off I am 30 years later...maybe I need a
shrink, or a few hours in the shop.

Haw! It DOES seem that the injustices of youth burn all the
stronger in one's mind! I suppose it has to do with one's feeling
of how much control over one's life there is. As a kid, we are VERY
controlled...so since we can't do much about injustice, it is even
more annoying than when we are adults and CAN do something about it.
Good luck getting over it! I know that I have a few things that still
rankle (although my issues are more with School Science Fairs).

Got an idea for a tongue & groove headboard...

Good deal! Always nice to turn that energy to something
positive...I have been remiss myself in that...I have several projects
that are rotting away from neglect that I really need to get finished
up.
Dave Mundt