It' s now April 2003 which means the Scorpio project has been on my mind for some 8 years!

In that time I have cursed many times my own inability with my hands and the lack of available people to help me.

Let me expand on that. I first hit on the Scorpio's revolutionary idea of what I now call ATC* in December of 1995. Having turned the Marchon MR1 design from something of a joke into an out-and-out winner here in the UK, I was keen to do the same when scalextric released their own H:O chassis.

Unfortunately, and in a move that surprised nobody, the new design was a balls-up. When Hornby decided to enter the H:O sector they had done so by buying up all the defunct design work and tooling apparatus from Marchon. The result was a huge hit in the toy market (although the out-of-the box cars where pretty poor for us 'serious' racers), and scalextric had a huge market share almost overnight in a sector that they had up till then ignored.

Having laid all the groundwork they then brought out their own design based on Marchon's but somehow only keeping it's worst feature (i.e.-slow!) and adding several of their own - not least the braids, common to their 1/32nd scale designs since the year dot.

Having abandoned any hopes of making the chassis into anything decent, I was still nonetheless intrigued by the replacement of fixed, rectangular traction magnets with movable round ones, and this eventually lead me dream up and chassis with a similar arrangement to this, almost certainly, accidental design but with the addition of threaded parts to make the adjustability very precise.

Having come up with the concept I became a bit obsessed with getting a prototype up and running. At this point I discovered how hard it was to move things forward, giving my own lack of ability in making things.

Eventually after about 2 years of searching I found a chap locally who, whilst expensive, was keen to see the end result. By this time I had come up with a design far better than anything i'd done before, my previous design involved hand-cut pieces bolted together and looked as hideous on paper as it sounds.

The end design is pretty much what you see in the picture (right), machined from a solid plastic lump.

As I worked on the drawings whilst trying to find someone to build the car, I took the time to address some other things that interested me. I realised early on that the finished car, if it ever came to be would need a body and that that body would in all likelihood be a 'lexan' one. (Although I did have an abortive attempt to work with Empty Shells).

Sick of all the problems I'd had in the past attaching such bodies ( I particularly remember having to pack out  my MR1 chassis so much to fit a sports body it weighed almost as much as with a standard poly body!) only to have oil or some such cause them to come off a very inconvenient times, I designed the Scorpio, as I'd come to call it, with 'overwide' sides which meant, in theory (and, as it turned out, in practice) bodies could be cellotaped on with great ease.

You can see this clearly in the fourth picture down at the right. The plan was to drill holes into the widened part of later versions to reduce weight whilst retaining the large, rectangular area onto which bodies would be stuck. The picture also shows the other idea I had, which was 4WD! I always expected this would be a gimmick (or extra USP** as they call it in marketing!) but maybe, just maybe with the kind of tires shown in the picture it would of added more grip.

At least we cut a cooling hole for the motor and put the front axle in the right way around (By this time this picture had been seen by quite a few people, and quite a bit of good natured ribbing had come my way for designing a car that attempted to drive into itself!)

The pickup arrangement in that picture was lifted straight from a 1/32 scalex car and here I made my first error. Having only attached the part to show off the basic design to other racers in the UK, we then began work on a H:O version rather than tackle the daunting task of constructing a design more along the lines of a Tyco X2 or Tomy Turbo.

The whole process from drawings to the car you see (actually the Mk3) took 6 months, many trips to Southend and a sum of money i'd quite happily forget if only I could! It was however just about worth it. It was a great buzz to see my idea in 3D, and to be able to drive it.

In testing at home, it became clear there were quite a few issues, as i'd expected, to address but the basic speed was there and all the concepts worked, especially the adjustable magnets (even on banking - staggered magnets anyone?). I was looking forward to the next step, even if my bank manager was not!

But that next step never came. Had I found a partner sooner maybe things would have been different, but by the time I did the guy only had 7 months left on the lease of his workshop. He was trying to negotiate a new lease when his mother became very ill and, with one thing and another, he was forced to retire.

Before that he produced a second chassis with a few changes (for example less magnetic travel as 7mm was more than enough!).

As you can see from the fifth picture down the chassis was too low, or more precisely the holes for the axles were too high, and I had to find some pretty wild tires to be able to run it! It was also clear that the braids were never going to work very well on the ultra-narrow track rails of H:O track and I couldn't see anyway of changing it.

 Despondent at losing my partner I allowed my head to drop and didn't do anything new to the project for 2-3 years. I was also having a really bad time with my business, and slot cars dropped of off my personal radar.

 Around this time I had purchased a Rattler without realising that it would not, in it's standard guise, work on H:O track.

The car was designed by Ed Bianchi to run on special 1/32 scale tracks with braided rails, and the ' 'slide guide'' was too wide for H:O track.

I was always intrigued by the direct drive aspect of the design and the car it copied and improved on, Gerry Cully's Microcuc .

in the summer of 2002 my secret hedge trimming weapon, so central to the turnaround of my business, went on the fritz. For years hedge trimmers have got more and more complex and almost all the HD ones are petrol-powered. I have always eschewed these and instead use lightweight, electric units which mean I can be more nimble and don't get fatigued so easily, enabling me to undercut my rivals, not least because these machines are cheap.

Anyway, whilst seeing my repairguy rescue my beloved machine I became aware that he was pretty knowledgeable about electric motors.

Having tried without luck to prise the secrets of direct drive from Gerry and Ed, I engaged the repair guy to try and make a 4WD/Direct drive enabling can motor, which in January he succeeded in doing.

This meant that I could attempt my own DD project (see sketches at right) (known at the moment as the CuBi in honour of Gerry and Ed) and add four-wheel drive to the Scorpio, which had 4WD-ready axles right from the get-go even though I wasn't sure there would ever be a motor to go with.

So fully fired up, I began looking for a new partner, and eventually found one in Surrey.

So far we have made and tested our own high-downforce 'STS'*** traction magnet for the Tomy turbo which ISU should have for sale as soon as we can knock out resin copies from the machined original, as well as beginning work on a guide pin for Tomy cars much wider and deeper than the original.

Work should begin on the actual chassis soon (I freely admit that the above project where undertaken so I could see what this guy was all about) but the past eight years have taught me not to make rash predictions on the outcome.

All I can say is watch this space!

  * Adjustable Traction Component

 **Unique selling point

 ***Super traction system

Contact me for any information or to discuss the project

Since Gerry Cullen saw the article the great man emailed me as follows:

I was reading your HO World article and thought I'd pass along some additional information.

Ed Bianchi's experiments with direct drive predate my own by a considerable margin. While visiting with Ed and trying out his some of his direct drive prototypes, I had the thought of a different way of putting together a direct drive car. I built the first Micro-Cuc prototype and it was a real dog. But it did point me in the right direction and resulted in the Micro-Cuc II. I made two of them, one for Ed and another for myself. Ed wrote it up and posted it on the internet and before you knew it the demand for the Micro-Cuc II was pouring in. So in regard to a commercial product, the Micro-Cuc did predate the Rattler.

Ed and I have developed the habit of testing each other's prototypes. And it was while testing the prototype of what became the Rattler that my teenage daughter named the car. I also did the machining work on the front wheels for the Rattler as well as the rear wheels for Ed's WingMaster Sprint Car. In appreciation, Ed gave my daughter and I Serial numbers One and Two of the original Rattler. I also have serial number one on the follow-up Rattler II as well as one of the first WingMaster Spring Cars.

So while there is some competition between Ed and myself, there is a much higher level of assistance and cooperation between us. Ed is truly one of the most innovative and accomplished individuals in the hobby of slot cars.