Dunn’s Hatch or Dunnington Park!
My wife encouraged me to buy the materials necessary to make the race track which is housed in the garage and on occasions I’ve wondered if there was an ulterior motive to this!
The track measures 16ft X 7ft 6inches. The frame is made from 3”X”2 timber and the baseboard is lightweight fibre board. The overall weight is still considerable but it is easily raised up into the roof by a hoist when not in use. We can be up and running in less than a minute.
A decent lap time is about 25 seconds although the lap record stands at
17 seconds.
I decided that the circuit must meet the following criteria.
1 To be two lane in order to get as much track length into the available area.
2 Each corner to be unique.
3 The close proximity of parts of the circuit to be disguised by a variety of
scenic features
4 To have a long fast straight but with close slots to prevent easy overtaking.
5 That it is able to be constantly developed and never finished!
With regard to creating the scenery I’d say the most important thing of all is to constantly look for inspiration. I find that if you are inspired you can create anything! On this circuit certain corners are inspired by real life circuits. Some of the scenery is inspired by real life or aspects of model railway layouts. And the spectator figure I made with his umbrella blown inside out was inspired by a Kinder Surprise egg!
John Dunn
