Awhile back, by lovely wife (Azucena for those that weren't sure) designed a slot car track with a pulley system. This consists of a 4x8 plywood, several pulleys and a crank. We attached the crank to the wall, cables go from the crank through the pulleys to the plywood. This is in the garage and allows us to lower the table to play with the slot cars and raise it up when we are done.
Well, I've been "done" for about a year and 1/2 now and when I lowered the table, the dust sent my allergies into high gear.
The size of the table and lots of extra track have afforded me the luxury of designing various styles of track. On a few occasions, I'd build a separate short or medium track into the design so we could have two separate races going on at once. Sometimes I'd have the track intersect and hope no one crashes. I think one of the best tracks I designed is viewed here (still on our old web site). I like to try to get about 20 - 30 seconds per lap and that being at reasonable speeds.
I purchased a few sets off e-Bay and got inspiration from those (don't get me started on the cars I found - glow in the dark, Jeff Gordon 18 Wheeler, 3 section bullet train). One set showed me how to race the cars halfway around the track sideways. This also gave me ideas on racing halfway around the track upside down (take a loop and extend it). Since the cars use magnets, this really isn't a problem. As long as they don't stop, they'll go as long as needed. I had one track that was so well done that you actually got lost on the straightaway. One setup I did was a bit too hard to work with and the last one I did (probably the reason it's been sitting idle) did not play well. I kept having dead spots. Since I didn't feel like taking the track apart to work on different sections, I just let it set and forgot about it.
So, why am I telling you all this? We've got a garage sale coming up in about 2 weeks. I have enough track that I was able to put together 4 separate tracks to sell. So, my project now is to put together a track that will use up as much as I can and we'll sell most of the rest. My problem... I'm having creativity block. I use to dream up different types of track. I can't even come up with a corner section to get started. Yeah, I did the short track with the crashing intersection, but the main track I can't vision. This has been three days now. Once I get an idea started, it takes about 2 days to put it together. I'm talking loops - long and tall, extended sideways racing, "spiral" racing, racing through loops, u-turns, high speed curves.
Now. Nothing. Nada. Brain dead. I have one loop. A loop that goes up, then loops in the middle and morphs into sideways racing for the length of the race track. Hmm, maybe I can have it turn the corner, then morph into an upside down stretch that finishes in another loop that loops into an oval spiral. Ok, still thinking this out. The idea is to use up as much track as I possibly can. No sense on selling my leftovers only to find out I sold too much and have to buy off e-Bay again.