Rally/off-road track

GTRguy83 Monday, 4/20/2020

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I am planning a 2 tracks right now. One of them being an off-road track. Has anyone ever done a more realistic off-road racing surface? I have been looking at model railroad dirt roads but worry they may be a bit too rough because of the rally cars ride height. I've also considered cork and roofing shingles. Any suggestions, pointers, or ideas would be greatly appreciated.



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Chaos_Canyon 4/21/20

Yeah, there's a guy on the 3D DRL FB page that has a multi track course, with one area being a downhill run of offroad over small pebbles/stones etc. looks really interesting

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GTRguy83 4/21/20

I've been seeing a ton of cool ideas and some of them look absolutely amazing, I'm just concerned with clearance issues with things like the fiesta rally car.


  • The fun part is testing! I think Ghost jerker did a full off-road video with monster trucks too that was quite funny. I was considering making a fake "dirt" section on my track by gluing to sand to it but think it might cause too much drag and stop the cars, but will test it at some stage :) — Chaos_Canyon
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BoogMiller 4/21/20

My idea for my track is not to have different textures on the racing surface but have different looking terrain printed on the racing surface.

Be sure to check out the Red Desert Baja on Diecast 64 YouTube channel...the best Off-Road race in Diecast Racing and multiple surfaces etc


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redlinederby 4/21/20
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Good idea with the roofing shingles, never thought about that...rough but not loose or too big. Hmmm...


  • I saw some at Home Depot Saturday and it reminded me that my Dad used them to make gravel driveways for his model farm. — GTRguy83
  • Ingenious — gstackert
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Dtag08 4/21/20

Spray adhesive and play sand might be another option


  • i done that, they run fast but a lot of bounce causing some to flip over. — DiabloRidgeSpeedway

Check out Ghost Jerker on YouTube. I think his off road track is really well built and gets some great results.


Haha...good eye BV...you can buy that type foam in a roll...and I'm eventually going to build another track in the vein of D64's Red Desert Baja but it will be "The Trail" inspired by the Appalachian Trail in winter time...but the cars roll very well on that foam and it's easy to work with as well.

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gstackert 5/27/20

Check out the Ghostjerker YouTube channel and search "dirt drag racing". There is some nice rally action going on there. Ghostjerker uses cakemix, but they have hinted that the track was very hard to set up. I owe my passion for diecast racing to ghostjerker nearly as much as 3dBotmaker himself.


Mix elmers white glue and water....mix in play sand, and small rocks/peddles, add food coloring or paint to change the color.   Use the blue-shop towels as mentioned in the scenery build section.

I am just going from memory of childhood school diorama's, nothing recent, just my suggestions.

I built this over the weekend. Trying to find a good packing/rolling method like on a real dirt track. Now if I could just get the dog to stop using it as a ramp...


  • That’s awesome. I was thinking about the same sort of thing in our garden, where I don’t have to worry about it and can let it weather etc. how are the vehicles going on it? Are they making it down consistently or are the wheels clogging up? — Chaos_Canyon
  • https://youtu.be/KLA1wtuBbVM — RustBeltRacing
  • You might need to copy and paste that because it didn't come up as a link. The higher clearance seems to roll the smoothest. That pick up got snagged a couple times. — RustBeltRacing

youtu.be/KLA1wtuBbVM


  • Please do a HW/Spinmasters/Whatever Monster Truck drag on that. You will need to rig a starting gate of some type though — Uncle_Elvis
  • Nice. Amazing how well they handle the rough terrain considering there's no suspension - same thing with eh Beaverworx track. Have you tried any rally cars down it yet? — Chaos_Canyon
  • Elvis, I ran some monster trucks down it the other day and added a jump at the end. That was awesome! Gotta make some tweaks but I think it'll work great. — RustBeltRacing
  • Captain Chaos, I was really surprised the rolled at all haha I tried some rally cars but the clearance was too low. It rained yesterday which may have packed it down a little so I'll try again after I roll the surface. — RustBeltRacing
  • Sweet. Be keen to get this in next week's DSPN report if you can get some footage without you in it :) Nothing personal, just trying to keep the illusion that it's more real than toys — Chaos_Canyon

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