Quote:
Originally Posted by Shane Van Wey
Kids can do a great paint job with guidance, but the trick is using the aerosol cans. Hard to get a good finish with a brush. The one thing I do for my guys though is the axles. I wish the Scouts would sell them as a pre-polished deal. What a pain id the rear to get those things deburred. I am not sure a 8-10 yo would have the patience for it. I barely do at 40.
As it turns out, we got waxed. My younger son won the first 2 and then got beat twice in a row. Older son did not when a race, yet his ET's were juat lower than the final race's winner. Those cars were slowing down, but not fast enough to help us. He raced the wrong guys at the wrong time. This was my 8 yo's first one and he is extremely competitive. He wanted a perfect chinup bar for Christmas this last year. 8 years old... He got one, and we have created a monster. He rips off 10 chinup's every time he walks past the thing. The other day my wife called me at work to tell me I needed to have a talk with him. He came into her room and says, "Hey Mom, look at these guns!" I have NO idea where he got that from... really. Man, I must be in a talkative mood, way off track. Anyway, back to the drawing board for 8 yo. This was 10 yo's last one...
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Per the axles. I/kids chuck em up in the drill press, turn it on and run a small jewelers file along the head and shank. Cleans the burrs right off. Then the kids run some 600 & 1200 grit paper across the shanks to polish them up.
After they sanded them it dawned on me that the rougher surface would probably hold more graphite. The smoother surface is slipperier and will outlast the graphite. We'll see how the polished shanks work out this year.
Edit - add: the 10 year old is a bit different. He doesn't want help at all painting his car. Therefore there are about 12 coats of aerosol paint + some brush paint on there. He also wanted to paint moms car.
Also, after the kids got tired of sanding by hand, I took a vibrator sander and clamped it in the vise. I had the kiddies wear welding gloves and they cleaned up everything nice. Then proceeded to try to sand off the gloves.