How to Build an Outside Racing Track for Remote Controlled Cars

Sketch out the track you want to build. If you make the track in one or more figures of eight with tunnels and bridges you can fit a lot more track into a limited space. Get some variation into the track with some fast straights as well as tight corners and leave space for the teeter totter obstacle.

Pour lines of flour to mark out the track, setting the lane width between 20 and 44 inches depending on the size of cars you will be racing. Account for visibility of the cars as they go around the track, especially if you are building a track on several levels. Work out a good place for the people racing the cars to stand where they can see the whole track or move easily if they have to do so.

Bank up the turns with a spade and shovel, allowing faster cornering. Lay polyethylene pipe for a tunnel where the tracks cross over and build the earth up and over them for bridges where the track crosses the other way. If you feel you can risk it, bank the earth up on each side of the cross over to make a jump, leaving plenty of straight run-up for the cars to gain speed to clear the jump.

Cut strips of the plastic sheet about 6 inches across to serve as crash barriers. Push them edge first into the earth along the sides of the track to a depth of about 2 inches.

Install the teeter totter as an obstacle somewhere along the track, burying the stand to make it extra stable and attaching a little extra weight to the end from which the cars will come so it will return to the right position after a car has driven up and over it.

Cut away the turf with the spade if you have built the track over grass, as grass does many RC cars no good. Rake over the entire track, removing any large stones, sticks and twigs and breaking up the surface to give traction to the car's tires.