What is Coroplast? DIY Fat track material
Coroplast is a corrugated plastic (and brand name) that has become a popular go-to for open road fat track builds. It's like cardboard, but plastic. It is also the recommended material to use with the Magtrack Open Track Project by 3DBotMaker.
You can buy Coroplast from various places. Certainly online but also in retail builder stores like Home Depot and Lowe's. Overall, it's a pretty cheap material and easy to work with, no unlike cardboard.
Recently, the guys over at Hot Car Track shared a video with their review of Coroplast and how they're using it on their track build. Give it a watch if you're interested in some thoughts on how to use Coroplast and how it works with cars.
www.youtube.com/watch?v=m_HMVxnhaNg
I have never used Coroplast for any track build but it's on my radar for when I get around to building myself an open track. I like the idea of cheap materials that are easy to manipulate, as I'm not a big planner so when I mess up, I don't feel like I just burned a pile of money.
My concerns with Coroplast is connectivity with retail tracks (orange, crashers, etc) and then the turns and curves. Coroplast isn't incredibly flexible so it's great for striaghts but might not be great for the curves (hence the worry about connectivity).
I also don't know if there is any generic Coroplast out there...I'm sure there is.
If you have used Coroplast for your track build, share your experience and maybe some photos of your build.
Discussion
So I am noticing that a couple of people are using the coroplast for flat turns with high walls. How's that working? (Chaos Canyon has got it down pretty good, looks like...) How are the walls being fastened to the base sheet for the turns?
- Where the turns aren't too high speed it works fine but if they hit it too fast you get rollovers. My track is made from palight (high density foam) and every corner has a bank to it as well and for Carhooner corner (the one after the jump) I have actually added some padding and a flexible strip in front of it to absorb the impact in order to reduce the rollover, it still happens but a lot less than before. I did have a high banked turn when I first made the track but the cars were coming in so fast they just drove straight up it and hit the top and fell down so this system I have now actually works better for me :) — Chaos_Canyon
General note on coroplast:
I was messing around with some last night, and tried cutting a strip so that it would fit underneath a regular orange track. Wow! It worked! If you cut a strip of coroplast five flutes wide, it fits tightly into the ends of orange track with no discernible bumps, and holds the track together tightly so that blue connectors are not even needed! I tried splicing together three sections of track in this fashion, then rolled several cars down the track - each performed flawlessly. And, for additional support, you can cut pieces four flutes wide to support the rest of the track, no sagging.
I would recommend getting a coroplast cutter called the Coro Claw - it allows quick clean cuts with minimal effort.
- Sweet, thanks for the measurements, good tip. — redlinederby
- I’m planning on doing a short two-lane drag strip with this method in mind - I’ll keep you guys updated. — SpyDude
I've been eying this for a while now as I can get a 4x8ish sheet for about 15$. As mentioned, it looks great for straight sections but curves may be an issue.
More to follow as it develops