# Faller F1 HO sloty car



## Marty (Oct 20, 1999)

Ever since I found out these existed I have been trying to get one. The ones I find on ebay go for way more then I want to pay. I finally won an auction with twoof 'em!! They are not complete. I am missing the mid mounted wings (similar to Aurora T-Jet wings), 3 mirrors, 1 roll bar, and 1 driver. Here they are next to an Aurora Slim-Line car.



















Pictures of chassis in next post.

Marty
Marysville, OH


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## Marty (Oct 20, 1999)

Here are the chassis pics next to an Aurora Slim-Line chassis.














































I hope the pics are clear enough to see the miniscule armature shaft! Plese note there is NOT an access hole to oil the armature!!

The brushes are sitting on top of springs. What a pain to reinstall the top gear plate! I still do not have it completely in place! There are very small notches front and rear that have to line up, and I haven't done it yet.

Did you notice the absence of a top plate gear clamp? It is hel in place with two small screws!

I really like the wneels and tires. The "wire wheel" detail and the tire sidewall detail "AMS" and Continental. The only problem is the wheel has a center raised rib so standard slip on tires won't work.

Did you notice the holes in the pick up shoes? Are they there to reduce weight? Reduce arcing?

I applied power the chassis and it sounded really strong. The hard rear tires prevent any real track testing.

Marty
Marysville, OH


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## Marty (Oct 20, 1999)

OOPS I forgot the picture of the pick up shoes.










The shoes are not parallel. They point slightly outward in the front.

Marty
Marysville, OH


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## Marty (Oct 20, 1999)

There are diodes on the chassis. You can see them back by the rear axle. The guide pins are also used to designate which diode you have. They are marked "+" and "-".



















I am guessing they are in there so you can run two cars in the same lane?

Marty
Marysville, OH


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## ParkRNDL (Mar 20, 2002)

Very cool. I just noticed an auction or two with Faller F1 cars like that earlier this week. I had no idea they existed before that. Wonder if it was the same auction...

--rick


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## foxkilo (Mar 27, 2008)

Hi Marty,

The things next to the rear axle is not a diode but a condenser to reduce interference on the telly and /or radio, cb and the like. The diodes were integrated in the pick-up shoes, but your cars have none of them. Have a look here: http://www.ebay.de/itm/Faller-ams-S...t=Rennbahnen_und_Slotcars&hash=item232161f38f

But you only need them if you want to run two cars independantly on one lane. AC is used and one car runs on the upper (positive) wave and the other on the bottom (negative) one.

The F1 chassis was the only one with a skrewed on top plate. 

IMHO the car was not always delivered with a wing, As kid I had several and all without wings And it wasn't until I started collecting in later years that i realised they came with wings as well. To get replacement parts (wings, mirrors, heads, headrest) look here (unfortunately not in english):
http://www.slotcar-online-shop.de/

Mario


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## slotcardan (Jun 9, 2012)

The old Aurora Vibrators worked off AC power.

The reason was actually so both cars could share the same power supply without one car effecting the other.

one car would run Positive the other negative. Thus the positive car could not see the negative car and vice versa.

with a low amperage power supply this would stop one car from slowing down the other car when accelerating or when one car deslotted it would not effect the other cars speed.

with a DC system where both cars see all available power at once when one car has high load(acceleration) it would slow down the other car also if one car deslotted it might cause the other car to suddenly speed up and deslot as well.

Basically AC power acted like 2 separate power supplies when you have separated the lanes electrically.

this system was superior to modern DC systems but caused issues for the customers and was dropped to make it simpler for the customer.

Ho from that time never had lane changers like larger scale did. Faller did have train set scenery slot car sets where you could have control over 4 cars at the same time but it was just so you could adjust the speed and have the 4 cars run on 2 lanes continuously for display.


There is a story when Aurora first made the T-jets some engineer placed the hand made prototype on the Track without checking the power supply configuration which was AC from the Vibrators to DC for the new track system, and he lit the prototype on Fire and returned it back to R&D and didn't say anything,,, the second hand made prototype had a note not to use this with AC power. this occurred back in the early 60s.


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## foxkilo (Mar 27, 2008)

Hi Dan,

I beg to differ slightly on the Faller topic. As you pointed out it was the scenery issue which had a big hand in the Faller system. But the Faller system was also marketed by the company as an educational game to learn the traffic rules. That meant realism by two cars on one lane indipendently controlled. For example could the driver of the first car switch on a turn off and andd go right where as the driver of the second car would would reverse the switch and kept going straight ahead. Faller even created and announced special overtaking track allowing the car overtaking car to switch lane. To make it more workable the car to be overtaken was slowed down after passing the lane switch by reducing power through a preadjusted resistor. The over taking car still got the full power. This thing made it into production and was included in a special set. Unfortunately technical problems arose after the first batch of sets had been already dispatched to the dealers. Faller immediately made a recall and got all sets back except a handfull. These sets are now the most elusive of all Faller sets and kind of holy grail. INMHO the reasons for the recall had been that it was in theory a nice thing but in practice didn't work out and knowing the construction principle of the Faller turn-off mechanism which have a tendency to melt through tracks it was that what happened in thehands of the kids.

Mario

Btw: If you are interested in a copy of the mechanical and electrical layout send me a pm


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## slotcardan (Jun 9, 2012)

You are right I forgot about the faller Porsche set that had passing lanes and is very rare.
The turn offs were electro magnetic like the rail switchers for the faller train sets.


More recently faller has made digital control systems using photo sensors to control sections of track to simulate more traffic


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## foxkilo (Mar 27, 2008)

Hi Dan,

I had a look through my collection and found what I was looking for an Aurora Tjet Indy racer in chrome still in box with a pick-up shoe similar to Faller to allow it to run on ac and together with a second car on same lane. It is an original part not something aftermarket or the like an dit does like different than the Faller part. I don't know when Aurora sold them in that form or which sets and/or for what markets they were intended.

Mario


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## slotcardan (Jun 9, 2012)

faller and aurora always sort of intermixed inventory.

aurora later made special bodies for faller.

Faller always went for realism and more for the model railroader customer over the american slot car racer customer.

typically you see Faller versions of Aurora bodies with different paint jobs, and the german customers loved the Blazing brake bodies because they had the ability to have working headlights and working brake lights. but that was limited to 3 bodies from aurora's inventory
Firebird
Monza
Corvette
there was a porsche blazing brake body however it did not have working headlights as an option.

going back to Tjets, Faller basically had licensed copies of aurora chassis and parts, the track system was different, but the chassis and parts were very similar though not 100% copies.

in the 1980s when aurora went under Faller bought out the european holdings of the company aurora had divisions in germany and spain. the rest of aurora got resold many times but never went anywhere until the parent company of tyco in 1987 merged with another company that held the remains of Aurora plastics then tyco gained access to some aurora designs that made there way into future Tyco products through the 1990s.


The thing with many faller items is they look identical to aurora until you put the 2 side by side usually they need some modification to make work or they are 99% the same and will interchange but not 100% perfectly.

the change from AC to DC was different depending on your country. in the US after 1970 it went pretty much DC power there was a huge slot car industry collapse in 1968 so things changed fast in that time frame DC would of save money on the manufacture costs of the chassis and controllers, 2 pennies saved on diodes would of added up fast during production.


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## foxkilo (Mar 27, 2008)

Hi Dan,

here we are now in really murky water but on the risk of being called names I'll try to put a bit of light on the subject as far as my knowledge goes.

I doubt Faller had had a real licence agreement with Aurora. They started out with copying Atlas tracks as well as their inline chassis (incl. layshaft with idler gear). If thhis was done by licensing I don't know but as Faller has had a standing relation with Atlas through their RR-Kits the assumption that there was something along those lines isn't too far fetched. After realising that the Tjet might be the way to go they started copying it. Whether in order to avoid patent claims or to improve on it they started fiddling with the tjet design. Although not altering its basic design completly they they changed it enough to make it more complex and reducing the simplicity that made the tjet reliable or at least easier to maintain and tune. Where as Aurora had only two handfull of different chassis (incl. Vibes, AFX and even G+). Faller had least six more or less completly different chassis and several dozen variations of those. I think the figures is around 57. Some were mere prototypes others were mass produced in volumes. They even came up with a copy of the AFX but that one was a mass 'cause it was sold with the wrong tires, rubber instead of sponge or silicon ones. And its reliability left much to be desired. This let Faller to get in contact with Aurora through Aurora's Dutch subsidiary. An agreement was reached by which Faller bought complete Aurora cars and some of them were specially produced for them. In return Aurora stayed out of the German market and Faller wouldn't sell in Aurora territory. I am not shure about whether Faller bought Aurora's European entities. But Faller soldiered on for 2-3 more years afterbthe demise of Aurora still selling Aurora Cars and the Tyco fire engine.
Before the agreement with Faller Aurora sold sets on a small scale through department stores under the speedline name. I don't think Aurora had real german subsidiary. The one in question was the dutch one which had its own production facilities. Aurora was never a household name in Germany even their plastic kits were hard to get by.

I don't know if you know this side, but it gives a good insight into auroras European endeavers.

http://members.chello.nl/j.berg133/index_bestanden/Page3964.htm

Mario

Sorry I had to edit the text but I found so many mistakes in it, it had to be done. Apologies


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## ParkRNDL (Mar 20, 2002)

foxkilo, your information matches pretty closely the little bit that is given in Thomas Graham's Aurora history book. I don't have it in front of me, but it said something to the effect that Aurora agreed not to sue Faller for copying the pancake chassis as long as they kept their product out of the American market...

--rick


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## slotcarman12078 (Oct 3, 2008)

A law suit wouldn't have been beneficial to either party. Lawyers cost $$$$... Love the history lesson foxkilo..


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## slotcardan (Jun 9, 2012)

neither company had the money to retain lawyers HAHAHAHAHAHA


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## videojimmy (Jan 12, 2006)

The Fallers chassis with the arms scream. The hard part for the F1 is trying to find tires for them. I have and the tires are so bad the just spins its wheels


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## foxkilo (Mar 27, 2008)

Those tires are the reason why they didn't really make it. The chassis is fairly high up with quite a bit of ground clearance i.e. high center of gravity. It was the same with the Chapparal the AFX clone. Good chassis but bad tires.
As for all who need tires you get at least the rear ones here.
http://www.slotcar-online-shop.de/

It makes me wonder that nobody really had bothered to make silicone ones.

Mario


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## slotcardan (Jun 9, 2012)

i think Jelclaw does make replacements i know they make 4 different Tjet type tires.
T-jet,500, Buggy and Truck.. it looks like the buggy or truck tires would be a replacement for the originals if needed.


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## Marty (Oct 20, 1999)

The wheels have a raised rib so the tire has to have a matching groove on the inside.

Marty
Marysville, OH


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## alpink (Aug 22, 2010)

it has been said that JelClaw makes a tire for that wheel. I don't know, But I will check it out.


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## videojimmy (Jan 12, 2006)

I have two versions of their AFX chapperal... One has the inner groove
Rims and the rims on the other look exactly the same ... Minus the inner groove

If anyone finds tires for the F1... Please let me know.
Thanks !


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## Marty (Oct 20, 1999)

videojimmy said:


> If anyone finds tires for the F1... Please let me know.
> Thanks !


Me too!!

Marty
Marysville, OH


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