Oh My God!! You All Need To Read This

**trickyvic3** · 01-22-2008, 02:42 PM

As most of you know, We have been working on setting my son Joe up with a mouth controller of some sort. Well, I loged on to controller talk yesterday and was blown out of the water. Gary gerding wrote in and said that someone had read about Joe and is donating the money to have him build Joe a brand new track, custom made for him!! OH MY WORD!!! We cant beleve it. Not only is Joe getting a new track, but hes also getting a lap counter, timing system, and power supply. And yet the best, Gary is bringing the track up here to NH. Can you beleve it? I had to let you ALL know, because without you and OWH none of this could have happened. I wrote to paul K / MOM and was telling him We have not seen Joe this happy in a long--long time. And its all because of you guys. We did not expect this. Its a great feeling to know there are still GOOD PEOPLE out there who can make such a difference in the lives of one family. I am at a loss for words. OWH is the best thing that has ever happened to us. We have made so many new frends. I have always said that slot racers are a breed of there own. Every one is family. Well boys,you just proved it!! Jeff, with the help of some frends, are working on a controller as we speek. I will keep you all posted on how things are going. Thank you all so much, from the bottom of our harts. ----Vic, Joe and jennie

READ THIS THREAD FOR MORE INFO REGARDING THIS PROJECT:
http://www.slotcartalk.com/slotcarta...ad.php?t=21938
(I'm speechless right now... will post when I can find the words)
- Paul K - aka "mom"

**RapidRick** · 01-22-2008, 03:22 PM

After a great conversation with Gary G...last night...he asked me about my track (The Whip) and my experiance with Slot Racing. I too use a wheelchair for all of my transport. I've been racing since I was 7 years old.

Having the use of my hands I am wondering about a controller for your son. I'm great friends with a lot of "magical" people who have assisted me in getting things for my life. Knobs and buttons, grabbers and clamps to make my life as easy as possible.. We know need a slot car controller.

Armond Legault is a man I know who drives his van with a "puffer" control. This is a device that Armond blowes into to steer his Van. We joke with him frequantly about sneezing in traffic. I'm sure the brains we have within the Slot Car community can create a "mouth" controller to get some great lap times.

I think this would be something that Jim DiFalco, Howard Smith, Dan Ruddick or Jay "Gee"...or any other controller creator could modify so that driving a slot car is possible.

If you need some added assistance in this area...Email me here...or call me.

Rick "Rapid" 860-229-3970 and I'll try to help a bit too...

**trickyvic3** · 01-22-2008, 04:19 PM

Thank you rick, Jeff from jaygee is working on something. I know he is also working with someone else on this as well. I know that Howard Smith had offerd to help, but I,m not sure whos working with who. I do know that Jeff has been keeping in touch with us, I think good things will come. Joe has a sip + puff wheel chair [ I hope he can race better than he drives his chair ] HA,HA Gary was telling me about you this morning. He told us about your track. Joe is going to go with the mini orange. We used to race on a black and the orange is pretty close, without the s curve. We cant wait !!

**Phil I.** · 01-22-2008, 05:04 PM

NECESSITY....THE MOTHER OF INVENTION....

Don't know who coined the phrase...BUT HOW TRUE

....I'v been a wheeler 15 years now and got back into slots after the accident. The young lady couldn't see my full dress Harley

.....

Most people don't really realise what we have had to do to find, redue, bend, break, con, beeg or make to be able to do what we do so well...."Wow. I didn't know you could that"....as we

.....I raced in the Florida Div. 2 from 93 to 99...Stayed in the top 8-10 overall cause I had to miss the races I couldn't drive too. And some of them boys ain't slow.....

One thing I have noticed over the many years is the slot car "family" will rally around and help in any way they can.....But give no quarter on the track. When a new racer comes in, I will help anyway I can to get him/her up to speed....And it also proves that not only we can DO it and we are people too.

I had to move in 02.....no tracks any place near..Gary G. told me of a new track about 1.5 hr. away....and I'm havin a ball again....

A very nice track in the smallest of towns....Newburg Mo.

THE OLDER I GET..THE FASTER I WAS
PHIL I

**RollinI** · 01-22-2008, 05:09 PM

Originally Posted by Phil I.

NECESSITY....THE MOTHER OF INVENTION....

Don't know who coined the phrase...BUT HOW TRUE

....I'v been a wheeler 15 years now and got back into slots after the accident. The young lady couldn't see my full dress Harley

.....

Most people don't really realise what we have had to do to find, redue, bend, break, con, beeg or make to be able to do what we do so well...."Wow. I didn't know you could that"....as we

.....I raced in the Florida Div. 2 from 93 to 99...Stayed in the top 8-10 overall cause I had to miss the races I couldn't drive too. And some of them boys ain't slow.....

One thing I have noticed over the many years is the slot car "family" will rally around and help in any way they can.....But give no quarter on the track. When a new racer comes in, I will help anyway I can to get him/her up to speed....And it also proves that not only we can DO it and we are people too.

I had to move in 02.....no tracks any place near..Gary G. told me of a new track about 1.5 hr. away....and I'm havin a ball again....

A very nice track in the smallest of towns....Newburg Mo.

THE OLDER I GET..THE FASTER I WAS
PHIL I

Phil,

Hope you can make it back to Florida and race with us again some day.

And I don't exactly recall Phil giving any quarter on the track, either!

RIDEr...... never mind!

Rollin

**Phil I.** · 01-22-2008, 05:21 PM

I'm trying for this summer. Got a daughter, son in law(who used to race at Les's place in Tampa) & 3 grand kids, one of which I have not met yet, in Zephyer Hills.

CYA ALL AGAIN
PHIL

**trickyvic3** · 01-22-2008, 06:58 PM

We have had Joe home with us now, going on 4ys. [ many hospital stays ] I might add. We have seen it all. The stairs, questions, and the ever so popular, YOU CANT DO THAT!!! And lets not forget, YOUR GOING TO DO WHAT!!! Well let me tell you, We all know that with the complacations that Joe has, he has a somewhat short life span. We dont let anything stand in our way. He is going to live out his life as normal as we can make it. Its good to hear that you dont let it stand in your way eather. My dad was in a chair most of my life, so Im used to it. My wife jennie, who is a saint by the way, Thinks maby it was ment to be because I was ment to care for Joe. Who knows? All I do know is that life is good for us at the moment, and thats what you have to live for - - THE MOMENT -----, Vic, Joe and jennie

**Slidergreg** · 02-08-2008, 08:56 PM

As a musician who built many prosthetic aides for my former bassist, the late Monty Hibbard who had Muscular Distrophy since childhood and passed away at the ripe old age of 42 in 2005, I have an idea.

You may be able to adapt some hardware and software used to control digital music controllers for synthesysers. I was involved in electronic music back in the 80s and 90s before I rediscovered slots and there is a protocal called Musical Instrument Digital Interface or MIDI.
There are "breath controllers" that work as what is called "continous controllers" for such things as woodwinds and brass instrument players to be able to trigger a synth. Controller paramaters are assignable and are unbelievably flexible to control such things as pitch rise, detune and vibrato levers as well as volumn. It shouldn't be too dificult for someone like Howard at Third Eye to make this system work to control such things as voltage, brakes, choke and so on.
Just check it out on line. It's all there.

Contact me for any other advice I can give.

I hope this helps.

Greg Gilbert