LifeLike HO Dodge Intrepid #22 Slot Car Review

LifeLike Dodge Intrepid CAT#22

Features for this HO slot car #9753:

Custom Armature for Increased Horsepower
Cornering Speeds Over 800 Scale MPH
New Style Traction Magnets (Neodymium)
New Fast Tracker Chassis (T Chassis)

Overall Rating:

3 out of 5 tires

LifeLike HO Dodge Intrepid #22

LifeLike Racing is the first to bring the Dodge Intrepid NASCAR Stock Car to the HO slot car scene!!!

Test Drive Results - Ten Lap Sprint:

Lane	Best Lap Time	Average Lap Time	Chronometer
1	4.318	5.677	1:05.299

Test Drive Observations:

When looking at the HO slot car scene for 2001, you don't see many new releases from the little three - Mattel/Tyco, Tomy, and LifeLike. LifeLike did release a new slot car and here it is: The Dodge Intrepid Stock Car. Well considering from the decent job LifeLike did somewhat on their Lumina and Thunderbirds and then the Taurus, figured this one had to be ok. The prototypes pictures didn't do the car any justice so I had to wait until I can get one in person to see how it actually looks and runs.

First off, let's take a look at the body. LifeLike did an excellent job here on the engravings like the roof flaps, rear spoiler, air ducts on the windows, etc. stuff like that is done really well. Next, we take a look at the stance. Well, the car sits like its ready for some 4x4 rally action. It sits up too high. I was wondering if this caused the nose of the car to slope down too much and have the front wheel wells positioned too low on the body. There is enough room there, they could have moved up the body mounts, had the nose less sloped like that, and move the front wheel openings up into the body. From the front doors back, 3/4s of the car doesn't look that bad. The front part (the nose) is the worst with it sloping down too much and not as flat as the NASCAR stock car or real car is. It's almost as bad at that 1993 Camaro they did and the ugly Superbird / 1970 Mustang they made. They have to fit the body to the chassis but there is much better ways to do, look at Tyco's efforts on some of their car bodies and you see what I mean. Also, why those little sponsor stickers on the body. Why not just tampo-print all of them on there.

Now comes this new chassis. A year or two ago LifeLike came out with their own new chassis. None of the other chassis were actually theirs as they were modified from past Rokar/Amrac/Cox chassis so this one is all new from them. Nobody in the racing world likes it. The new design has a totally different set-up. The first ones were released into sets mostly without the added round traction magnets. The new ones for packaged cars in 2001 come with the round traction magnets along with the motor magnets that aid in traction. The new design features independent front wheels, soldered connections to the sealed can motor, and unique gearing. Totally new pick-up shoe arrangement, different pinion gear, and can't change motor brushes, etc. An ok chassis but not that well thought-out. I guess cheaper for them to have made then the others.

Let's see if this baby moves!!! The car stuck pretty good to the track so you know it has strong magnets. With any slot car, you look for that balance of speed, traction, and power. This car drove pretty good but it has too much speed for a standard home track. You can get it up to speed but the turns are not for this one. You can take them pretty fast but the problem with these super fast chassis is that there really isn't any low end to keep these cars going at a steady pace. You can floor it down a long straightaway have to slow to a crawl to hang onto the slow curves and twists then hope it doesn't stall or flip out on you when you try to give it any gas to get some speed. It would probably work well on a long standard oval but nothing fancy with twists and turns. You can probably develop a rhythm for driving this car but I prefer the older standard Fast Tracker over this new one. From doing some tests, I found the new one to be actually slower than my older stock Fast Tracker chassis on my layout.

Finally to round things up, I am giving this HO slot car a total of 3 out of 5 tires for it's rating. Why a 3? First off, they could have did better on their body. I would take a little less little detailing over a ill-shaped body. The new chassis isn't the same as the old Fast Tracker ex-Rokar M-Car (High5 version) one plus you just don't get any low end running out of it. It's an ok car if you want a Dodge Intrepid Stock Car since it's the only out there for now but don't expect it to out run your other fast HO slot cars.

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