Wow! This thread was a trip down memory lane. So much time spent as a kid in my parents basement sitting on the concrete floor with the bigger cars (1:32 scale?).
I remember:
  • Constantly fiddling with brushes
  • The smell of burning ozone from the little electric motors
  • Swapping tires
  • Cleaning the electric motors and "diff" gears
  • Putting stuff on the track to do smoky "burnouts"
  • Blocking up the corners with books to make banked turns
  • Putting pillows and blankets at the ends of the straights to catch the fly-overs that the guardrails couldn't contain
  • Building "custom" bodies out of paper and cardboard.