I recently acquired a TCR slotless racing set, Three car system, slotless racing with a drone car and lane changing capabilities... sounds like digital?? wrong this set is 46 years old and completely analogue. So how does that work....
I had one in about 79. Although I think it was a newer version. I think I had some vans etc, like the A Team van. The contacts underneath would wear out quickly and I bought a fair few. I also had issues with the car engines burning out. One of my most vivid memories of TCR was the smell of the warm cars. Thanks for sharing, brought back some happy Christmas memories.
Ye Gods man!! This brought back amazing memories. I got the red box set that you had for Xmas when I was about 10 or 11 years old and I just about wet my pants on Xmas day! What a present that was! This was by far the best present I ever got as a kid. Thanks for the memories dude. I grinned like a Cheshire cat all the way through your video 😂
I remember the TV adverts, but this is the first time I've seen the reality. There was a "jam car" that was a truck whose trailer acted as a ramp for flying overtakes. Might be worth looking out for one of those, as it should be either fun or frustrating.
I was given a TCR set as a Christmas gift from my parents in around 1980….it was second hand I recall but was absolutely fantastic- it was great and yes you could genuinely overtake. So much good memories, soon after that Christmas we went to the factory shop and we bought a load of new tyres and a few new cars etc. I never forgot how much fun I had and 20 years later I bought more TCR when I was in my early 30s! I still have the sets today - I still appreciate my parents buying me the TCR - was better than Scalectric!
Back in the 70s diodes were the answer to so many control problems when the technology couldn't run to anything more exotic. I used to fly models round-the-pole indoors, which was where a model plane was electric powered by just two wires via a rheostat outside the flying circle, and it was tethered to a pole via rotating slip-rings. The one concession to 'control' was that the supply polarity could be reversed, to account for the fact that there was no standard to wire one's motor. So one enterprising builder built a replica DH88 Comet with retracting undercarriage and flaps, all controlled via the polarity switch. Diodes routed the power to the motors such that they always ran forwards, and other small motors to raise and lower the wheels and flaps, with limit switches to set their travel, and more diodes to bypass them when the polarity switch was flipped. It was an utter work of genius, and very impressive to me as an 11-year old!
I got a TCR set for Christmas around '79 or '80 but never got it to work as well as the ad and cars were always either flying off or struggling to run as the contacts wore out pretty fast. I'm commenting in reply here as after reading your comment I was reminded of a 'remote' helicopter I got one Christmas back sometime around then as well, that flew around in a circle on the end of an arm that was balanced on a central unit that had metal circular rings on top and contacts on the centre of the arm that connected to these rings for power that spun the arm and helicopter either clockwise or anti-clockwise. The controller was connected by cable to the central unit, and there was a pallet of pipes that you could try and pick up with the hook un the underside of the helicopter. I can't for the life of me remember the correct name for that toy but great to bring that memory back, thanks.
My next door neighbour friend had one of these some time in the late 70s or early 80s, and we played it together a few times. I had a Matchbox Race & Chase but I must admit I was a little bit jealous of him having this as it seemed so much more advanced. I think the way they change lanes and stay in them is that only one drive wheel is powered at a time, so the cars are either forced to drive against either the inside or outside edges of the track.
My friend, I was a young owner of scalextric , I also had TCR and I had Race n Chase (by matchbox)and I loved the lot.....the TCR was high maintenance though , which led to it's downfall, constantly having to clean the contacts and car pick ups..but this video brought back great memories of playing with this stuff in the seventies..😊, happy days...( now that's another blast from the past, ...Henry Winkler, Ron Howard...brilliant!)
I loved my brother's TCR set as a kid. I wish they still had them today as it is the ultimate expression of slot car racing IMHO. The only problem we had was that the pads wore through before long.
Us men are weird creatures. I used to play tcr with my mate Brian when I was around 11 to 12 in 1980. I love all my modern tech. But watching this brings back great memories. No computers, no internet no mobile phones. There's a part of me would choose to go back in an instant. Thanks for the memories
I had the green set and I can remember my dad buying it for £40 from WHSmith in 1980 for my Christmas present. By boxing day the pick ups had already burnt through.
Great video! I had one of these TCR sets, it did actually work, but apart from the jam car getting in the way, there wasn't much skill involved in playing it because you didn't really have to control your speed. But, honestly, in the 80s it was enough that it worked at all and that the cars made it round the track. I recall the manual telling you to clean the track power rails with a 2p piece. I also had a Scalextric set, but the problem there was that the track warped lengthways making sharp metal stick-up edges where the track pieces joined causing the power braids to rip often. Still have my Scalextric March Ford 6-wheeler in it's box, but it's a bit tatty.
Had a double oval one as a kid in the 80's. The TV ad did a really good job of disguising how small the cars were. It was pretty unreliable even from new. Don't think we ever got the jam car to work properly.
I had the semi-truck version. The lane switch on the hand-controller switched the track polarity for your given car which changed motor rotation. The rear-wheels used 2, 1-way mechanisms, one on each wheel. Only one wheel would drive at a time vectoring into one lane or the other. Also, the front of the motor would bend a little “finger” attached to the front wheels, turning them slightly, working with the drive of the rear wheels to keep it hugging one guardrail (lane) or the other. Turns would throw both car’s momentary into the outside lane (where the cars often went dead by loosing contact with the rails for too long. In actuality, you needed a REALLY long track to take advantage of this lane switching technology. It was a bit disappointing and not all the commercials professed it to be. However, it was a cool idea in the “golden age of toys”. This was the predecessor of the ultra-modern “digital” multi lane tracks of today.👍😉 I wrote all this as soon as you said Hmmm how does this work. Looks like you sorted it all out. The Jam-car has a tiny bridge rectifier in it. Nice review! Thanks for the trip down memory lane. Love this stuff!👍😉
TCR was awesome. I was the only kid to have one, everyone else had Scalextic. The jam car was a great dynamic, especially when playing on your own. It had its faults and I can see why Scalextic was more popular, but i'm still glad I had one.
Oo, you reminded me of how much fun I had playing with my jam car solo. I would tape down the other controller so the jam car would run full speed while I maneuvered around it. Probably how I trained myself to be good against other players . 😂
I got one for Christmas when I was about 12 - LOVED it! I had the triangle track set-up with one blocker car, but purchased more track and cars. This was so unique when it came out. Too bad it did not last - just too expensive to keep in good shape. The track needed to be cleaned very carefully and the tires and shoes for the cars wore out really quick. It was a lot of fun while it lasted.
I had these back in 77/78 brilliant thing , the rails are very abrasive , the coolest thing was the bodies they had , a lot like hot wheels They had a positive reverse power , so the car would pull to the left or the right depending on the switch , brilliant fun for a while till they burn through the contact shoes , that was about 3 weeks , a million years ago
Years ago I found heaps of new boxed track on a garbage throw out and sold it on eBay to a fella in Western Australia And I'm pretty sure I still have a new chassis for a Jam car in it's unopened packet somewhere
Nice bit of nostalgia, thanks. I had a similar set up called “lane changer” it’s still in my mums loft 45 years later, not sure if it will work! We bought it as my Christmas present about 45 years ago. 👍
I have a whole ton of TCR all boxed stored with 40+ cars , as a lad I grew up in Woodley about 200 yds from the Ideal Toy Co ,I have some really odd trucks and trailers , jumps , random lane changing Jam cars and opposite direction Jam cars that I never saw in shops all recovered from their skip. I used to clean the track by running a 2p around the contact lines and clean the pickups with a coarse rubber
from the comments it seems like most TCR was obtained by working at the factory and walking out with it or skip diving! love these stories, thanks for watching and commenting
I got the Jam Car set when it first came out in the 70s. The cars switch lanes by switching the polarity of the magnets in the cars via the trigger controller. It's awesome. I still have a complete set with indy cars (my second set). The first one is long gone.
I was only born was this was first released. I somehow remember seeing an advert for a scalextric type system where you can overtake cars. I remember the advert very clear and was amazed that it wasn’t on rails - blew my mind. It must have been early 80s. It’s great to finally see one in action and awesome that you got yours working. Love to see more content these. I had a Tyco train that went up the wall, loop the loop and even had a stunt jump. Was huge layout but great fun. Don’t see these sorts of things anymore.
saw the commercial and immediately started crying. i remember seeing these in jc penneys big book and begging my mom for one and finally getting it for my birthday/xmas/decent report card.
My knowledge on this is limited but i remember loving the tcr set i had intrestingly the one i had diddnt come with a jam car just to dirt track looking cars but it was a cool concept i remember the switches on the back of the controlers and when they went around corners the cars woulld go so fast they would slam in to the corners
I had that racing set. What a blast from the past lol. We eventually found out we could easily jump them by making a straight portion of track on a stack of books.
I had Scalextric and Matchbox’s Race ‘n Chase. The Race ‘n Chase set was a two rail slot system with the ability to turn the cars around by pressing a large button on top of the controller. It had a teeter totter section so the u-turn feature was necessary if the section was set against you. The cars my set had were a Corvette with working headlights and a police cruiser with working roof lights. It was similar in size to TCR and the track was rigid plastic with clip on side extensions for the curves so you could u-turn on the corners. That set was great fun as it was more about car chases than races and with the special track able to create a dead end as the police you could create a trap to stop the Corvette.
I had a pal at junior school back in the early 80's who had lots of TCR stuff and was infinitely superior to anyone else we knew who had it,you just couldn't beat him,great memories😊
Also had the tcr back in the day, my mate up the road had the version that was even more advanced where you had a police car and a getaway car and you could do a handbrake turn and there was a swing bridge in thee middle, there was also a dukes of hazard TCR set with a jump in the track!
Wow, memories!!! My friend had the go kart set in the 80s, like most I was taken in by the adverts and then learnt you could only change lane on bends (effectively sling shooting out one lane) but it was still amazing and fun as I only had standard scalextric.
A friend of mine had the set with the later _"dual lane changing jam cars!"_ Not one, but two automatic lane changing jam cars you had to work around that would switch lanes without warning! Also, there was more track with this particular set... It was good for about a couple of hours of fun - until the transformer started getting hot from running all those cars, and then you had to shut down and let things cool down for a while... Cool racing set, though!
As a kid I remember a friend having a TCR set. It looked quite impressive, and over taking was a good feature. I seem to recall some lighted cars too which was very cool. However, can see why ultimately it failed and was only around for a couple of years. The cars became unreliable quite quickly in use due to contact, tyre wear or other factors. The cars didn’t handle well either and the overtaking feature was sort of spoiled by the cars being flung outwards on every corner. Trying to race became a frustrating experience. Compare that to Scalextric which had easily replaceable contact braids and better handling and you can see why they outlasted TCR. I’d guess an other reason might be the relative lack of variety in track pieces compared to scalextric.
Great video, I remember TCR from 19 late 70s and early 80s as it was heavily advertised on childrens ITV. It was a smaller rival to Scalextrix and there was another car racng toy at the time called Aurora.
I had a different version of this - the motors had a spindle sticking out of each end and the front steering wheels were moved by a gear rotating in one direction or another.
Sorry to be a bit of a damp squib but, having read nearly all the nearly 400 comments at the time of writing, it's obvious many folks out there got a big kick out of TCR at the time. My story is a little different. Money was also a big issue for us back in the 70's but there was a large magic box full of 1950's/1960's Triang Scalextric Dad acquired for my older brother that I was NEVER allowed to touch. 😭There were several Cooper and Lotus cars, with real steering operated by the front blade, along with a Vanwall, front wheel drive Mini Cooper, and even a Motobike and Sidecar combo driven by a rubber band (if memory serves me right). Track sections included the Goodwood Chicane and even a lap counter. He never really used it so Mum eventually told big brother that I was allowed to play with it and that was it... 20+ years of ecstatic slot racing began. All my mates had new stuff so we often joined the tracks together in the back garden and had an absolute blast. Eventually, I managed to buy up all the other sets and kept it up until my late 20's. Just one outsider had a TCR setup and it really was a poor imitation of the classic Scalextric. I remember the utter frustration at the unreliability and it was soon consigned to the back of the toy box and we all reverted back to slots. The 1988 introduction of Magnatraction was the beginning of the end for me as my old Coopers, and even the Vanwall, just couldn't keep up with those cheating swine.🤣🤣🤣 Fabulous memories though and thanks for prompt to kick and scream about just how bad TCR really was. Keep it up, you got a new sub, cheers👍
This reminded me of my Matchbox Lane Changer set. The freedom to choose which lane you rode in made it seem far superior to Scalectrix to me. Just to repeat what everyone else here has said, what memories!!!!
I was a TCR kid and loved every minute by the time I was 15 I had a 40 foot track taking up most of the loft the most expensive thing I had to buy was a booster transformer which cost me £35 from radio shack god I almost wore my tires out on my paper round to earn the money for that but wow what a difference it made 😊
I got this for xmas one year and was deeply dissappointed as I asked for Matchbox race and chase. However my brother and I did play with it a lot but more so me. I found that the track wore grooves in the cars pick ups to the point they would cut right through. My controllers didn't have the switch on them like yours they had a push button on the top of them that you could just bash down with your hand. I seem to remember that my cars were saloon cars and I maybe wrong but I could swear one was a corvette stingray. I don't remember having a jam car though. I never really liked it as the track was small there didn't seem much skill in driving it and I always preferred Scalextric even though I never had one as a kid...I had to wait until I was in my 20's to get that.
The Jam car seems to work off of the principle of a diode bridge. Similar to how Powerpacks convert AC electricity to Dc. I remember seeing adds for in in Canada and in ToysRus in the late 80's to early 90's.
Which turns the steering. The switch changes motor polarity causing the motor to change rotation direction which seamlessly causes the steeringbto change.
I remember TCR, it had a terrible overheating problem if I remember right. i think it was quite pricey . I was 12 back in 1980 and it was all over the TV, shops, catalogues etc still cool though :)
i still have the red set and the blue set. the small holes in the track pieces are for small flags to make over-taking nigh on impossible. theres another system out about the same time, "race'n'chase" think it was matchbox. thanks for this though.
We have local hobby shop here that has tubs full these types of car parts, found them when I was looking for the newer style slot car parts. was sure what type of clot car they were for till watched this video but dam those cars could be tuned. with so many parts I assume they were bit costly due to the high amount of stock in these very old full totes of parts that where never sold, from old hobby store sitting around. not expensive now currant hobby store lets me rummage thru see what want made off on what found I thought I could use. very cool racetrack defiantly ahead of its time.
I got one of these sets in '78 or '79. I remember it being quite terrible. It never worked as well as I exoected, and I soon ditched the slotless cars and moved on to building motorized cars with Lego Technic.
I had a few sets of TCR in the late 70's early 80's .... in my opinion, far better than scalextric... (i had both, also race and chase) had hours of fun with TCR but got bored quickly with scalexteic! I used to make huge tracks with jumps and shit. I had the zig zag jam car and, my favourite cars were two Trans am firedbirds(one black & one yellow) to clean the track, i used to go round rubbing the rails with a coin. GREAT STUFF!❤
@@pqrstzxerty1296 Don't know but Mattel "HO" or more like 1/64th slot car sets are basically the same as Tyco The cars use Tyco style chassis and the Mattel track will clip to Tyco track
Wiko states Tyco took over in the 1990s from Ideal for TCR after the Ideal sets were getting reports of children getting electric shocks from the track, as the cars needed 2amps to work, and Ideal sets were then banned from sale. So Tyco apparently, new TCR "zigzag" sets changed to 20V at half and amp instead of 12V 2.5 amp. Tyco was bought by Mattel in 1997 Tyco bought Ideal in 1989
Cannot believe you not heard of TCR. Still have mine from back in the day. Started with Indy car system got extra track and cars. Try the zigging jam car
My god, this was our nightmare christmas present. Me and my brother wanted this so badly witht he working headlights and change lanes mum and dad brought it but was expensive we didnt get anything else. We set it up and it never worked! so gutted. It was back to the star wars toys
I have just bought the 23 ft. navy blue TCR box set (1977). Do you know which 1/64 slotless tracks which will fit/work for extending this existing circuit - both physically and electricity? -Any slotless tracks from TCR and maybe Tyco - regardless of age/version? Matchbox lane changer tracks too? Which type of cars will work?
You know those silver metal bits that went on the bottom of scalextric cars that used to burn away, did anyone elses dad just attach a bit of brillo pads to them instead or was that just mine?
