> >Model cars use RFID tags for lap timing and seem quite reliable.
>
> I suspect that this is how the formula one and similar race cars do it
> as well. However in these cases I suspect that it is a permanently
> transmitting beacon seeing power is available

I believe all race tracks are now based on this loop system

http://www.amb-it.com/

Click through English/Europe/Oval Track Racing to get to a page
with a How It Works link (nice big picture at the end of it all)

I looked into it just out of interest last year. This isn't the company I
remember looking sat (Dutch I think it was) but the principle's the
same. ISTR there were other loops for something that could be up
to 50m long. Which isn't that long when you're doing 90+m/sec in
a CHAMP or IRL car

> For the OP, is it not possible to have a slot cut in the track to drop
> a wire receiver aerial into, or is it a dirt/cinder track? If a hard
> surface then potentially any other uses of the track would probably
> also welcome having the receiver loop permanently embedded,
> even if each club had to own its own timing gear (maybe an
> opportunity to hire the gear you own)

That's what I was thinking. Rather than messing up someone's track,
you're actually improving and increasing the value of it. Surely a narrow
slot or two isn't THAT objectionable. There's a certain overhead for
the hardware, whichever way you go, may as well make the one that's
going to work. A couple of lads at the weekend with a cutting disc to
make 1/4" slots and a pot of asphalt to patch it up ?

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