SLOT CARS : Speeding Again : Not since the ‘60s, say enthusiasts, has the sport of racing tiny electric cars been so hot. Courses are popping up all over.

Navigating the high-banked turns and sprawling straightaways of a slot-car race course can drive a person crazy.

Sometimes, when a car flies off the track, its operator flies off the handle.

“You hear a lot of screaming and stuff like ‘Get that car back on the track!’ and ‘Hurry up!’ ” said Brian Tait of Simi Valley, a 35-year-old professional drag-racer almost as passionate about slot-car racing. “It gets pretty heated.”

Tait took five to cool himself and the innards of his slot car recently after a few hot laps at Simi Valley’s Hot Traks. The facility opened last September with an eight-lane, 220-foot track, reportedly the largest slot-car course in California.

And it attracts among the most serious slot-car racers.

A slot car is a miniature electric race car about nine inches in length that is powered along a miniature racetrack by a hand-held controller, in much the same way an electric train operates.

The car is guided along the track by a slot, or groove, in the track through which a guide pin on the underside of the car moves. Running parallel on each side of the slot, an electrical strip with which the car is in constant contact gives the car its power.

A controller typically is like a small gun with a trigger. The more electricity applied via the controller, the faster the car goes. Too much juice, and the car flies off the track. That’s where skill comes in.

Tait’s oversize toolbox is filled with spare parts, including tires, motors, oil and even a miniature electrical fan to cool overheated motors. His toolbox is covered with small metal plaques won in competition.

“This sport comes and goes,” Tait said, fumbling with a half-dozen thimble-size motors in his palm. “Maybe this time, it will stick around.”

Slot cars, last popular during the era of bell bottoms, the Beatles and Lyndon B. Johnson, appear to be back on track. The proof is the plenitude of pint-size electric race courses popping up throughout Southern California.

At least eight slot-car tracks have opened locally within the past year, including two in Ventura County. A track in Santa Paula has been in operation since 1987, and rumors of additional track openings abound.

“The slot-car industry is jumping,” said Bob Scott, an Oxnard racing buff who publishes a monthly newsletter on slot-car racing in Southern California. “There has been such an outrageous increase, even in the past few months. It’s like the old days.”

But the ‘60s slot-car boom never witnessed so much zoom.

Troy Hann, owner-operator of Hot Traks, said he recently clocked a customer’s slot car circling his track in 3.3 seconds, a speed in excess of 45 m.p.h. Some cars, Hann said, go faster than 70 m.p.h.

Meanwhile, prices of slot cars have soared accordingly. Serious racers commonly spend as much as $300 for a car. Accessories, including a hand-held controller and spare parts, can run an additional $500.

“Basically, the faster you go, the more money it costs,” Hann said.

Ron Leavitt, who opened Cruzin’ in Westlake Village last April, stages organized competition five nights a week in which about 100 entries race for as much as $150 in prize money.

“This was a crazy idea,” said Leavitt, who also owns a slot-car track in Tarzana and is considering opening another in Thousand Oaks. “I actually thought that they were dead and gone. I guess a lot of people were sitting around thinking, ‘What ever happened to it?’ ”

The fad simply faded, according to Scott. The birth of radio-controlled cars and airplanes was among the biggest reasons. But during the current economic recession, Scott said, slot-car racing has emerged as an affordable endeavor for hobbyists.

The novice can purchase a slot car for as little as $20, or rent a car, controller and an hour of track time for just a few dollars.

“We get a lot of kids, a lot of grown-ups, everybody from age 6 on up,” Hann said. “We get a lot of old-timers trying to get back into it. And a lot of fathers who used to race bringing in their sons.”

Speeding through a miniature Grand Prix course appears simple enough. One recent afternoon at Cruzin’, a group of young boys seemed to be, well, cruising along with ease through after-school traffic. But appearances are deceiving.

“It’s a lot harder than it looks,” Jeremy Burke, 11, of Thousand Oaks, said, his eyes never wandering from his car as it circled the track. “Sometimes, you go flying off the track and you have to go over and pick your car up off the ground.”

All racers face the same prospect of soaring through a turn too quickly--hence the need in official competition for so-called turn marshals, observers stationed along the track to retrieve wayward vehicles.

At Hot Traks, competitors qualify for races based on one-lap time trials. Most competition is similarly structured.

In 1971, the United Slot Racers Assn. was formed to sanction competition and promote the hobby. Organized competition culminates with a USRA national championship Labor Day weekend at a site determined each year.

Membership in the USRA stands at about 500 nationally. About two-thirds are members of the USRA’s Southern California chapter, which also includes Arizona and Nevada, according to president Doug Shepard of Los Angeles. In 1989, Southern California membership stood at about 50, Shepard said.

Of course, not all slot-car enthusiasts are members.

“There never used to be this much organization,” Tait said. “This used to be dead.”

How long it will remain alive is anybody’s guess.

“At this point, we’re going through a boom or resurgence the likes of which we saw in the ‘60s,” Shepard said. “But I find that worrisome because with booms there are also busts.”

Scott concurred.

“I wish I could say that it’s here to stay,” Scott said. “But you never know.”

Hann is confident enough that he recently explored the possibility of buying the shop next door for the purpose of tearing out a wall and expanding his business, which already is thriving, he said.

“Simi Valley didn’t really have a place like this for kids and adults to go,” Hann said. “That’s why I opened this place.”

* WHERE AND WHEN

Hot Traks, 2513 Tapo St., Simi Valley. Hours: noon to 10 p.m. Monday through Thursday; noon to 11 p.m. Fridays; 11 a.m. to 11 p.m. Saturdays; 11 a.m. to 10 p.m. Sundays. Call 584-2513.