Dragster Acceleration

Tom Olson · Post by **Tom Olson** » 30 Mar 2004 4:23 pm

Dragster engines can produce a lot of power for their size, but they're designed only to run for a few seconds at a time, and that's it. They have to nearly completely rebuild those suckers after only a few runs.

On the other hand, you can run a jet engine or a heavy-duty diesel engine at operational power 24/7 for year after year and hardly do any maintenance at all to it.

Allen · Post by **Allen** » 1 Apr 2004 1:53 pm

I will date myself with this post. I used to be into drag racing big time. The group I was with, "Clockers" of Hawthorne, CA., had the very first fuel dragster to break 140 mph in the quarter. A fellow named Jim Kambor was the engineer and money behind the effort. Nitro was $50 a gallon.
We ran several cars all over So. Calif. for many years.

My oh my, how times have changed.

------------------
Allen Harry
Zum SD10
Nashville 1000

Jerry Overstreet · Post by **Jerry Overstreet** » 1 Apr 2004 2:35 pm

Chas, been around drag racing most of my life. Love the rumble and raw ominous sound of so much power. My brother who is not really into music used to always say the sound of these engines shakin' the ground was HIS music. I've seen or read some of these stats., but the one that floors me is that a stock hemi can't even spin the huffer on a Nitro engine. That is surprising.
Living in close proximity to Indy, I used to spend Labor Day weekends at the Nationals.
That is until a more powerful interest came along and sent me to St. Louis instead!

[This message was edited by Jerry Overstreet on 01 April 2004 at 02:42 PM.]

chas smith · Post by **chas smith** » 1 Apr 2004 6:44 pm

but the one that floors me is that a stock hemi can't even spin the huffer on a Nitro engine

That one got me too, this is second hand info that I got from a friend who is an engineer. I assumed that that was when the engine is cranked.

I had a friend who was doing a documentary on drag bikes, about 30 years ago. We were interviewing Russ Collins, from RC Engineering, about the triple-engined Honda dragster that he dropped, at around160mph, and was now a coffee table in his office.

He said it was too heavy to steer, so they just pointed it down the track and hoped for the best. It shook so hard that his eyeballs vibrated too much to see when he crossed the finish line. So he just guessed when he crossed it and shut down.