Ducati Sporting Club UK > General > Idle Chat > Dragster Facts

[rockhopper]

Lifted from "another forum"

"Dragsters reach over 300 miles per hour before you have completed
reading this sentence.

One Top Fuel dragster 500 cubic inch Hemi engine makes more horsepower
than the first 4 rows at the Daytona 500.

Under full throttle, a dragster engine consumes 1-1/2 gallons of
nitromethane per second; a fully loaded 747 consumes jet fuel at the
same rate with 25% less energy being produced.

A stock Dodge Hemi V8 engine cannot produce enough power to drive the
dragster supercharger.

With 3000 CFM of air being rammed in by the supercharger on overdrive,
the fuel mixture is compressed into a near-solid form before ignition.

Cylinders run on the verge of hydraulic lock at full throttle.

At the stoichiometric (stoichiometry: methodology and technology by
which quantities of reactants and products in chemical reactions are
determined) 1.7:1 air/fuel mixture for nitromethane the flame front
temperature measures 7050 degrees F.

Nitromethane burns yellow. The spectacular white flame seen above the
stacks at night is raw burning hydrogen, dissociated from atmospheric
water vapor by the searing exhaust gases.

Dual magnetos supply 44 amps to each spark plug. This is the output of
an arc welder in each cylinder.

Spark plug electrodes are totally consumed during a pass. After ½ way,
the engine is dieseling from compression plus the glow of exhaust valves
at 1400 degrees F. The engine can only be shut down by cutting the fuel
flow.

If spark momentarily fails early in the run, unburned nitro builds up
in the affected cylinders and then explodes with sufficient force to
blow cylinder heads off the block in pieces or split the block in half.

In order to exceed 300 mph in 4.5 seconds dragsters must accelerate an
average of over 4G's. In order to reach 200 mph well before half-track,
the launch acceleration approaches 8G's.

Top Fuel Engines turn approximately 540 revolutions from light to
light!

Including the burnout the engine must only survive 900 revolutions
under load.

The current Top Fuel dragster elapsed time record is 4.441 seconds for
the quarter mile (10/05/03, Tony Schumacher). The top speed record is
333.00 mph. (533 km/h) as measured over the last 66' of the run
(09/28/03 Doug Kalitta).

The Bottom Line; Assuming all the equipment is paid off, the crew
worked for free, and for once NOTHING BLOWS UP, each run costs an
estimated $1,000.00 per second."

[cashburning748r]

Quality facts! Thanks for that, just hope I can remember them for pub talk!

[skidlids]

Still a bit slow compared to Sammy Miller's Vanishing Point Rocket car.
I watched it at Santa Pod in or around 1980. He ran 300mph in a smidge over 3 secs. At least they had plastic windows in the control tower this time following a previous run at the track when a lot of the glass windows cracked.

[Monty]

Hmmmm, interesting facts-I do think the comparison with a 747 is a bit lame though "Under full throttle, a dragster engine consumes 1-1/2 gallons of nitromethane per second; a fully loaded 747 consumes jet fuel at the same rate with 25% less energy being produced."-doesn't actually compare since the 747 is burning what is basically parafin whereas the dragster is burning rocket fuel.................

John

[rcgbob44]

Yea but can they handle the power of a Puch maxi?

[AK]

Originally posted by skidlids
Still a bit slow compared to Sammy Miller's Vanishing Point Rocket car.

it had an identical engine to the current lunar module.

He knew when he had run faster than 4 seconds in the quarter mile, because his ears would bleed.
This is why that sort of racing was outlawed, because of the blackouts caused due to the g-forces.

top fuellers go from 0 - 100mph in about 1 sec.

My one and a half tonne Plymouth Duster in full street trim (inc nos), would accelerate from 0 - 60 in less than 4seconds (which wasnt that fast in drag racing circles) - back in the late 80's - and then I modified it to track only.

AK
(ex-drag racer)

[Guido]

AK,

A man after my own heart.....

Before finding bikes I would be found peeking around the garages at he Gatornationals chasing Joe Amato's autograph (got it in the end...... )

Had a '67 Chevy Nova when I lived in the states and always wanted the 454 big block to go in it. Oh what joys at 18 yo.

Guido......the 1320 Gentry (as in 1320 feet in a quarter mile for all you draggin heathens )

Tis me outside the most famous address in Drag Racing - Ahh those were the days

[Monty]

Big Don Garlits eh-hmm as you say Guido, those were the days.
I was still more into the bikes though-do you remember Alf Hagon and his 1100cc Jap engined drag bike(that is J.A.P as in vintage 'V' twin for you youngsters out there) he had a spring loaded stand on it and a single gear. Used to wind the back wheel up to 140mph and then trip the stand .....
Fastest thing out there up to 220yards-then it generally holed a piston and coasted the rest-still set records though. From memory it was running on methanol.
And what about the Hobbit- John Hobbs 21ft long dragster rail, 2 850cc Weslake engines running on methanol, 2 speed gearbox. I saw that 4 years ago at the classic sprints at North Weald, he dragged it out of retirement, hadn't ridden it for about 15 years, blew the dust off, fired it up...........and set fastest time of the day-not bad eh!

John