Gotta Love Top Fuel Dragsters

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spiffyguido
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Gotta Love Top Fuel Dragsters

Post by spiffyguido »

I'm not a huge Top Fuel fan, but stats like these are still uber impressive. The offset cam grind is mad crazy!
One dragster's 500-inch Hemi makes more horsepower then the first 8 rows at
Daytona.

Under full throttle, a dragster engine consumes 1 ½ gallons of nitro per second, the same rate of fuel consumption as a fully loaded 747, but with 4 times the energy density.

The supercharger takes more power to drive then a stock hemi makes.

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

Cylinders run on the verge of hydraulic lock.

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

At stoichiometric (exact) 1.7:1 air/fuel mixture (for nitro), the flame front of nitro methane measures 7050 degrees F.

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

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 off its fuel flow.

If spark momentarily fails early in the run, unburned nitro builds up in those cylinders and then explodes with a force that can blow cylinder heads off the block in pieces or blow the block in half.

Dragsters twist the crank (torsionally) so far (20 degrees in the big end of the crank) that sometimes cam lobes are ground offset from front to rear to re-phase the valve timing somewhere closer to synchronisation with the pistons.

To exceed 300mph in 4.5 seconds dragsters must accelerate at an average of over 4G's. But in reaching 200 mph well before ½ track, launch acceleration is closer to 8G's.

If all the equipment is paid off, the crew worked for free and for once NOTHING BLOWS UP, each run costs $1000.00 per second.

Dragsters reach over 300 miles per hour before you have read this sentence.

Top Fuel Engines ONLY turns 540 revolutions from light to light!

The redline is actually quite high at 9500rpm.

To give you an idea of this acceleration, the current TF dragster elapsed time record Is 4.477 seconds for the quarter mile. This means that you could be coming across the starting line in your average Lingenfelter powered "twin-turbo" Corvette at 200 Mph (on a FLYING START) and the dragster would BEAT you to the finish line FROM A DEAD STOP in a Quarter mile distance!

TOP FUEL DRAGSTER SPECIFICATIONS

WHEELBASE: 300 in.
WEIGHT: 2,225 lbs. (with driver)
ENGINE: 500 cid V-8
HP: 8,000
TORQUE: 4,500-6,500 lb.-ft.
FUEL: Nitromethane/methanol mix
TOP SPEED: 330 mph
AVERAGE E.T.: 4.65 sec.
0-60 MPH: 0.5 sec.
0-100 MPH: 0.8 sec.
0-200 MPH: 2.5 sec.
G-FORCE: 5.5-6 gs (equal to a space shuttle launch)
COST PER RUN: $5,000
VEHICLE COST: $250,000

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RedRacer
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Re: Gotta Love Top Fuel Dragsters

Post by RedRacer »

Ahhhh, that ain't NUTHIN! My Prelude could take it in heartbeat! See, the only reason these numbers are not disputed or different is because I've just kept my car off the track......you know, don't want to shame all these guys who've spent so much money, time and effort...... :lol: :wink:

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spiffyguido
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Re: Gotta Love Top Fuel Dragsters

Post by spiffyguido »

Ha ha ha!

Love it.

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Edge2lyfe
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Re: Gotta Love Top Fuel Dragsters

Post by Edge2lyfe »

I haven't watched drag racing in a long time but caught a glimpse of some NHRA top fuel dragsters last week in a restaurant. They were running 3.8 sec times! Is that 1/4 or 1/8 mile times?

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spiffyguido
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Re: Gotta Love Top Fuel Dragsters

Post by spiffyguido »

That'd be the 1/4 time.

Incredible when you think about the physics involved in hurling something down a road that quickly. I guess that's what 8000 hp gets you.

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spiffyguido
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Re: Gotta Love Top Fuel Dragsters

Post by spiffyguido »

Oops. Sorry. The NHRA races 1000ft events now for safety reasons.

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RedRacer
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Re: Gotta Love Top Fuel Dragsters

Post by RedRacer »

Like I said ...... that ain't nuthin.

The Prelude is so fast, they don't even record her times in seconds. They record eyeblinks.

She runs the quarter in one blink of an eye. You just see her at the light-pole and then she's at the end of the track. BLINK. Just like THAT.

Amazing to watch. (if you can actually see it happen)

Of course, due to this incredible speed, I can't get any kind of video or anything to put up. Naturally. You understand that.

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RedRacer
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Re: Gotta Love Top Fuel Dragsters

Post by RedRacer »

Edge2lyfe wrote:I haven't watched drag racing in a long time but caught a glimpse of some NHRA top fuel dragsters last week in a restaurant. They were running 3.8 sec times! Is that 1/4 or 1/8 mile times?
Now wait a second, Edge...... since when are they running top fuel dragsters inside restaurants? Is this like a drag racing restaurant? Must be really long. Do the servers wear roller skates? How's the food?

Oh that was just TOO easy! LOL!



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