Acceleration and Top Fuel Cars

[Dangler]

In my last thread I posted a pic of a rail w/ a 2JZ motor. In that thread 92BlackTT made a comment about how much power it takes to just drive the supercharges - that reminded me of an old thread I pulled that's been around for a while...

Interesting reading. If you haven't seen the races at BIR in the late summer, you have no idea what you're missing. Its the coolest thing I have ever seen (even better than 2 topless lesbians sharing an ice cream cone on the beach in Australia!!)

• 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 Top Fuel dragster engine consumes 1½ gallons of nitro methane per second; a fully loaded 747 consumes jet fuel at the same rate with 25% less energy being produced.

• A stock Dodge 426 Hemi V8 engine cannot produce enough power to drive the
  dragster's 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 1.7:1 air/fuel mixture for nitro methane 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 1/2 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 at an
  average of over 4G's. In order to reach 200 mph well before half-track, the launch
  acceleration approaches 8G's.

• Dragsters reach over 300 miles per hour before youhave completed reading
  this sentence.

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

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

• The red-line is actually quite high at 9500 rpm.

• 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. 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).

Putting all of this into perspective:

You are riding the average $250,000 Honda MotoGP bike. Over a mile up the
road, a Top Fuel dragster is staged and ready to launch down a quarter mile
strip as you pass. You have the advantage of a flying start. You run the RC211V hard up through the gears and blast across the starting line and past the dragster at an honest 200 mph (293 ft/sec). The 'tree' goes green for both of you at that moment. The dragster launches and starts after you. You keep your wrist cranked hard, but you hear an incredibly brutal whine that sears your eardrums and within 3 seconds the dragster catches and passes you. He beats you to the finish line, a quarter mile away from where you just passed him.

Think about it, from a standing start, the dragster had spotted you 200 mph
and not only caught, but nearly blasted you off the road when he passed you
within a mere 1320 foot long race course.

[StangerBanger96]

thats crazy!
awesome, but crazy!

[SmitEvo]

Good Information......

[Guest]

very good explaination....but the engines alone dont make that much power....its the superchargers that do...they run at 14-71psi.......

[Guest]

lets see...that also is technically true, BUT it takes one hell of an engine to turn the superchargers...think about it, a 426 hemi can't do it.

[24valvenotak]

This post is deleted!

[Guest]

a 426 cant but a 500 can obviously....they have billet steel crank shafts, forged aluminum everything pistons, rods head, ect....and it burns 10 gallons of nitro methane each run down the track.

and....* 6 g-forces at the starting line (nothing accelerates faster on land)

An NHRA Top Fuel Dragster accelerates quicker than any other land vehicle on earth . . . quicker than a jet fighter plane . . . quicker than the space shuttle.

[Pony_Racer]

i love V8's :D. i wonder what the 2JZ would be pushin down the 1320?

[Guest]

i'd say 5-6's depending on how much HP is pushin.

[03SVT]

I've read the same thing before, but the MotoGP bike was replaced with a Callaway corvette or something like that. Dragster's are kinda fast.