Thread: general top fuel ?

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Hey bent, Good food for thought. One problem.....Math goes entirely out the window on a "Fuel" run. But I like what you are doing here. Now let's get down to reality. The Engine was warmed in the pits, Granted, it was only for a couple of minutes,trust me, they time them with a stop watch for record keeping and warmth on the engine so they don't over heat the clutch yadda, yadda, yadda. They'll "blip" it to check for response to linkage to rotating motion to ....Etc, etc. Now, "run" plugs go in. This doesn't sound like much but, remember, this thing has been together and running even though it has not been under load. Now don't forget this setup doesn't like "NOT" being under load. Warm it up before burnout to just the right head heat and burnout.....(no load again). Load this "Bad bo" up on launch and do the new math this thing does. The engine is "tuned" for optimum 7200 rpm. They desire this range because of hp and torque and fuel control. Meanwhile the clutches are now creating havocto bring the whole thing in motion. Various loading depending on the track and atmospheric conditions. Now, we all cross our fingers to hope the tires don't shake more than anticipated and then in all the gods of good fortune need to ride along to insure we have the blower belt "hang" on and frame and driver and what else can let go hang on. Now the math has changed. Look at a computer readout if you get lucky enough and you migh tjust bewilder yourself into a stuper and tell yourself.......I can't believe this thing works....LOL.....LOL. Not poking fun....just chuckling at the articles and "simple" math most people think a fuel motor goes through to make a run. These things make as much work as the biggest and baddest engines would do in a hundred lifetimes. And this takes place in minutes for the whole proceedure. Kinda cool huh?

....and the rest of the story.
Actually I was only referring to the absolute power portion of a run and only in "about" numbers to make food for thought.

Computers and data loggers did not exist in my day and neither did excell spread sheets. You were your own data logger and sensors. The thicker your note book was the more stuff you could look at and therefore the better the guess was each run. Yes I really did have a 4 function calculator ($400 in '70) along with my engineering sliderule and graph paper. I did the math in the mo-tel room or while we were going down the road. And yes I did litter the road liberally with "out the window math" pages.

None of it was simple. None of it is today. If you want to run .001 3 straight runs everything better be perfect.

The only thing that is the same is the "Now, we all cross our fingers to hope the tires don't shake more than anticipated and then in all the gods of good fortune need to ride along to insure we have the blower belt "hang" on and frame and driver and what else can let go hang on. "

And of course if you brought everthing home in one piece you didn't let it hang out far enough.