Sign of the Times ..........

[Old Coyote]

Looking at all four rounds of qualifying for today's NHRA event in Memphis, there were 19 Top Fuelers, 18 Funny Cars, 17 Pro Stocks, and 16 Pro Stock bikes which tried to qualify ........... that's a total of 70 professional entrants for the four classes .......... that's really sad

The 1969 U.S. Nationals had more Top Fuelers than that trying to qualify to get into the field of 32.

It's a sad statement on what drag racing has become

[Dave Severson]

Yuppers, takes a ton of money to even be close to competitive in the pro classes....

I guess you know you're old when you can remember when two guys with good jobs could afford to go racing.... Now it's a struggle to keep a bracket car going!!!!

[NTFDAY]

Garlits’ ideas are simple and harsh. Make the rear wing smaller and lower it to take away downforce. Have Goodyear build smaller racing tires to take away grip. Disqualify any team that blows an engine and drops oil on the track. The engines right now, if they’d cut them back to about 1,000 or 1,500 horsepower, they would run forever,” he said. “And the problem about slowing the cars down would be solved. It would also bridge the gap between the haves and the have-nots. The competition would be a lot closer, and that’s what’s going to bring the fans back.”

I think these are good ideas, but NHRA and the powers to be will never go for it.

[Dave Severson]

I second that, Ken!!!! We used the same block, heads, crank, and blower for 3 seasons in top alcohol.... We weren't the biggest horsepower operation there, but I sure did drive around a lot of those 'built on the edge' engines when they gernaded at about 1,000'!!!!!!

Along with the smaller wing, cut the nitro percentage back to about 70% and parts will last a lot longer, too!!!

I've gave some thought the last few years to going back to where I started out in drag racing, a B/SS Mopar.....Man, you wouldn't believe what it would cost to put together a super stocker that can run on index!!!!! and I originally did it working in the service department at a Dodge dealer!!!!!

[gassersrule_196]

they should run them like the nostalgia fuel funny cars motors 70-90% 6-71 blower small pump 2 speed trans those motors like a long time for being fuel motors

[nitrowarrior]

they should run them like the nostalgia fuel funny cars motors 70-90% 6-71 blower small pump 2 speed trans those motors like a long time for being fuel motors

"whaattt???"

[Jetstang]

If they take away all the latest R&D and put the teams in ill handling, low HP cars, won't it become NASCAR? Or crate model racing? Teams are already limited, that is why Outlaw Pro Mods are cool, very limited rules, but makes it hard for the lower budget teams.

[JeffB2]

Looking at all four rounds of qualifying for today's NHRA event in Memphis, there were 19 Top Fuelers, 18 Funny Cars, 17 Pro Stocks, and 16 Pro Stock bikes which tried to qualify ........... that's a total of 70 professional entrants for the four classes .......... that's really sad

The 1969 U.S. Nationals had more Top Fuelers than that trying to qualify to get into the field of 32.

It's a sad statement on what drag racing has become

There are links on www.hotrodders.com posted yesterday the entire Memphis racing facility is going to be shut down,NHRA has announced that there will be one less event for 2010.

[Dave Severson]

If they take away all the latest R&D and put the teams in ill handling, low HP cars, won't it become NASCAR? Or crate model racing? Teams are already limited, that is why Outlaw Pro Mods are cool, very limited rules, but makes it hard for the lower budget teams.

You think NASCAR is affordable??? Limiting rules on the pro classes are necessary to keep the big money teams from turning it into a money race....

Look at the qualifying times in the Pro Classes, can't get any closer!!! 30 or 40 cars qualifying within thousands of each other would just be better!!! Why not make it affordable for more teams???? From first hand experience, it's absolutely no fun racing where the biggest check book wins......

[Dave Severson]

There are links on www.hotrodders.com posted yesterday the entire Memphis racing facility is going to be shut down,NHRA has announced that there will be one less event for 2010.

Yup, saw that. Another victim of the economy....

[26Tudor]

Somebody sent this to me a few years back, before the Nitro cars switched to 1,000 feet (R.I.P., Mr. Kalitta)....


One Top Fuel dragster 500 cubic inch Hemi engine makes more horsepower
than the first 6 rows at the Daytona 500.

Under full throttle, a dragster engine consumes 1 gallon of nitromethane
per second; a fully loaded 747 consumes jet fuel at the same rate with 2
5% 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 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 wa
ter 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 _ 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 8Gs.

Dragsters reach over 300 miles per hour before you have 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 redline is actually quite high at 9500rpm.

It takes 1500+hp just to turn a top fuel blower.

The pressure coming out of the headers can provide 1000lbs of downforce.
When a cylinder goes out, it can actually steer the car due to loss of
downforce on one side.

There is so much torsional twist in the crankshaft (up to 20 degrees at
the big end of the track) that sometimes cam lobes are ground offset from
front to rear to try and re-phase the valve timing closer to synchronization
with the pistons.

The car will be going over 60mph before the rear wheels cross the start
line, 300 inches.

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 US
$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 driving the average $140,000 Lingenfelter "twin-turbo" powered
Corvette Z06 (or blown Viper). Over a mile up the road, a Top Fuel drags
ter 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 'Vette hard up through
the gears and blast across the starting line and past the dragster at an honest
200 mph. The 'tree' goes green for both of you at that moment.
The dragster launches and starts after you. You keep your foot down 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.

[gassersrule_196]

now this is what i was trying to say a while back , i knew this was coming from talking with cruz and NHRA.

http://www.nhra.com/story/2009/11/4/...dregon-racing/

"The combination tested with Cruz Pedregon’s team included a single magneto, one less clutch disc, and a smaller fuel pump"

"NHRA will work with Cruz Pedregon Racing to schedule more testing during the off-season. In addition, NHRA will continue to work with Tim Wilkerson and his team on the combination tested earlier in the season, which included decreasing displacement, use of a smaller-capacity fuel pump, decrease in percentage overdrive in the blower, a change on the rear-end gear ratios, and the use of 90 percent nitromethane"

[Dave Severson]

yuppers, but why the heck are they stuck on the 90% figure???? Maybe if you get some of the timing and supercharger pressure out of the engine the nitro isn't as letal with the parts???? Where the heck is Jerry to straighten me out on this anyway????? Hope he isn't AWOL or anything!!!!

[BigTruckDriver]

Garlits’ ideas are simple and harsh. Make the rear wing smaller and lower it to take away downforce. Have Goodyear build smaller racing tires to take away grip. Disqualify any team that blows an engine and drops oil on the track. The engines right now, if they’d cut them back to about 1,000 or 1,500 horsepower, they would run forever,” he said. “And the problem about slowing the cars down would be solved. It would also bridge the gap between the haves and the have-nots. The competition would be a lot closer, and that’s what’s going to bring the fans back.”

I think these are good ideas, but NHRA and the powers to be will never go for it.

You mean Don Garbage,lol. Don knows nothin.
I dont think that will do much for drag racing. IMO , they need to limit teams and sponsors. How can a new comer compete with the field dominated by 2 teams , there no chance at all. You can slow them down all you want but when a team is dominating the class their dominating the class. If your going 50MPH or 300MPH theres no room to get in. Its been that way for years now. The teams and NHRA have lock them selves in and locked everyone else out.

[Dave Severson]

Limiting teams and sponsors is going to do nothing to attract anyone to the Pro Classes.... until the amount of $$$$$ it takes to run a competitive car is reduced, better be happy having the multi car teams show up, not many others can afford to field a car...

Don Garlits knows nothing????? Hmmmmmm. Seems to have done fairly well as a racer......