I can't find this and it's drivin' me CRAZY!! About a year ago we were talking about the drags and one of the members posted a detailed thread about the 4 or 5 seconds of a pass with a top fuel car vs. a C5. Do you remember? It was "approximately" this: The C5 rolls across the start line past a top fuel car, in 5th gear at full throttle, maybe going 100 & change, as the vette crosses the start line the top fuel car lights up and not only catches but passes the vette in less than a quarter mile. Now the member who posted that thread was a lot more eloquent than I just was, but if you read it, you'll remember it.
Anybody????
Thanks,
Greg

 

That was a thread that had all kinds of facts and figures in it. I started one thread at one time about the subject. We were talking at work if a TF car turns 8000RPM how many Revolutions would it turn in the 1/4 mile.

If the TF car runs the 1/4 in 4.5 seconds it only takes 600 revolutions to make the distance.
Someone also said that it consumed fuel faster than you could pour it out of a 5 gallon bucket.

 

Hey Eddie, that was the thread! Can you remember who posted the technical end of it?

 

 

Not sure if this is what you are looking for, but I had this in a file on my computer:

The Definition Of Acceleration!

* 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 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 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 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.
* 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 driving the average $140,000 Lingenfelter "twin-turbo" powered Corvette Z06. 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 '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.
That folks, is acceleration.


www.bigdogvettes.com

 

That would be the answer I think Greg is looking for. I am glad you posted it. I was having a hard time finding it again, too.

 

I had saved this from an email that was going around about a year ago.

It is hard to comprehend the power that a Top Fueler produces. I guess that is why they are my favorite races to watch!









www.bigdogvettes.com

 

If you have never been to an NHRA Top Fuel Event, you need to make it out to one once in your life. Those cars are literally like a bomb going off at the starting line. I was totally ruined by the experience. There is no drag racing like it.

 

I absolutly,positootly....agree, it is awsome watching those things take off from the line, but when your sitting 1/2 to 3/4 down track, those things are freakin haulin azz, especially when you get a good solid run from both cars.......thats 14,000 horsepower that just blurred by you at 300 mph......

 

 

On a recent episode of NHRA2day, Doug Kalitta's crew-chief, Rahn Tobler, said that the pumps used put-out 90-95 gallon-per-minute at max-RPM.

In May at Columbus, Ohio (a historically 'short-and-slow' track), Tony Schumacher re-set that mark at 336.15 MPH:
his crew-chief, Alan Johnson, says that a RPM-limiter, mandated by NHRA this season, actually HELPS the cars go faster by keeping the motor down into it's power-making range.


Wait'll they get to Reading, Pa., and Chicago in September this year!

 

A couple of years ago, my family and I went to Disney World in Florida. On the way there, we stopped at the Don Garlits Museum of Drag Racing in Ocala, FL. I actually met Don Garlits there and we talked for a few minutes, even had my picture taken with him.

I bought a cylinder sleeve that was from one of the Swamp Rats. It had been run only once, but the inside of the sleeve was scoured due to the power the engine produced. Don Garlits signed the outside of the sleeve and wrote which race the sleeve was used in at the Gator Nationals.

As we were leaving the museum, I told my wife and kids, that we could just go home now instead of going to Disney World, because I just had the highlight of my whole trip!


www.bigdogvettes.com

 

When you think about what Garlits did, and when he did it, using nothing but his 'T-lar' method (that-looks-about-right ) of engineering, he is truly an amazing man.....


I'm trying to find a T-shirt he sold in the mid/late '80s from his Museum that I once saw, but didn't buy:
it was basic-Black (what-else would Large Father wear? ), and across the front, it had a White silhouette of a Ferrari, next to the word "ROME", below that was a White Porsche next to the word "STUTTGART", below that was a White Model T next to the word "DETROIT", and at the bottom, a White silhouette of Swamp Rat XXX, next to the word "OCALA"


VERY

 

I have been to a few. They are just unrealistic. You can't beleive how fast and how loud they are for the entire run. I can't see how the tires hook up but they do. They are just awesome to watch. Makes the average 12 to 13 second car seem pretty pathetic.