Interesting Top Fuel Dragster Facts.

February 13, 2009, 09:46:12 AM

You don't have to be a drag racing fan to appreciate
these statistics. Some Interesting Top Fuel Dragster
Facts:

* One dragster's 500-inch Hemi makes more
horsepower then the first 8 rows at Daytona.

* Under full throttle, a dragster engine consumes
1 1/2 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
vapor by the searing exhaust gases.

* 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 off it's 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 syn-
chronization 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 1/2 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 turn 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!