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Top Fuel Dragsters
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. At half 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).

There is no existing axle/wheel dyno that

measures over 5000 Horsepower. So HP of top fuel

dragsters can not be measured, only calculated.

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.

:FI:Falcon wrote:
Good thing that nuns don't know about Top Fuel.





F