Acceleration Defined

One top fuel dragster 500 cubic inch Hemi engine makes more horsepower than the first 4 rows of stock cars at the Daytona 500. Under full throttle, a dragster engine consumes 1-1/2 gallons of nitro methane 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's supercharger. With 3,000 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 of nitro methane, the flame front temperature measures 7,050 deg F. Nitro methane 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 halfway, the engine is dieseling from compression,plus the glow of exhaust valves at 1,400 deg 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 9,500 rpm. Assuming all the equipment is paid off, the crew worked for free, and for once NOTHING BLOWS UP, each run costs an estimate $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, picture this scenario: 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 pass 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 1,320 foot long race course. AND, THAT MY FRIENDS IS ACCELERATION!

 

Actually, acceleration is the rate of change of velocity with time, and this is a repost.

Hang yourself.

 

Oh about 10 years ago or more, there was a write up in a magazine... maybe cycle world..?? It was a 500cc GP bike that was put on the city streets and ridden around and then the journalist wrote up his ideas of how it felt to ride it.. Sentence's like pulls harder than a CBR900RR in 3rd gear at full throttle, a devil in disguise, oh hell, I can't even remember.. But reading that article was to motorcycles as this is to cars.. I'd rather read the bike one again..

 

zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz it still can't turn

 

In that 1/4mi run how many times does the crank turn?

 

boy it sure must take a lot of skill to......ummm........push....the button?

 

Screw all these other jerks, thats some impressive factoidiumage. If you think of everything that has to happen correctly in such a short period of time for a successful run it boggles the mind. If you have ever stood at the fence during a top fuel burnout you know what HP feels like, smells like and looks like, if you can keep your eyes open!!!

 

I thought that was pretty interesting.

 

Oh hell yeah!! That my friends is better than PIE!

 

The thing about 747's sounds like bullcrap to me.

747s make like 100,000 pounds of thrust...

Not to mention that a gallon of nitromethane has WAAAY more than 25% more power than a gallon of jet fuel, so it's not like top fuel engines are more powerful or efficient than 747 engines.

 

when you haven't had pie in a long time, apparently you lose perspective.........

 

There is *nothing* like a nitro car in person.

In bike terms:

Each 1000cc cylender makes 800 to 1000 Horsepower.

If you don't like that, you suck balls.

Seriously.

That is all.

 

10,000 RPM divided by 4.5 seconds = 750 times

 

Im not into drag racing, but that is definatly some interesting info.

 

Agreed.

You can't really appreciate it until you're there.

 

http://www.racecarbook.com/articles/tuneup.shtml

Look to avg 7000-7500 rpm or so.

 

ZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZzzzzzzzzzzzzzzYeah, and I have seen the space shuttle launch two times, still does not give me the feeling that I did anything to make it happen.
(other than to pay my taxes)



Oh yeah,........... top that for acceleration.

 

Now... how 'bout the cam?


Bonus: Cam rotation in same or opposite direction to crankshaft?


These may or may not be trick questions...