Nuts. The crew chief basically described each injector as a garden hose. I can see he was understating a bit.
Coolest thing I've ever done in racing is stand between two of them at Vegas during a qualifying run about 15' before the lights.
Spark plugs are a big challenge! I worked with a few teams early in my career - pretty wild stuff. I got to stand behind the tree during a practice session at Indy - incredible. What's neat to consider is that in a pass, a fuel car engine only makes ~540 revolutions - and trashes nearly everything!!!
It should be on every gearhead's bucket list to attend an NHRA event and experience the Top Fuel & Funny Cars! Your first time.... don't wear earplugs if you can stand it! I didn't when I went, and I was fine during & after, but if I went again, or often, I would wear them more often than not. Gotta go to the pits and get right up there for when they crank & blip the throttle testing the motor after rebuilding..... HO-LEE-CHIT!! Feeling your insides vibrate when they take off.....INSANE!!!
I believe it's been said that a Top Fuel could spot an Indy Car a 175mph rolling start, and would still beat it to the finish.
What's more impressive is the cubic sponsor dollars thrown at an event that results in nothing moving towards the consumer. It's not like a lot of Top Fuel tech makes it's way into daily drivers. Then not to mention the total amount of time a sponsors logo is seen on track. The dollar per second number is astronomical when compared to some thing like Napcar and such. Still don't understand the business model.
There's no Camry parts on that Toyota NASCAR, either. I recall there being A LOT of people at the drag races. And they're on TV. If you've got both of those things, the money will be there.
No..I get that. The amount of time that the consumer stairs at that Camry on track is way more than the time they see that top fuel car. The Top fuel spectacle is better however.
Still one of the best experiences is to watch one of them take a run and feeling like you got punched in the chest when you're standing 20 feet away. Last time I watched top fuel cars was in Vegas the day before a WERA round about 3 years ago. Do they still "cement" the cooling passages on them? I absolutely love the mechanical side of this stuff.
Back before they encased blowers in kevlar that would be a risky place to be. Those things would go pop and send shrapnel every which way!
They tap into that "primal" desire that's on display every time a traffic light goes green and someone "wins" the takeoff.