This is very humbeling to say the least...
 

For those who love numbers, engineers, speed freaks and those who think they have gone too fast at one time or another. This puts Corvette performance in perspective. This article mentions Lingenfelter twin turbo powered Z06.
Read this thru slowly and try to comprehend the amount of force produced in just under 4 seconds! The last paragraph puts it all into perspective !

There are no rockets or airplanes built by any government in the world that can accelerate from a standing start as fast as a Top Fuel Dragster or Funny Car..and that includes any aircraft launched by a catapult from an aircraft carrier. Nothing can compare…..





DEFINITION OF ACCELERATION

One top fuel dragster 500 cubic inch Hemi engine makes more horsepower than the first 4 rows of stock cars at the Daytona 500.

It takes just 15/100ths (0.15) of a second for all 6,000+ horsepower (some believe 8,000 HP is more realistic - there are no dynomometers capable of measuring) of an NHRA Top Fuel dragster engine to reach the rear wheels.


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'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 nitromethane, the flame front temperature measures 7,050 deg F. (Oxy-acetylene on "cut" is 6,300)


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 one 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. >

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 4.428 seconds for the quarter mile (11/12/06, Tony Schumacher, at Pomona , CA ). The top speed record is 336.15 mph as measured over the last 66' of the run (05/25/05 Tony Schumacher, at Hebron , OH ).


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 pass the dragster at an honest 200 mph. The 'tree' goes green for both of you at that instant.


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 friend, is ACCELERATION!


Glenn

There are no rockets or airplanes built by any government in the world that can accelerate from a standing start as fast as a Top Fuel Dragster or Funny Car..and that includes any aircraft launched by a catapult from an aircraft carrier. Nothing can compare…..

WRONG ...
Rocket Sled land speed record - YouTube

"The part in the middle of the video is a different segment and talks about John Stapp's acceleration to 1017km/h in 5 seconds and how he temporarily lost is his vision."

1017km/h = 632 mph

I used to be a weapons development engineer at Eglin AFB, FL. Our rocket sled could accelerate from zero to more than 600 mph in 2000ft - and that was loaded with a 5000lb warhead! :eek: I think that's faster than 300 mph... ;)

http://www.ausairpower.net/BLU-122-Sled-Test-1S.jpg

Pete

I think they were talking about a manned rocket like the Discovery, but intresting read i thought...

Glenn,
This bit of drag racing hyperbole has been floating around the Internet for years and has been posted on this forum several times before. I don't say this to criticize your effort to share something interesting. Rather I say this to let you know that you run a significant risk of posting old info if you just repost something your read elsewhere. The search feature can let you know if something is new to this forum. ... Here is my reply the last time this was posted here: click here if you care.

Thanks for the input Tommy, hopefully some of the newbies will get a kick reading it.

And not all of the information is factual.

Factual or not these Top Fuelers will always be the most incredible spectical one could ever observe.My first time at a big meet and watching two do battle down the quarter mile could not get my ears covered fast enough.They will forever amaze me how enough oil pressure could ever possibly make these things last.Actually heard once these motors full throttle would never last very long,before grenading.

More horsepower in one cylinder than an entire nascar engine!


.

that is pretty impressive. have you ever seen the billet parts from the engine explosions? they are twisted apart or split right in half - incredible

That's the point of sharing this thread (again) because of the tremendous HP these bruts have and you realize just how powerful they are when you need to cover your ears and feel the vibration in the stands as they scream past you at 300 mph. Never gets old for me : )

Glenn

As impressive as those statistics are, they are outdated and underestimate the current reality.

Current top fuel engines consistently make 8,000 horsepower and when tuned for a track with good top end grip make closer to 10,000 hp.

Since Nascar uses restrictor plates at Daytona, the top fueler makes at least as much power as the first 10 rows of the Daytona 500.

The blower requires 800-1,000 horsepower to drive it, depending upon air density and pulley selection.

If you have never heard a top fuel engine "idling", you cannot imagine it. It's something you have to experience in person. No recording can capture it and no description can convey it. One writer said, "Each time a cylinder fires it sounds like a hand grenade going off in a garbage can". That might be close, but who can imagine that times 8 cylinders idling at 2,400 rpm? If you ever get a chance, go. You'll never forget it.

All of this is very sobering. What impacted me most when I went to my first Fuel meet was the sound shock waves assulting and reverberating off of my chest and the vibration caused by the same as the stands shook when the throttles clapped open instantly as they rocketed down the 1320.

Show of hands. Who would have enough KAHUNAS to strap there a$$ in one of these and give it a go...

Er,......uh......the first yellow lights have come on and......I have to go to the bathroom NOW!

Can somebody with top fuel knowledge update that original email?

I too saw it several years ago and was quite impressed. Would be cool to see an updated version of it.

For example, I heard it's more like 10,000 a run instead of 1k. Not sure if it's true or not though.

Are there any manned rockets that are faster like some have suggested?

Footnote: not sure if I would strap myself in one of those or not. Probably not though. I haven't even taken my FFR mkII to the drags. It scares me.

I would in a heart beat if given the chance to get used to it.Just because pedalling these beasts is so hard on parts you would need to know exactly what you are doing.

If you want to see a display of HP go to a drag strip and see Les Shockley’s Shockwave 3 jet engine semi truck. You have to be there to hear and feel the ground shake.

Are there any manned rockets that are faster like some have suggested?
Not suggested but fact, John Stapp's 1954 rocket sled run is proof of that, this is not a doctored vid ... MANNED ROCKET SLED RUN - YouTube
In doing it he underwent 40g's momentarily, had the duration been any longer he would have died.

Fighter aircraft can sustain 9g's structurally with no problem, but the pilot can't - the limiting factor is always what a human can withstand. The best pilots in the world can withstand 9g's for short periods of time before blacking out. The original assertion that top fuel dragsters are the fastest at propelling a man forward is nonsense. Driver's running top fuel down the strip experience about 4g's. A pilot in a fully loaded fighter with weaps and fuel experiences about 4g's on a carrier catapult launch. Sure, the power that a top fuel V8 can generate is impressive, but that's the bottom end of what a rocket motor can produce. If NASCAR approved rocket motors for the drags, then you would be seeing sub 3 second ET's & trap speeds of 500 mph.
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Your right no doubt,personally would much rather see a top fueler go.We all know you will never see a rocket screaming down the 1/4 mile.Have heard that someone on this planet wants to take a jet powered car to 2000mph,not in a 1/4 mile obviously but on a salt bed,read this on V8 bike forum.