The Coolest Dragster of ALL TIME!!

[rocketman]

NHRA.com Photo of the Week presented by Auto Imagery

Need I say more?

I agree there's never been a car like it since. It deserves to be in the Smithsonian.

 

[mike]

 

[TooTall999]

My favorite of all time was the "Jade Grenade" rear engined dragster,the one that had the front wheel fairings.Not the most impressive runner,but I thought it had extreme cool factor.

 

[Nunz]

Hey Dave, in reference to those little junior fuelers from the 60's, I think it would be cool if there were something like that today. A lightweight FED with an injected, nitro small block. Throw it in Comp Eliminator.

 

[none]

They supposedly tried that! The N/D that Borgeis and Carter drive. Small block ,410ci, on alcohol. Record is around 6.8 seconds!
The class was designed to allow inexpensive cars to go fast, like they did in the '60's. Now, they're using Pro-Stock motors. Mega $$$.

Lee
Nitroclovers

 

[Rajunz]

This car was also very pretty and ahead of it's time. It showed up at the Cajun Nationals in 1980. If I remember correctly it was called by Walt Darbin's "Favorite Thing".

 

[Just Paul]

Swamp rat XXX, one of the coolest cars to ever run down the 1/4 mile, and very historic, well ahead of it's time.

To touch on a couple storeis posted on here--

Garlits lost one of those rear wheel moon disks it and became a 200 MPH metal frisbee. If I remember, it was the in that final round against Ormsby in 86, Baton Rouge. I don't think they lasted long after that. (on the rear anyway)

Ormsbys car ran with a traditional front end in 86, but for it's last race, it had an aero front end with the small front wheels.

Joe Amato only ran his spoon nose car at one event, the 86 Northstar Nationals.

I also seem to recall some thought the enclosed front end was only to distract away from the fact that Big had put the fuel tank ahead of the front axle, to allow for better weight transfer, and let the car arch up more in the middle. I think Gene Snow built a car that had an open front end,, but a fuel tank like Don's ahead of the front axle.

Trivia bonus points!!

Who got in as an alternate at Englishtown in 1986 after Big crashed???
This person also beat Eddie Hill in the first round.

 

[Professor Dave]

They supposedly tried that! The N/D that Borgeis and Carter drive. Small block ,410ci, on alcohol. Record is around 6.8 seconds!
The class was designed to allow inexpensive cars to go fast, like they did in the '60's. Now, they're using Pro-Stock motors. Mega $$$.

Lee
Nitroclovers

The cost of the car is relatively cheap-it's always the cost of the motor in comp-and you can't run a pro-stock motor in those classes-must be an iron head.

 

[Professor Dave]

Hey Dave, in reference to those little junior fuelers from the 60's, I think it would be cool if there were something like that today. A lightweight FED with an injected, nitro small block. Throw it in Comp Eliminator.

One of the guys in D1 running A/ND (Stu Sandhaus) wanted that class in comp-he couldn't get it approved.

 

[racer83]

I still like the Peterson & Fitz Streamliner but a lot of the cars mentioned are at the Garlits Museum

Lots of good pics here : GARLITS

TK