Turbochargers, one more time... (3 Viewers)

[Mooseman]

I think the question needs to be asked is why would you want to try turbo's?

 

[Bill]

Easy answer. This is a race to the finish line.

In almost every venue where turbochargers have been legal, turbocharged cars have been the fastest and quickest. The NHRA indexes for Comp Eliminator turbo cars were always quicker, and the amount of weight they were required to pull, compared with the conventionally-blown cars was always greater back when they were allowed on V8s . Turbos were almost always handicapped in order to give the other (GMC-blown) cars a fighting chance.

Given that, I can't think of a reason not to, can you? This IS about winning races, isn't it???

 

[JHOLE]

"Did he run competitive numbers?"

Yes.

Googled - found this.

Golden Gator drag racing - a set on Flickr

Guess I'm older than I though...

 

[Nunz]

I'm no genius but it's obvious the turbo is way more efficient than a blower. However, regarding just TF & FC, even if someone made it work, as it's been said, it could quite possibly kill the whole appeal of fuel classes. Without the thunder, they would probably not be very entertaining, aside from the numbers on the scoreboard.

 

[Toejam]

I'm no genius but it's obvious the turbo is way more efficient than a blower. However, regarding just TF & FC, even if someone made it work, as it's been said, it could quite possibly kill the whole appeal of fuel classes. Without the thunder, they would probably not be very entertaining, aside from the numbers on the scoreboard.

That's my opinion of Turbo's in general, everyone knows how much Power they make. Yet despite how fast any Turbo car is, hearing that Vaccuum cleaner sound doesn't do a thing for me!

 

[Bill]

So, what it boils down to is; is this show biz or is it a sport?

If it's just show biz, then why get serious about who wins? It's just show biz...

But, if it's STILL A SPORT, like it was when Garlits knew he needed that 6:71 to come out on top at Bakersfield, then it's counterproductive to keep the good stuff from the race track through Draconian legislation.

It's not just turbochargers; there are other systems that NHRA has legislated out of existence in T/F and F/C that could have injected some new technological "blood" into the sport without changing the "thunder" that is so appealing, such as 4-valve, DOHC, cylinder heads and screw compressors.

Ford had a great little Fuel motor (the SOHC 427) but NHRA banned it, along with the McGhee motor from down under.


All in the name of "controlling the cost of racing"???? I don't think so...

I believe that NHRA, if they COULD, would mandate every last part on these cars to create a COT Fuel racer that they would never again have to worry about someone, ANYONE, gaining an advantage on the rest of the field.

Look at traction control, for example. If everybody had a working, viable, traction control system, the days of aborted runs due to "up in smoke" passes would be history. This would result in a LOT more close racing, less worry about "one-lane-dragstrips" on raceday, and generally improve the spectators' viewing experience. I don't know about you, but watching a car go up in smoke is not a very enjoyable thing for me to witness... So, driver A is better at pedalling an up in smoke race car than driver B.... who cares???????? That's not as much fun (for me, anyway) to watch as a traction-perfect run with a "photo finish."

Since it's not really RACING; only SHOW BIZ, the show's the thing, and serious racing is a secondary consideration, right?

I think they have decided that the spectator appeal is way more important than the serious racing aspects involved in T/F and F/C . If not, we'd have the Garlits "NO SILLY RULES" cars in both lanes... with twin turbos on one and a DOHC, screw-compressor "blower" motor in the other....

I think that would be a LOT more interesting than these present-day, cookie-cutter examples that NHRA has mandated through the restrictive rules they have insidiously slipped into place over the years.

But, that's just me... Your mileage may vary!

 

[Toejam]

So, what it boils down to is; is this show biz or is it a sport?

If it's just show biz, then why get serious about who wins? It's just show biz...

But, if it's STILL A SPORT, like it was when Garlits knew he needed that 6:71 to come out on top at Bakersfield, then it's counterproductive to keep the good stuff from the race track through Draconian legislation.

It's not just turbochargers; there are other systems that NHRA has legislated out of existence in T/F and F/C that could have injected some new technological "blood" into the sport without changing the "thunder" that is so appealing, such as 4-valve, DOHC, cylinder heads and screw compressors.

Ford had a great little Fuel motor (the SOHC 427) but NHRA banned it, along with the McGhee motor from down under.


All in the name of "controlling the cost of racing"???? I don't think so...

I believe that NHRA, if they COULD, would mandate every last part on these cars to create a COT Fuel racer that they would never again have to worry about someone, ANYONE, gaining an advantage on the rest of the field.

Look at traction control, for example. If everybody had a working, viable, traction control system, the days of aborted runs due to "up in smoke" passes would be history. This would result in a LOT more close racing, less worry about "one-lane-dragstrips" on raceday, and generally improve the spectators' viewing experience. I don't know about you, but watching a car go up in smoke is not a very enjoyable thing for me to witness... So, driver A is better at pedalling an up in smoke race car than driver B.... who cares???????? That's not as much fun (for me, anyway) to watch as a traction-perfect run with a "photo finish."

Since it's not really RACING; only SHOW BIZ, the show's the thing, and serious racing is a secondary consideration, right?

I think they have decided that the spectator appeal is way more important than the serious racing aspects involved in T/F and F/C . If not, we'd have the Garlits "NO SILLY RULES" cars in both lanes... with twin turbos on one and a DOHC, screw-compressor "blower" motor in the other....

I think that would be a LOT more interesting than these present-day, cookie-cutter examples that NHRA has mandated through the restrictive rules they have insidiously slipped into place over the years.

But, that's just me... Your mileage may vary!

Bill, you need to factor cost containment in all of this! Allowing a new combination that does prove to have an advantage means the competition will need to make that investment just to play catch up! And anytime this happens several racers just opt to quit or change classes, rather than have to spend several Thousands of $$$ trying to be competitive!

 

[Mooseman]

The Mcgee was a great idea which for whatever reason didn't work out as good as it should have , remembering that Mcgee's were trying to run that engine for years before the NHRA banned it .

Heres an interesting article about multi valve engines on Nitro

On Your Cycle

And heres an interesting article abot the 427 SOHC

Competition Plus.com - Drag Racing's Internet Magazine

And heres another interesting article which doesnt talk about turbochargers in general but it shows that they new about them since the early seventies .

On the Line... Should Nitro be banned?

 

[Nunz]

Bill, your argument about sport vs. entertainment is understood. But this isn't the '60s anymore. Any meaningful performance gain, in just about any category, is super costly. Do you see what's happening around us? The wealthiest team owners in the sport are scaling back. Racing is racing, and it can be a show as well. The nostagia fuel guys have turned the clock back on performance, but it appears that they serious about winning, and I'll gladly watch a field of 8 or 16 NTF or NFC and be entertained. The contemporary cars are way, way out of control costs-wise, so I don't think it would be a good thing to take the lid off and let anything go. The other factor, is everyone agrees, drivers included, that 300whatever mph is fast enough. So there isn't really a point in allowing screws, turbos, high-helix, 3 motors, or whatever, at this point in the sport.

 

[Bill]

Good points, all, Nunzio... Sometimes I forget how old I am...

One of the reasons I got involved in this sport in 1955 (no typo... 1955) was that it was a blank sheet of paper; there were cars with airplane engines, big and little car motors, and various types of forced induction setups (remember the Latham axial-flow blowers??? Probably not...), and "HYDRAZINE-POWERED" CARS...

It was a potpourri of different approaches to covering the quarter mile as quickly as possible.

That's what I miss... The sport grew up and I never did...

Thanks for the explanation. I'm sure you're right.

Doesn't mean I like it, but the way you laid it out, it makes all kinds of sense.

Bill

 

[Bill]

Thanks for the interesting links, William; I'll definitely check them all out!

Bill

 

[Nunz]

I'm with ya' Bill, my dad raced in the '60s & '70s, so I remember the "good old days". Back then, small changes could result in 1/4 or even 1/2 second improvement in ET, same with MPH. Now, racers fight for thousandths. Which is the natural evolution of things. But I miss opening National Dragster, especially when the season started, because you never knew what you would see, the term "cookie cutter" was not invented yet, at least when applied to race cars.

 

[Bill]

>>>"the term "cookie cutter" was not invented yet, at least when applied to race cars.

Yes, the variety and scope of what qualified as a viable race car has gone from the bizarre to what we have, now in that 54 year period (1955-2004.)

Some instances of very "different" cars over the years, that I recall, that actually won races were the Miller/Sanger, Potvin-Blown, 430 Lincoln-powered dragster that won the Detroit Nationals in 1959 or '60; the "Old School" normally-aspirated and carbureted "Cyr and Hopper" Chizler-motored K-88 dragster that ran a 2-speed transmission at the '58 Oklahoma City Nationals.... and won it all. Cyr and Hopper also had a "state-of-the-art" TE440 chassis car with a GMC-blown, high-gear-only setup car there, but, "Old Blue" won it all, shifting gears... and, with a cracked cylinder wall!!!

Then, there was the 1962 NHRA Nationals (it wasn't the U.S. Nationals, yet) win by Mickey Thompson with a Pontiac-powered dragster using a Pontiac engine with Hemi heads. Go figure...

Somebody on the West Coast built a Fuel car using an Offenhauser DOHC, 4-cylinder motor (Indy 500 -type) but I never heard how it ran. Might have been a twin; I've slept since then....

I went to a Points race in Caddo Mills Texas in 1962 and there were a BUNCH of California cars there. One was a twin-engine blown dragster with two aluminum G.M. 215cid V8s mounted one in front of the other, with a single 6:71 GMC blower feeding both of them pressurized air! It sat halfway between them... on the back of the front engine and on the front of the back engine... kinda dwarfed them both!

Then, of course, there was the Green Monster, but that's Twilight Zone stuff.... in 1957...


One more... Hot Rod magazine one month had a feature article called "Blown by proxy" that showed a '41 Willys coupe, some big V8 under the hood, with a 4-cylinder industrial engine IN THE TRUNK, turning a GMC 6:71 supercharger, with the pressurized air delivered to the conventional-location engine, through 4"-diameter "plumbing."

Some of that innovative thinking still goes on in Comp Eliminator, but that's about it...

Too bad; it was VERY entertaining!!!

Bill

 

[Mooseman]

The interesting thing about these kind of topics is , you look back on the combinations that people have run over the years and you hear and see what people are running and you realise that people ran this or that but you never hear about how much damage they may of had or how often they had to replace things they broke or whether what they ran worked or didnt work .

Then over time all the things that didn't work disapear and everyone ends up with the same thing because it works .

I am only 20 years old but its like looking back on the iron block days of nitro sure they ran the iron blocks and they did the job but you never hear how often they had to change the blocks due to cracks and damage .

 

[T.Smith]

F1 couldn't afford the turbo era...I sure drag racing couldn't have either.

 

[Bill]

Tony,
My original contention was that the Fuel motors that they run today are SO EXPENSIVE to maintan due to fuel costs and parts attrition, that it might well be possible to duplicate their performance with a twin turbo alcohol package that would comparatively, last forever, and be worlds cheaper to maintain on an ongoing basis.

A Sonny Leonard twin turbo alky motor has already made over 4,000 horsepower on his dyno, I realize that's a helluva long way from the 8,000 horsepower made by Alan Johnson's combination, but a less-powerful car could be built a lot lighter, and with cheaper, less hefty drivetrain parts.

Fuel costs would plummet, and the horrific explosions expeienced by Fuel cars wouldn't be a factor any more.

Just thinking, here, but dragsters have gotten awfully heavy, and if you made a 270-inch car with an all-aluminum 700 cubic inch motor, running on alcohol, with dual turbos in a cleaner, more aerodynamic package, it might approach the speeds that NHRA would be comfortable with returning to 1320-foot racing (300 mph?) You might be able to pare the weight down 400-500 pounds...

I realize that this will not happen, particularly in today's economy, but I think the costs associated with the changeover to a plan like this would pay for itself in less than three years, due to the giant reduction in parts attrition and fuel costs. Alcohol is CHEAP, compared to Nitro...

I am a lifelong addict to "the thunder" that a Fuel motor produces, and have always cupped my hands around my ears in an effort to capture as much "Nitro Thunder" as I could (while others around me plug their ears...)and, I adore the way the ground shakes when they go by... but be that as it may, I'm wondering if the time has come that we and NHRA can no longer afford the astronomical costs of racing Fuel motors. The overhead is killing all but the best-funded teams.

Remember "64 Funny Car" shows on the West Coast???

Try that today... You'd be lucky to get 18...

 

[Mooseman]

Nascar costs more then nitro racing , I read somewhere that if a team needs 3 million in nitro racing then a nascar team needs 12 million .

NHRA banned nitro in the early 60's so Big Daddy Don Garlits and the other nitro racers just went somewhere else and raced . I highly advise you carefully read those links I posted earlier they really go into detail about some of the things you have sudgested , like getting rid of nitro and using multi valve over head cam engines .

My personal oppinion is that banning nitro would be the stupidist idea ever .

 

[Bobby]

ok Bill I 'm just a fan never been anything but a fan.

take away nitro and there is no reason to go to the races. It is a show.
There's no reason this show cannot include good racing, but it is a show.

Chess can be very competitive right?

But who's paying to watch it.

The 1000' rule pissed me off bad enough. Take away nitro and seriously you'll see attendance plummet. Most of those people I see at the gators don't know **** about racing and still get glassy eyed when you talk about a holeshot. 'why'd the faster car lose ' oh shut up dude

but they know the snap cackle and pop.

 

[Bobby]

And BTW, I 'm hoping like hell the indy cars bring back turbos. for that application they make sense, from a spectator point of view.
I 'm sick of not being able to talk to my wife for 2 hours when I 'm at an irl race. Plugging your ears for 5 seconds is fine, but 2 hours? Those irl cars are much too loud. I love watching the Audi diesels. all you hear is tire noise.

 

[Mooseman]

Drag racing is about the racing and the competition and winning and stuff yes but for the people in the stands the people who watch it that arent die hard motorheads and may not know all the technical stuff its pretty much a show and entertainment to them you know .

Me personally I am a die hard petral head . I love v8's and I dont mind waiting for hours to see racing or sitting in the rain or anything because I love the technical aspect of it as well as the racing . But for the average fan who just goes to watch its entertainment they go to have a good time and be entertained .