What's happening to the engine in this video?

[.]

About 20 seconds in, it starts shooting sparklers and odd flameage.
Vid is titled "first fire."

[vbtube]ZFWPRGte67c[/vbtube]

In this one, it starts behaving differently towards the end shuts off in an abrupt manner

[vbtube]-uIEs-ZvMVM[/vbtube]

Someone says "Too much fuel." So it got richer as it got warmer?

 

[Randy]

3:44 is the length of the second video. Nearly four minutes is more than twice as much time an engine like that would be running if it was out on the track including start up, burnout, backup, prestage, stage, and go. There is no reason it should be running that long unless they have a lot of money and just like hearing it run.

It shut off because it started backfiring. First backfire was at 3:29 when the guy reached in to feel the head. When it finally backfires for the last time you can see the blower belt turning counterclockwise just before the guy claims it has "too much fuel." Backfire was likely caused by the fact that the engine/heads/pistons/valvetrain are red hot. I wouldn't be surprised if the fuel tank was about empty.

Probably the real reason the engine shut itself off was because it was trying to save itself from everyone else just standing there watching it melt down. It did them a favor.

Disclaimer: Normally I mind my own business and probably should have this time, too.

 

[elvis]

Good to see they had the car off of the ground and a driver in the seat too....

 

[Bullet]

Probably the real reason the engine shut itself off was because it was trying to save itself from everyone else just standing there watching it melt down. It did them a favor.

No crap! There is one place you don't want to be when a fuel engine starts misfiring or detonating... NEXT TO IT!

 

[Huge]

Good to see they had the car off of the ground and a driver in the seat too....

I hope they had the coupler out of it.

 

[Nitrohelper]

..... it starts shooting sparklers.....

The sparks are from the grinding dust inside of new headers.
I've had it happen several times on the first start and sometimes the first run...

As to the rest of the warm-up - someone once said that a license should be required to start a Nitro car,
this video give some credence to the idea...

 

[Muddy]

Back in the day I've seen several teams put valve lapping compound in the headers just prior to starting. Generally it occured after having some type of problem on the previous run. Anything to get inside the head of the guy in the other lane. Valve lapping compound makes the headers look like giant sparklers left from the last fireworks display.

 

[Vern]

I think that's a case of more money than brains there !

 

[Treeshaker]

I think we are being a little hard on some guys who are experiencing their dream. Looks like they built a sweet looking cackle car and they are proud enough of their initial results to put in on the internet.

Looks like the old guy has enough knowledge to keep the group from having anything really bad happen. Sure, there could have been some things done better, but it was probably many of their first time this close to a nitro car starting. They will learn the do's and don'ts as they get experience.

Nothing unusual in the first video for a first start up with all new parts. It always takes some time to adjust the fuel mixture, and he set theirs a little on the lean side so that they could see flames at night.

On the second film, I think the tank was running low and the pump started to cavitate sending an air bubble then a little splash of fuel until there wasn't enough momentum to compress the fuel in a cyclinder and the motor stopped. If someone had squirted gas into the injector as they pulled the fuel shutoff to allow the lines to purge the nitro when it started to run rough, it would have shut off normally. Hopefully they pulled the plugs to clean it out or someone might be catching a head as it flies off.

And I agree that everyone new to nitro should have someone with experience teaching them the ropes PRIOR to starting it the first time. A standard test and license wouldn't be a bad thing either.

 

[legendman]

The videos Paul posted remind me of this one, the video is 20+ minutes long.
Did they let these things run for this long or did they make a lap and shutdown and let it cool then make another lap after that?

2012 CHRR Cacklefest - YouTube

 

[sdwarf36]

I agree with Virgil. No-one is born with nitro knowlodge-and unless you learned from someone else, you burned up stuff learning the hard way. I could easily see the scenario-its 10pm at nite-you finally finished the car enuff to run-and just can't wait to put fire in the pipes. You got someone who knows something about fuel-but he's 2 hours away + can't make it till Saturday. "We'll just get it ready for him-we'll get it to start-check for oil leaks-set timing-look for...."OH HELL-I JUST WANNA HEAR IT RUN!
Yea--i could see doing that.