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Old drag racing class letters and numbers???

Discussion in 'The Hokey Ass Message Board' started by LilDuec, Jun 8, 2007.

  1. LilDuec
    Joined: Feb 28, 2006
    Posts: 288

    LilDuec
    Member

    Anyone know what the old drag classification numbers were? I put some numbers on my car that an old drag racer said my class would probably have been. The letters/numbers are C/A 283. The guy said it would probably be a 283ci class but what does the C/A stand for? And what would be any other classes? Just curious, thanks!
     
  2. phat rat
    Joined: Mar 18, 2001
    Posts: 4,920

    phat rat
    Member


    C/A was C class in altered division, the 283 more than likely would have been choosen by the cars owner and doesn't necessarily mean anything other than a number. Although it could have meant he had a 283 in it.
     
  3. VA HAMB
    Joined: Jun 14, 2006
    Posts: 1,377

    VA HAMB
    Member

    accually I think the number does mean something. It did mean he had a 283 and I think the classes were divided into cubic inches versus weight.
    I have an origional B altered drag truck . It has 264 on the door for the early nailhead. But later after classes changed It didnt matter and the truck now has a 401.
    A= altered G= gass The top letter stands for the class. A was a faster class than B and so on.
    None of this could be true but I think im close. If not ,someone will say so im sure. Hope I helped.
     
  4. RichFox
    Joined: Dec 3, 2006
    Posts: 10,020

    RichFox
    Member Emeritus

    I ran in the late 50s and early 60s. My class was C/A or B/A depending on how much weight I had in it. The A was for Alt which was much like the Altered roadsters they run now, except Altered then was for coups and sedans. Roadsters ran in Roadster class. The number was owners choice and different for each car. The letters and numbers being used today by the SCTA/BNI are just about the same as the early days of drag racing.
     

  5. Wesley
    Joined: Aug 12, 2006
    Posts: 1,670

    Wesley
    Member

    generally speaking, and there are variations depending on the sanctioning body C is for the engine (power or CID)to weight ratio. A is for altered, which usually means altered wheel base. 2 is for the division or region, while 83 is the driver number. in the alphabet soup that drag racing has used over the years A is the highest power to the lightest weight, as you proceed through the alphabet the power would go down and the weight would go up, sometimes both. In the event that you would see AA/A, that would indicate a blown big engine lightweight altered. I worked for a guy around 1990 that ran a C/EA car. It was a 88 olds cutlas ciera that had a shorter than stock wheelbase, converted to RWD powered by a 304 CID buick headed SBC with a single 750 holley and a powerglide. The E in the class designation stood for "econo". The biggest limitation in the "econo" classes was the single 750 holley and the automatic trans. "econo" long since lost the meaning of economy as this was a $50K car powered by a $30K engine. If you really want to see an alphabet soup car designation look at any of the Land Speed Record rule books.
     
  6. RichFox
    Joined: Dec 3, 2006
    Posts: 10,020

    RichFox
    Member Emeritus

    I guess it changes with what you think of as the old days. About 50 years ago for me. Attached my Altered drag car from '59-64. The C leter is a cubic inches to weight deal. Also my Altered salt car from '78 to '86. The XX meant Blown Vintage inline or flathead V8. Now they give the flathead Ford guys their own class so they won't tear up so much. There were no divisions when I was drag racing. You had stock class. Ment pretty much stock. Then gas coup/ Street roadster. Ment not stock but fenders, headlites, all the street stuff, then Altered coup for gas burning cars/Fuel coup for the same cars on pop. Also Roadster/ Hot Roadster for topless cars. Next was Comp coup and Modified roadster all fuel classes and almost dragsters. Then the diggers themselves.
     

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  7. Wesley
    Joined: Aug 12, 2006
    Posts: 1,670

    Wesley
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    from what I have seen the basic alphabet soup has not changed much from the early days of drag racing to today, although the cars certainly have. LSR class designations are completely different animal.
     
  8. turdytoo
    Joined: May 14, 2007
    Posts: 1,568

    turdytoo
    Member

    If I remember right "C/A" was a coupe or sedan with max 25% of wheel base engine set back and 8 pounds or more naturally aspirated,per every cubic inch of engine displacement. Blowers moved you up one class.
     
  9. RichFox
    Joined: Dec 3, 2006
    Posts: 10,020

    RichFox
    Member Emeritus

    Could be. I don't remember the class breaks. It was a 260 inch '53 Dodge and I think it was around 1900 pounds with the weight in. Maybe that was without the weight and we went to 2080 to make class. Been a long time. Wish I had the car back
     
  10. flatheadmalc
    Joined: Mar 4, 2006
    Posts: 245

    flatheadmalc
    Member

    Don't for get things like SS/A (Super Stock Automatic). Gas classes that were like A/G (A Gas) A/GS (A Gas Supercharged) and a bunch of other designations. Actually made sense toyugh.
     
  11. Oilcan Harry
    Joined: Mar 3, 2001
    Posts: 906

    Oilcan Harry
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    from INDY

    SS/A is Super Stock A class. SS/AA would be Super Stock A Automatic.
    Gas classes were variously: A/G, thru H/G?, A/GS thru C/GS, AA/G Thru CC/G, and AA/GS Thru CC/GS. Seems Supercharged was designated at variuos times as an added S on the end, a double letter AA, BB, CC and for a time a double letter AA , BB, CC, AND an S on the end. Kept changing and got confusing.
    Whatever, NHRA dumped my favorite class, Gas Coupe /Sedan, along with Fuel Altereds, and the Modified Production classes. I don't care much for today's drag racing. TV coverage has ruined it. I've allways wondered how popular TV Drag Racing might have been if it had been televised during the Gasser Wars.
     
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  12. phat rat
    Joined: Mar 18, 2001
    Posts: 4,920

    phat rat
    Member


    So now that you have all these answers from different eras. Which time frame were you looking at? The answer above mentions Modified Production and that's 66 and later. After around that time classes got really crazy and racing started changing to what it is today. Which in my oldtimers opinion isn't really racing. Racing back then was "balls to the wall first guy to the finish line wins" non of this bullshit of "hey you went too fast so you lose"
     
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  13. Andamo
    Joined: Jan 10, 2006
    Posts: 523

    Andamo
    Member

    Phat Rat, I hear what you're saying about going too fast, but face it, bracket racing saved the sport of drag racing. How could you compete with a home built car against a big dollar sponsored car in the same class back then ? That's why a lot of racers bailed from the sport back because of the disparity.
     
  14. Harms Way
    Joined: Nov 27, 2005
    Posts: 6,894

    Harms Way
    Member

    There is a great article about this on Byrons Gasser Madness, on the left side of the page go to "A Brief History of the Gasser Classes"

    http://gassermadness.com/

    A old Drag Race historian pal of mine, Dave Crain, once told me the numbers (especially the first number) had more to do with regon.
    Hope this helps
     
  15. phat rat
    Joined: Mar 18, 2001
    Posts: 4,920

    phat rat
    Member

    A friend/co-worker for many years has stayed in racing the whole time. He runs a so-called stocker. Always has to worry about going to fast in order not to be factored to a higher horsepower. He's held both ends of his class record many times over the years and is not big money sponsored, he does it on his own. As I said before there was no such thing as going to fast and losing. To me going faster than the other guy is what racing is about, not who has guessed the closest for his dial in. An example is my grandson who runs a jr dragster, couple of weeks ago he lost by .007 of a second. The car slowed down just a hair (.020) that night from what it had been doing so he lost because he broke out and they didn't figure on that much difference when doing the dial in.
     
  16. rooman
    Joined: Sep 20, 2006
    Posts: 4,045

    rooman
    Member

    First letter is capacity to weight (in the "hot" classes) and power (factory advertised or sanctioning body adjusted)to weight in Stock and Super Stock. Of course in super stock they put the category designation first to confuse things (SS/B, SS/I etc)
    After the slash is category: /D = dragster
    /MR = modified roadster
    /C = comp (dragster style chassis with coupe or roadster body
    /A = altered
    /G = gas
    /MP = modified production etc
    /FX = factory experimental
    Double letters before the slash generally indicate supercharged in the hot classes. BB/D,BB/G, CC/A etc
    In the early days of the gassers the supercharged cars were classsed the same as unblown with an S after the basic designation. A/GS etc.
    What determines the base classing can be complicated but dragster is obvious, altered is 25% engine set back max, gas is 10% engine set back, two seats and basic street equipement (lights , fenders etc). Modified production is basically a stock or super stock style car with a bigger engine than what came with the car.
    FX was the beginning of funny car with highly modified super stock cars (originally created by the factories but built in small volume and thus not legal for super stock)

    Roo
     
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  17. RichFox
    Joined: Dec 3, 2006
    Posts: 10,020

    RichFox
    Member Emeritus

    Phat Rat-Kind of a long tow for you but the SCTA will never say you went to fast.
     
  18. LilDuec
    Joined: Feb 28, 2006
    Posts: 288

    LilDuec
    Member

    Ok so for my coupe I guess C/A 283 would work fine for the era I'm goin for I guess. It seems from what you guys are saying that C/A, C meaning it wasnt all that crazy fast, and A meaning it was in the coupe, sedan class? And the 283 is pretty accurate. I worked at Gateway International Raceway for 3 years but all the classes are different now. Just tryin to get it right. Thanks for all the feedback, this is great! RichFox thanks for the pics man those are great!
     

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