scatterred, kind of related (?) ideas, good for visualizing: "An inexperienced driver can easily spin the car when using a 2 way LSD if they lift the throttle suddenly, expecting the car to settle like a conventional open differential." also: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=K4JhruinbWc&NR=1
Tim, I disagree with Tony that tuning nitro is a black art. It is very difficult and humbling at times but that's why we do it. It is simply science. It's an experiment in physics and is bound by the laws of physics and the universe. It has boundaries where as art does not. The main thing to learn is to read your parts to see what the engine/clutch need/want. The thing I will harp on is that maintenance is ESSENTIAL. You HAVE to tear things apart after you run it and visually inspect every part. It will save you $$ and wasted time at the track. You have to do it to protect your investment. If you do that you will catch problems before they bite you in the ass. Dragsters are easy to work on and you will learn to love it. You kind of develop a relationship and a routine with your car. Time in the shop taking her apart and putting her back together is quality time for most gearheads. It is for me anyway. There are many ways to run nitro and most of them will work but you can't mix and match parts of tuneups from different tuners. That will get you in trouble fast. Pick a theory and stick to it. With Jensen helping you it will be fine. The fuel makes the power. In simplest terms the motor mainly has to STAY TOGETHER and the clutch is where the performance you are after will be found. That may be over simplified but on a basic level it is true. You are cutting a new path with what you are trying to do. (old style smoker runs on modern tracks with quick ETs)I hope you can make it work. Brad
Brad, I refer to nitro tuning as a "black art", because for someone just learning this deal, the mysteries and seeming contradictions can become overwhelming. There are no books, classes, videos from which the beginner can scratch out even the most basic foundation of knowledge. Even when you pay an old pro to come in and sort your stuff, you are still left out of the loop of intuitive thought. Experience can only come from experience. The car you run is a very straight forward "Formula" package. The basic combination has been sorted and scienced over the years by countless individuals, and all of the causes and effects are known and documented. That's not the case with what these guys are trying to do. They are going to run into dynamics that people who run conventional N/TF cars like yourself have never encountered...and the old timers...who were actually smoking the hoops through the lights...they won't be much help because back when they were doing it, nobody was paying attention to what made it happen, only that it happened that way. What these guys are attempting, smoking the tires AND running a number is alot more difficult than it sounds. When I first read the idea, I blew it off as too easy to devote any thought to...then, after a couple of nights worth of pondering, all the dynamics at play came into focus. That's what I tried to spell out in the previous posts. When they do run into issues with this sort of deal, borrowing knowledge from people who run conventional combinations is going to lead to confusion and breakage. You tell Tim to check his stuff every lap...and that's absolutely a golden kernal of advice...but what he is going to find when he tears his stuff down is gonna be a different animal than what you are going to find with yours.
So....... If all that's truely the case..... . . . Take a guess at the setup... Make a pass... Tune... Repeat... It's the exact same formula people have been using for years... It won't be cheap or quick or easy to get it right but it's not a 'black art'... Or some other Gandolf shit... It's racing... Put your pedal down and go fast... If you live, tune it better, and go faster... Anything is possible... Even chassis reconfiguring... Just add desire... That being said, if I was in Condor's place, with a bitchin' drag rig all done and ready to go, I don't think I'd be trying to reinvent it and go for the Smoker thing... I think I'd just get a few hundred passes under my belt and start planning my next endeavor... I'm partial to funny cars... Maybe a 'Satan' Corvette? But again, what Tim want's to do could be done... With enough time, effort, and money... Even if nobody out there helped. But he'll get help... Even if it's not from some White Punk on Lithium...
I fully plan on tearing everything down after every run. Jensen is a current NTF tuner, and he learned from guys like Ted Gotelli. Pete actually managed over 100 runs on the same stock block/crank, running 98% in the past. This was one of the reasons I chose Jensen. As far as confusing the whole deal by running a combination of different tune-ups, Recycler is right. After hearing a bunch of tuners tell (yell?) me a constant barrage of technical and theoretical knowledge, I did what I've always done in the past when learning a new trade or skill...I chose one path and focused on it. The only thing I've ever been "overwhelmed" by has been the unbelievable expense. I love complicated shit that's nearly impossible to do (most of the time it's the only thing that keeps me interested) but the !@#$ing money is just brutal. This isn't a "Cacklecar"...Everything has to be certed. The parts are super high quality to not only last but be safe. I can't borrow a fuel suit etc...Money money money. Not only is this gig dangerous, it's unknown territory. Sponsors and partners are scarce in Vintage racing as it is, try finding money for THIS! Bitching aside, I'm close. I have a bit of guidance to start with (sooner or later, if I want to keep Jensen I have to start paying him - Thanks again for everything Pete) and a solid, proven (at least in NTF) nitro combination as a starting point. As I've said, we're gonna sneak up on this. Jensen has a rigorous tear down ritual that involves checking EVERYTHING between runs. This is all very cool as far as I'm concerned. I have the big picture on this and always have. I won't be hoarding knowledge or hiding my mistakes to look "cool." I'm hoping this (and all aspects of automotive culture) will evolve beyond the get nowhere cycle of "learn it on your own like the rest of us." Science and technology has progressed unbelievably fast in all other areas due to excellent communication and shared previous knowledge. I plan on doing the same thing here. I believe you never "give anything away" teaching. It's money in the bank. Nitro is fantastic and dangerous shit. Like we used to say in my unit, "Stay alert, Stay alive." Big thanks in advance for any knowledge shared here.
FIRST UP, I dont know anything about Nitro. SECOND UP, I know a little about smokin slicks (title of thread is Smoker slicks.... ). So with that said, I went on another adventur with my dragster last saturday. I tried like the old guys say , "Use the brake to bring the motor down". So I launched it Hard and smoked the tires, grabbed the brake to bring the motor down a bit. But the motor didnt seem to come down too much. Kept smokin the tires, I kept pullin the brake and finally started hookin then I lugged the motor. Second pass. Launched hard, wheelie and smoke. Grabed the brake, pulled. Then let go right away. And it started pullin like crazy. Skating around pedeled it twice then . Something happened. Something went flying past my face. Shut it off. I thought it was the blower belt. But after gettin out of the car looked . And it spit out the blower gasket. It blew the pop off valve and took the gasket too. So I am trying to figure this out. Looks like I found the right combo. REV, DUMP, PULL BRAKE, LET GO RIGHT AWAY, AND DRIVE. I think the pedaling it popped the intake blow off. So it is back together right now and ready for the hamb drags. I will just try not to pedal it . At least that is my plan. Sorry I have no technical advice to give. Just some seat of the pants, Missouri trying to do like the old timers.
yeah, Nessie the front engined dragster made some passes, and guess what? THERE IS CLEAR, WELL SHOT VIDEO OF IT! i saw it with my own eyes, i swear! but, we didn't have the right cable to download it, and i got something in my eye, then the phone rang and brian had to go home...
Damn Brian....that sounds like a shitload of fun!!!! Your actually DOING it......that RULES!!!! Quick question...for anyone....what other rail classes were there in the 60's? Fuel, Jr. Fuel, gas? And were they all basically "smokers"???
HELL YEAH! So Brian, you had to DRIVE the car? How did you manage that without a trans brake thumb switch, a tranny or a computer? Where's the !@#$%^&*&^%$#@ing video????????!!!!!!! You're killin' me man. I LOVE ya, but you're KILLIN' me.
Tim, you would have been proud of Brian! I was! Brian didn't think the car left good enough I think. I was in the stands straight across from the car at about the tree. he's getting it down, I was very impressed, I could tell he's on the right track. Brian and I talked for quite awhile, I wish he could have made another pass. Looked good to me. Beautiful little car and it was smoking them AND moving out pretty quick. I don't know how far it really went smoking but I was impressed, it was quite a ways! Brian stayed in it like a veteran. I believe a little more HP and he's gonna fly, AND make smoke. You guys got me wanting to do this now!! Lippy, (had a blast yesterday) in Ks.
Lippy , it was good to meet you. And a great talk we had. Im lovin the car right now. Just need to sort this stuff out. But I think Im headed down the right road. I hope someone has video of it, so I can see how it looked. Oh , and I dare you to go "the smoker route" , ha,ha. And again great to talk to ya. brian
Don't tempt me..I have tubing!! Good job Brian. I'll stay in touch. Lippy Oh yeah, wouldn't that be cool, half track looking at each other through the tire smoke !!behind the tops of the tires!! YEEHAW!!
Yeah Lippy, Brian Fox is my !@#$in' HERO! Thanks for getting me up to date on the run at Mo-Kan too Brian! I'm not sure when you were making your pass, but we fired Satan on alcohol at around 3:30 pm on Saturday. Jensen wanted to warm it up on alcohol before we lit it on nitro. She fired perfectly and ran smooth as glass up on the stands. The !@#$in' thing was screaming and I could feel each cylinder fire past my head. It was beautiful. But, we lost oil pressure when we loaded it with nitro and had to abort everything. It seems the oil pump relief valve boss on the Titan pump cracked when we shut down after the alcohol warm up. Nothing else was hurt and it won't cost me any money, just some down time. We'll use the interim to prep the rest of the car and get it ready to push. We have video and I'll post it later! - Off to work... Here's part of the video... http://www.autoculture.org - Big thanks again to all who showed up. Nitro and push starts next!
Thank you, I have never seen that before. That is what I want to do with mine, when I get it all sorted out. Brian
Conder I have watched that videoagain and again......the maniac smile is contagious....the heart beating quick is emotional....and letting go of that throttle will be a feeling of power.....the g-force will capture you to do it over and over. I am happy for you bro.
Thanks! Yeah, it was great. When I was in the seat behind that screaming Donovan, it felt like my molecules were separating. The first thing that came to my mind was that technical lesson for shaping metal... "Okay, what you're doing is re-arranging the molecules of the steel...moving them around and evenly arranging them..." Towards the end though, when the flames were firing past my head and Pete was ramping everything up, I was breathing pretty much straight alcohol fumes. My ears were getting that spike pain in 'em I used to get firing my 60 and I kept seeing that one picture of Jungle Pam in my head...You know the one, where she's backing Jungle up and kind of turned to the side at the waist? With the sweepstakes milk dud thing happening? Yeah that picture, but in COLOR. Actually driving the car on nitro should be interesting.
HOLY SHIT, TIM! Congratulations! I think I had a smile as big as yours just watching the video. The only thing that could have been better is if this had happened back up in the NW so that I could have been there. Congratulations again, man! AWSOME!!! I do miss you you know!
Condor, The sH!%t eating grin on your face in that video says it all. Un F'n imaginable power under your right foot! Great video. You guys have definately got the right idea with these smokers. I'm a gnat's ass away from calling King Chassis myself. Only problem is that I've had two back operations since the mid 90's from driving these things. I've started calling some guys in this area that may remember something about the old tune ups. Always remember...No matter what happens, don't let off the gas. The crowd will think you're afraid. Seriously dude. Have a safe one.
THAT was !@#$ING BAD. You are absolutely right. Thanks Lippy!!!!!!!! No sweat CoupeMerc, the good thing about balls is...once you find 'em they're FREE. It's what you baste 'em with that's hard to find$$$$$$$$! Thanks Loogy, you're my bondo brother...And TMan, my 60 NEVER sounded that good! She never jammed either, let's hope that karma transfers over...
The Jalopy Journal
