Yes I'm planning on it, but two things could keep me away.

1) Work - some weekends I need to stay in Columbus OH with my teams. So far those are just planned for Feb 2/3 and Mar 2/3. Unless things get hectic I should be OK for now.

2) Weather - I imagine snow, rain, etc makes the dragstrip a funky run.


Dex - good idea on the ECU. Could some folks showing up for this event please DON'T reset your ECU until after a couple of runs. We can gather some real documented evidence on the difference it makes.

 

Sounds good guys - I'll try to be there.

 

I'm hoping to get a chance to go out and get some quartermile Gtech readings on my car before this meet to get an idea of how accurate the Gtech is.

I've never been to a dragway other than watching John Force on TV - does anyone have a good explanation on the way the lights work to get a good launch? I haven't done any research yet myself, so if I find anything I'll post it here.

 

the tree that we will be on is full tree. the yellow lights are staggered .5 sec before the green comes on. so a perfect reaction time is .5, near impossible. so the trick is to leave right after the yellow comes on. if you wait till the green, your time will suck, almost .5 sec added to your time..........which is alot. this info is from my brother, the evil dragger. but it has been corroborated on the net. hope this helps. see you down there.


Doc

 

Hey guys,

I'm glad to see you getting together at a track instead of a parking lot. Getting ###'s to back up some theories will be great. My dad drag raced a 1400cc supercharged, fuel injected funnybike about a decade ago and I loved going to the track with him. OK, enough nostalgia. I found this little "blurb" from a webpage I found. It will help those of you that have never raced with actual staging lights. I'll try to find more info. Have a great time!!!

DON'T REDLIGHT!!!!

Josh

"Where you stage your car on the starting line has a direct impact on your reaction time and your E.T and thus affects both your dial-in and your tactics. Reaction time is important and critical to winning races. In order to cut a consistent light, you need to stage your car at the exact same point in relation to the starting line lights. The animation shows the normal staging procedure. You roll forward, lighting the top or prestage light on the christmas tree. Rolling forward another six inches lights the second or stage light on the christmas tree. At that point, you bring the rpm's up and after a few seconds the starter will start the race. The three amber lights will come down, showing the green and you launch.

Shallow staging is rolling the car forward until it just breaks the beams and lights the stage light. The object of shallow staging is to get a rolling start at the green light. It takes about 2 tenths to-3 tenths of a second for the car to react and roll the front tires through the light beams at the start. This is known as rollout time. Ideally, you want to launch the car before the green light comes on. The time to launch is the sum of your rollout time and your personal reaction time. If your reaction time is .030 seconds and your rollout time is .20 second then you want to launch your car .030+.20 or .230 seconds exactly as the green light comes on. This would be a perfect light.

As long as your front tires block the beams on the starting line, (about a 10 to 12 inch distance span) you can stage your car in various positions. The further or deeper you roll your car into the lights, the more your reaction time decreases. Why? Because the car has less distance to move forward before crossing the starting line. The trade off is that you get less of a rolling start at the lights and your E.T increases. This will affect your dial-in so the smart racer will know to add time to the dial if he plans to stage a little deeper then normal. If you think you really need to "push" the light for reaction time, then this is a tactic to try. This tactic takes experience and practice because the rollout varies with tire diameter and air pressure."

 

Thanks guys.

Found a good website to describe some thoughts on how to get a good launch with some excellent descriptive graphics that describe the pre-stage, stage and launch w/ a full tree. Here's a link--> http://www.staginglight.com/guide/react.html

 

I may be able to make it to the feb 23rd meet you guys have been talking about. Is there a nitrous refill station and a 111/110 octance race fuel pump available in the area? Or are these available at the track?

 

I'm going to start doing sme research of my own as well on subjects like:

"What to bring to the dragstrip"
"A newbies first dragstrip experience"

You know, like a cooler of ice with some big ziplock backs for the manifold between runs; that kind of stuff.

Anybody have a top 10 list off the top of their head?

 

Things to bring to the track:

1) WATER for yourself
2) Ice for your engine
3) Videocamera/Camera
4) AAA Card in case you bust something (and are not a pro racer)
5) Tool kit to remove stuff you dont need while making a pass (i.e. air filter, airbox, whatever)

 

Hmmm race fuel.

Has anyone tried a partial tank of race gas in a GS (or even octane boost)? I know too much of too high an octane is not good unless you've got the cam and compression to take advantage of it. It seems to me, however, that our cars should be smart enough to advance the timing a bit to give us a little more ooomph if the octane level supports it with no detonation issues... maybe a 1/4 tank mixture of 101 and 3/4 tank 93 octane.

MCElligot - I'm working just up the road in Columbus as I type this... Not sure which way you would drive, but if you come through Charlotte we should try to caravan down. How fast is your ES? Do you have mods to take advantage of the race fuel beyond the NO2 shot? How fast have you run previously?

Since this is February, do you think we'll need to cool our engines as much as if it were summer?

 

sick, i may try to get up there on sat or sun. promised my girl i would take her to the High Museum this weekend, so i will have to try to squeeze it in. ive been there before, so ipretty much know the setup. plenty of room to put our cars in a collective area. we would need to get there sorta early as to "post up" on a spot, i would think. if memory serves me correctly, i seem to have seen a gas station right as you turn in that sells hi-oc fuel, although i dont think that i will partake. octane booster may be about as much as i would want to do. dave, is your girl gonna bring her ac? cnat believe its already feb. oh well, lets make it happen. holla!


Doc


'Heels 87 Duke 84..........you saw it here first!!!!!!

 

I havent been to the track since the nitrous, my best run was a 16.3 (stock) in really hot conditions. I'm shooting for the high 14's this season. I dont have any other race fuel enhancing mods really, i just like to run some on race day.

 

I think I'll stay with regular gas; I'd think it would add to your authenticity since you'd be running regular gas on the street.

Same thing with leaving in the spare, full tank of gas, you know, real world conditions.

I dunno. Maybe a couple of runs with real world conditions, then a couple of not real, just to see the variance.

 

She's not sure yet, I think she'd much rather take the NSX on a road course than a dragway. Also thinking that she'd have more fun riding in the car with me rather than following each other on the highway driving down.

I'm still trying to convince her, I'd like for her to get more experience with some high-rev hard launches (and I'd like to try hers on the track as well).

Her new Tubi exhaust came today, but neither of us are in town to get it put on. Not sure if she'll have it on before the event either (which would probably sway her towards driving down, too).

 

Dave,

Got your email regarding Feb 23rd in Atlanta. Sounds like fun .


Tony