John Force

16th Funny Car championship--what a tough ole bird! Hard for me to understand why Castrol and Ford sponsorship is going away??? John
 
16th Funny Car championship--what a tough ole bird! Hard for me to understand why Castrol and Ford sponsorship is going away??? John


Because except for special shows, the interest in drag racing is down and they don't get the return from the investment they once did.
 
John gets to go out as Champ as Ford and Castrol and his team part ways. Capps gets Keep wondering when it's going to happen. Hagen must be wondering if it was fluke as #1. Antron is going to have to settle for less than he wants. Massey is lucky to be still with DSR. I still got hand it to DSR for taking care of the Greek.
 
drag racing has become about 4-5 teams racing each other. If you're not associated with one of those teams, you don't get very far. The horrible decision to shorten the top fuel and funny car run lengths are a joke and computers have taken racing out of the mechanic's hands and made it more like "simulated" racing.
 
With only air valves to control the clutch. It takes a lot of guess work to make a Fuel Car make a quick pass. Places like English Town could not be run with Top Fuel Cars with there short tracks. With out these four or five teams and long with the other two or three Pro Stock Teams you would not have much real world companies wanted invest there AD dollars in Drag Racing. Guys like Del / Head / Big Jim Dunn don't even spend there own dollars on this stuff. Even Connie try's to limit his spending . There is only a few driver owners with bucks to do this on there own nickle . DSR is one << and he doesn't do it . And the racer who's name slips my mind, that sold all his gas wells near a billion dollars. It's about getting to finish line with tires and wings intact and drivers safe. I guess you could say only big teams win, F1 / NASCAR / INDY / CARS all have same issues. That's why we pull for little teams / under funded teams / go gettem divers.
 
Drag Racing

That's guy PD . As you well know these two groups are carrying NHRA right now. It would great to have smaller teams run. But that will take some heavy dollars even at a limited schedule . Vintage fueler guys are even killing them selfs with dollars too.
 
With only air valves to control the clutch. It takes a lot of guess work to make a Fuel Car make a quick pass
How do these air valves control the clutch that make it so easy to do ???
Maybe things have changed in 3 years
Last time I checked out the clutches they were basically centrifugal with fingers at different heights and weights but used a hydraulic cannon to hold the fingers from engaging. The cannon moved back allowing the fingers to move out and apply the clutch. IIRC 12 stages and the air only controlled when the cannon moved . You still needed to have the whole clutch package correct or it would lockup to soon or slip to much.
 
Alexis Dejoria's team is financed by her father, billionaire John Paul Dejoria (Paul Mitchell hair products and Patron Spirits )
 
With only air valves to control the clutch. It takes a lot of guess work to make a Fuel Car make a quick pass
How do these air valves control the clutch that make it so easy to do ???
Maybe things have changed in 3 years
Last time I checked out the clutches they were basically centrifugal with fingers at different heights and weights but used a hydraulic cannon to hold the fingers from engaging. The cannon moved back allowing the fingers to move out and apply the clutch. IIRC 12 stages and the air only controlled when the cannon moved . You still needed to have the whole clutch package correct or it would lockup to soon or slip to much.
Top Fuel clutch is basically a centrifugal clutch, that has a pedal. There are a number of "fingers/levers" on the pressure plate that are weighted differently and are different height and lengths. When the RPM of the engine goes up and the clutch speeds up with it the centrifugal force on the fingers, which are mounted like a lever apply more pressure to the pressure plate reducing the clutch slip. The higher the RPM goes, the more counterweight force is transferred to the pressure plate.

There is a "ram" that stops the fingers from releasing and applying pressure, this ram is controlled pneumatically (I think is bleeds air pressure) and is activated when the throttle is hit on the line. Keep in mind that when a Top Fule/Funny Car is on the line fully staged, the clutch pedal is already out and the clearance of the clutch plates allows it to slip and the driver can hold the car still on the brake.

When the driver hits the throttle the RPM of the engine goes up drastically and the fingers/levers on the pressure plate that are not stopped by the ram apply more pressure to the clutch and drive the car forward. The ram moves at a predetermined rate and allows more and more fingers to apply pressure as the car goes down the track causing it to eventually be at 1:1 with the engine.

In simple terms, it is like taking off in 5th gear with a standard transmission, but instead of gradually releasing the clutch pedal with your foot to apply more and more pressure to the clutch, the slippage is controlled by the "ram" allowing more and more pressure to be applied to the clutch. I think that covers it .
 
Small teams in any major racing league don't get very far against the big money sponsor funded teams. It's pretty depressing if you ask me. JMHO
 
"Sportsman" racing is 'Where-it-is' in drag racing! (You loose a whole lot LESS money there) Unfortunitely, the PRO circuit is just another 'Barnum and Bailey Traveling Circus'....like Nascar. IE: SOS! :) Actually, the '1000ft' deal is a GOOD thing for everybody, except...Pro-Stock!
 
Sportsman" racing is 'Where-it-is' in drag racing back bone of all of NHRA. Lots thinkers in these classes 4-6-8 Inlines / Flat Four / V-6 / V-8 / V-10 Carbs / Injection / Turbo's / NOS / Blowers / Pump Gas/ Alky / Race Gas. Top Fuel they tell you How big / What kind / How much PSI / What Gear / How Big a Pump / How much Mag you can run / How much fuel max you can run / They throw you chutes for you when you go boom/ Got to love those little boxes to help you not go boom. One the Top of the Pop's for Alki guys is Frank Manzo over a hundred Wally on the shelf. Just like John Force got written off and comes charging back to win his final championship to end his run in NHRA as driver.
 
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