Dragster length

DIESEL_POWER said:
With a real drag clutch you cant do that with out over heating the clutch.... you just slip the rest of the way down track.

Now a sled pulling clutch like what darren and schieds use, is a different approach and works for them, but i dont make the TQ they do @ 70-100+ psi of boost at launch, so i couldent get that to work eather.

The clutch cars in a diesel will never be as consistent as a convertor car. Clutch car will be faster. so there is good and bad with both
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Truer words never spoken. We had issues with a lock up 47 RE in the dragster, and had to wait til way down track for lockup. Too much tire shake or shudder.

Our car seemed to like no more than 3 gears, load the heck out of it. The real trick would be a dual stall converter, one at 5000 for launch and then kick to a 2200 or so down track. The Bruno can do that . It is probably the best overall deal, just rtricky and expensve.
 
dieseldragster said:
Truer words never spoken. We had issues with a lock up 47 RE in the dragster, and had to wait til way down track for lockup. Too much tire shake or shudder.

Our car seemed to like no more than 3 gears, load the heck out of it. The real trick would be a dual stall converter, one at 5000 for launch and then kick to a 2200 or so down track. The Bruno can do that . It is probably the best overall deal, just rtricky and expensve.
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I know what you mean, I hated that high gear shift because thats where the traction problem usually happened for me and it came around 450-500 feet out. It was much better on passes where Id leave in second on the foot brake then pull high just out of the gate, it loaded the hell out of the engine and really pulled hard, the extra load just about made up for the little bit lazier it was from coming out on the 1.41 gear rather than the 2.41, the reason Id didnt do it all of the time was just wanting to leave on the brake for consistancy. It'd e.t. about the same either way but a low gear launch gave 1.16-1.18 60's and second more like 1.22-1.26. Best combo If I could have got there would be a built SuperGlide with a bell that would ecept my proven 13.5" convertor. I could never find a bell that would house larger than a 11" unit at the time. A 1.80 then 1:1 would have been perfect for me in the Altered if a bell could be had to fit my big ass convertor, I tryed a glide and a 11" convertor and absolutly hated a convertor that loose and unefficent with the kind of low speed torque that I built with my combo....
Ryan
 
Michael said:
There is currently ONE Bruno out there with lockup ability (custom built and in DirtyMax). For anyone interested, Brad has been willing to discuss details on how he did it. It works pretty dang slick, it is loose enough that I can get the chargers spooled but locks up solid.

Wade - are you running a clutch in your truck?
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There is one more lockup Bruno out there and it's custom built and in a Duramax powered tube chassis truck..
 
DIESEL_POWER said:
The clutch cars in a diesel will never be as consistent as a convertor car. Clutch car will be faster. so there is good and bad with both
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That seems to be a pretty true statement. Personally I would rather have consistent results but I also see how a guy can want to go as fast as possible.
 
Michael said:
There is currently ONE Bruno out there with lockup ability (custom built and in DirtyMax). For anyone interested, Brad has been willing to discuss details on how he did it.
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Brad's setup in the dirtymax is pretty much what I think would be an ideal tranny combo, possibly the two stall speed if the difference between the stall speeds can be made to fit the needs of a diesel setup.
 
stock600 said:
I know what you mean, I hated that high gear shift because thats where the traction problem usually happened for me and it came around 450-500 feet out. It was much better on passes where Id leave in second on the foot brake then pull high just out of the gate, it loaded the hell out of the engine and really pulled hard, the extra load just about made up for the little bit lazier it was from coming out on the 1.41 gear rather than the 2.41, the reason Id didnt do it all of the time was just wanting to leave on the brake for consistancy. It'd e.t. about the same either way but a low gear launch gave 1.16-1.18 60's and second more like 1.22-1.26. Best combo If I could have got there would be a built SuperGlide with a bell that would ecept my proven 13.5" convertor. I could never find a bell that would house larger than a 11" unit at the time. A 1.80 then 1:1 would have been perfect for me in the Altered if a bell could be had to fit my big ass convertor, I tryed a glide and a 11" convertor and absolutly hated a convertor that loose and unefficent with the kind of low speed torque that I built with my combo....
Ryan
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Funny story time:

1. I still have a Powerglide and GV setup spare that did not go with the last dragster sale. It is a 1.80 ratio. That still was the best setup overall for us. The 727 Torqueflite was good, but the tranny brake never released as hard as a Glide does. The 47 RE ATS billet killer deal with Clints's hand built tranny brake had the same issue. Slow release time, and killed 60' times. He worked his a** off making it as good as it was, but for a light car, the lock up was not needed even down track.

2. We tested at least 10 different people's converters. No kidding. That is a black art, blacksmith stuff. The best? Again, Clint at ATS (Shawn actually, their converter guy) built a 11" allison core and a spare when we first started. No needly bearing billet crap, just simple stuff. Still was the best ever. We tried to duplicate it later after destroying the stator in Indy, and could never find the magic. On the starting line, Dustin whacked it to spool,. and when the stator let go, it locked the trans solid, launching the car, redlighting against John Robinson. It he had been able to get the car to shift, he would have run a killer pass.

3. I has a guy at Don Prudhommes trade me a few parts for some diesel stuff. One was a staged set of air timers for a slider clutch. Still have it. Put a air cannon on a 3,4 or 5 disk top fuel clutch, and apply air pressure to slowly lock the clutch up from slipping to full lock set up like a John Force car. Again, still on the shelf in the garage. NEver had the time to build it all and test it.

4. Converter sizing. Some people that I know and have run fast with as little as a 9" converter. We ran a 11", 12", 13", and even still have a 10.5" caddilac with billet stator laying in the garage. The secret lies in one thing. Nope, not the size, not the stator, not the blade angle. Well all of that, but here is one hard learned secret - - TRANS FLUID!

5. Tranny fluid. Sure, we all did the B&M trick shift. Big deal. No effect. Then I ran stock ATS 10W red dyed oil. (OK, there is a bit of differing additives, but so what for 7 seconds). Go buy some 10W, 20W 30W, 40 W and 50W synthetic screw compressor oil. A tranny that worked great for us at Pomona at 7.98 had so stiff of a converter at Denver, it would not light. We started changing oils and it makes a 500-750 RPM change in converters.

OK guys, my beer is dry, time to go to the fridge. Now that I am retired, the secrets mean nothing to me.

Although, Dustin and I talked today. A Common rail, Procharger belt drive, Hy55 variable charger, Glide, GV, Stiff converter in a 2500 pound something to stay stuck, and we may have to dig in the junkyard again for one last spin at this.

Merry Christmas all!
 
Ya I found the same simular thing when I Kept burning up reg. atf, the stuff is junk really. I didnt know how bad it was tell Rossler req. me going to a premium Hydro Fluid at my torque level. I used either John Deere or the best grade Tractor Supply stuff and thier both great, worlds apart from any ATF. I noticed also when I made the change that the stall speed lowered maybe a couple hundred rpm which was also nice. I also tried every known convertor guy around at the time I was running the glide and had I believe it was 9 diff. ones built all in 11" and none was good enough to keep and race. I blew most of them up in the shop, the stators would literally just fly apart. When Id pull a convertor, I could pour out the stator, what was left of the bearings and all other hard part internals. Even Art Carr's 11" didnt make it to the track it broke in the shop along with TCI's 11", neil chance's, the convertor shop's, Neno's, Perf. Torque Convertors in Kennadle, and a couple others that I cant come up with thier names. I determined it was not even almost poss. to do with a 11" unit. Things changes greatly when I went with a 13.5" unit though, its based also off of the big Ally and allows for a huge stator, pump, and bowl this allowed me to be able to get the stall down low enough to work with my power band and being that tight made it very eff. on the big end. I spoke with Chad R. at the Topeka race he also runs a big 13" unit but uses Coan, Id bet his convertor is every bit as good as the one's I use. Diff. is I believe his is a lot looser than mine but it obviously works well. Some say I was doing it all wrong but my 60's in the mid 1. teens says it was working fine; just prob. harder on parts.
You mentioned you had ran a 13" unit.... in what case was this in if you were still refering to your glide, or bellhousing I should say?
Ryan
 
That was in either the 47 re or the torqueflite cannot remember. The stator issue is typical. Aluminum , espescially cast ones, will die behind a diesel. I had a guy doing chrome moly ones. That's what's in the dragsters now in Australia. It's also what the spare in the garage has.
 
rockjeep73 said:
There is one more lockup Bruno out there and it's custom built and in a Duramax powered tube chassis truck..
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I knew I should have qualified that with "that I know of" at the end ;)

Sooooo - whose truck is it? Now that you mention it I think I remember someone telling me about this one.
 
Fluids

That's funny Ryan your the first guy that has talked about the Tractor Supply Hyd. fluid! I have run it for years in my gasser stuff. I want to run it in my Ally but i'm not sure what it will do with shift timing. It is/was a Rossler secret that works very well!! Sometimes it's the simplest stuff that makes a differance.
 
dieseldragster said:
That was in either the 47 re or the torqueflite cannot remember. The stator issue is typical. Aluminum , espescially cast ones, will die behind a diesel. I had a guy doing chrome moly ones. That's what's in the dragsters now in Australia. It's also what the spare in the garage has.
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I hear ya and agree on the cast stators that seems to be what nearly everyone was using even the guys selling the super expensive pieces. These people were interested though in trying to make it work and most sent me thier built convertor to try, when it failed I just sent it back in pieces and moved to the next vendor. Every time you trash a convertor that bad, it makes a hell of a mess in the tranny to that takes a lot of time and effort to clean up and make run ready again. It was a ton of work to break so many parts. My latest convertors do use a custom billet stator that seems to hold up well though. The huge issue with the 11" units wasnt even the breaking that could have been addressed with a stronger stator, the real prob. was not being able to get down to a resonable stall speed with that small of a stator/bowl assembley. With a 13" piece is was acually poss. to get it to tight, so tight I couldnt light it... like 800/1000 'true stall' tight.
 
DIESEL_POWER said:
You talking about steve coles ride? TTS.
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That's the one I had heard about. Should we start a pool to bet on which one makes it to the track first between his, Mike Woods' dragster, and Comp461's dragster? I know where my money would be ;)
 
Michael said:
That's the one I had heard about. Should we start a pool to bet on which one makes it to the track first between his, Mike Woods' dragster, and Comp461's dragster? I know where my money would be ;)
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The real for those two will be who can alienate themselves more while telling everyone how to built their car when they have yet to prove any of their concepts. It'll never work they both tried that years ago!

I would love to see the SC bif GH deathmatch!
 
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