Whats the most practical means of/sustem for pulling timing at the launch?

I have spent a lot of time balancing power/launch on 275 radials... I can tell you there is NO room between dead hook and complete tire annihilation... Lol

Wize..........

I guess what I honestly don't get is all this scientific stuff when frankly the vehicle you are trying to make work is a toy,
It's the last thing on the planet that is designed to be a consistent drag car.
Cool... Heck yes..... Something to get grey hair over trying to make work when it's pretty likely it will never be consistent or repeatable without scads of money being thrown at it..... Likely not...
That all said.... Carry on..... Lol

Yeah, it's always been a toy, a distraction, its a fun and unique toy though!

I'll try to add some weight, worst case I'll throw a higher gear in it. I really like the way it pulls with the new cam, it's what the heads needed. I also discovered it likes to rev higher than it did before, it seems to peak around 6600 and I shift it at 7000.

Always best to move weight from one end to the other than simply adding weight. But you are likely limited with such a short car.

AS for timing the MSD Grid is the bomb for that and a bunch of other stuff as well. Problem is pulling timing may make things even worse unless you pull enough to completely kill and and watch the ET go with it.

It is easy MORE POWER....Now where is that nitrous smiley???

Drag radials have to dead hook if you have any slippage they go up in smoke , bias plys are a different story.

Not gonna throw away the hook, I prefer the stability of the Drag Radials over a bias Ply slick with the short wheelbase. Not gonna throw the baby out with the bathwater.

Next time out I think I might try to quick shift around 30-40 feet out before the nose gets too high, I'm so used to leaving the line with both hands on the wheel it will take some getting used to.

I might also drop the 4.10 and try a 3.73 I don't think the motors' gonna care on the big end the torque is so flat and the Powerband is so linear.

There's a place right below the bumper where the frame rails jutt out, its designed for a bolt on push bar so it will be real easy to staddle a stack of ~1 1/2" x 3/8" x 3' long steel plates right across, I'll start there and add bars until the nose stays below the 'event horizon', lol

Plus it adds a little more rigidity, each bar will weigh about 5-6 pounds and i can always bolt more steel or lead weight to it if need be.

Ill figure it out, I always do, eventually

Anything less than 50lbs as far forward and low as you can get it....is probably a waste of time

Move the engine forward 2 inches.

Once I have the plate system up front I can fasten (bolt in) more weights to them, I plan to start around +50 pounds before the next time I stage it. I just like the modular/stackable way I can adjust it this way. Flatbar is cheap (I have plenty of it around too) and lends itself to mass assembly techniques.


Moving the motor further up would put the radiator outside the grille

the sketch is fairly accurate BTW. The CG is right above the front leaf spring eye.

I could always swap this 414 motor in the Valliant Wagon and put the Iron w2 Head 440 in this one, that'll be 45-50 pounds right there. Don't think I haven't thought of it.

Can you lower the whole car?

Just to be safe, it wouldn't hurt to keep an eye on the front end alignment after you start moving weight around and/or lowering it. Your vehicle has a shorter wheelbase than the infamous Dodge Colts that many complained were a handful as a race car.

I was running a 5.14 gear a couple of years ago and broke them (9 in ). I bought another center out of a truck with 3.50 gears and put a mini spool in it and I only lost a half of a tenth in the 1/8. It was in the 60 ft. and I crossed the finish line in second gear but still gained 1 mph (108 vs 109)It did not pull the wheels half as high.

Im going to try to add about 40 pounds essentially right below the bumper bracket, i could also reinstall the locking hubs that weight about 3 1/2 pounds each to the hubs. I just want to get it where it will hike the wheels about a foot so i can at least still see over the hood long enough to shift to second.

The rear gear and tire seem perfect and with the 9 1/2" 4000 stall converter it launch like a dream, just a little slow ( high 1.6's) for as much motor as i have. The 8" seems to stall around 5200 and its a whole nudder animal, in a similar weight duster it'd be going mid 10's all day long.

Thanks myron, the car goes straight as a rail down the track, I know that suprises people but it does. The 40 pounds will really asd no more weight than the old iron head 318 that was in it to begin with.

Refresh my memory, using the rear axle as the pivot point of the seesaw with an imaginary 6' length to the end, adding 20 pounds at the 6' point is equivalent to adding 40 pounds at the 3' point in terms of balance. Of course I am also moving the static CG forward (away from the axle)

I've reinstalled the floating hubs and the spindle shafts, that's an easy 13 pounds but it's going to add rolling resistance, but it's only 5 minutes to remove them again if it works off the line, I've also added close to 30 pounds directly in front of the radiator and I can add more if the hub weight helps...I just don't want to add any more than is absolutely neccesary. I guess we'll see the next time out.

Decided while I'm adding weight to the front I would go ahead and build a chin spoiler, is there any "rule of thumb" degree of angle for the spoiler" it'll be roughly 5" x 54".

I think I'm going to take some gear out of it too, go from 4.10 to 3.73 since with the low gear 904 I have the equivalent of a 4.56:1 if I had the standard trans ratio. I'm hoping improving the aero (even slightly) on the big end will cut some of the drag down, as bad as the Rocky is (.65+ Cd where a Duster is about .5), anything sensible might be an improvement.

Quick (partial clip-found a nice lady willing to Email it to me) of the 11.14 @ 122 Second gear launch run, 1.63 is "on the right track" and tells me the 3.73 might make for a decent launch vs the 4.10 "low earth orbit" wheelie trajectory. I got on the 6400 limiter (twice -set for the old lower lift cam) before the 330 and again at the stripe so this probably might have wanted to be a 10.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ywZATfTxlKs

What kind of springs are in the front? If they are 4 cylinder springs they are going to be mushy and are really going to let the front rise fast, maybe you could get a lot stiffer one if thats the case and not have to add weight.

Adding weight to a race car always seems backwards to me.

Dave,

It has T bars just like a Mopar, i could stiffen them but that raises the height and the CG with it, im not adding a lot of weight just enough to keep the launch controllable

Tightening the adjustment does not make the spring stiffer, it raises the vehicle and decreases the extension from a static position... Not what I am thinking, you would need a thicker bar and then adjust it down to maintain the same ride height, that would reduce how fast the suspension rises and probably how high it rises. The thicker bar would probably help stability at the fast end of the track also.