When they started giving the reaction time around 1984, the electronics revolution began. There is really no policing it any more, I'm sure the new cars with launch control and traction control could have a feature that would allow it to run 12.000 every time.

Many years ago I heard a fairly high up NHRA person say that the gorilla in the room was the transbrake. Outlaw those and the rest of this stuff is useless. He was probably right. He still works for them and has a fairly high position in the company.

Every divisional or national event I've ever been to I see the NHRA plugging into random racers ignition systems. They police it, believe me! The digital ignitions like the 7530T have a limp mode in them that only NHRA can reset. Barring some MSD employee or electronics wizard. If you try to cheat with that box, the car won't run and then NHRA will want to know why the car won't run. There are some shake/spin, on and off the throttle situations that will put these into limp mode. The crank trigger pick up came loose on my buddy's T/S car and the box sensed something being manipulated and went into limp mode. This is how we found out that NHRA and ONLY NHRA could reset it. It's really quite the feat to work on a car and work on a car and get it to repeat. It's amazing how fast some of these cars are and will repeat within .010. It comes from a lot of hard work and experience. If you get caught cheating, it won't be the NHRA doing the "policing". Get with guys who know how to race and learn from them. Better yet, go to a bracket race and sit at the finish line and watch all the shenanigans going on down there. 6-7 times out of 10 you have to look at the scoreboard to see who won.

I approach racing like this .
I run no box through choice . if box was allowed I would go there .
Better not bring a knife to a gun fight

Tex

I will add that I believe he does not even have a race car or may have never even driven one down the track

A box is just a tool, nothing more, nothing less. If your car is inconsistent or you can't hit the tree with a shovel, all a box will do for you is drain your wallet.

Well all I can say is wow... thank you to most of the responses.. I hit the tree pretty good as of late I really think I need more seat time with this comb but it’s getting upgraded this year so going to be different again next year. So I was debating running a box because I’m going to put a t-brake in this year .. just interested in knowing more about box racing and most of the guys I hang out with are no box guys .. thanks John

LOL, yeah, I was wondering when you were going to come back and see the monster you created...Good luck with whatever you decide and you are correct about seat time...either footbraking or delay box, there is no substitute for seat time

Its simply a different game running box over no box. The BIGGEST thing you will find if you decide to make the switch is that the MOV in Box racing is usually much much tighter than in no box. I have done both and the MOV numbers in box are simply much closer on an average basis. Also you will generally find faster cars in box than no box, which adds another variable especially if you are one of the faster no box guys. You wont win a lot of rounds in box racing being "sloppy" on the tree and not keeping it close up top. Just as when you ad a stop and try running .90 stuff the margins just get that much closer on an average basis. You have to be good at both ends to turn on win lights.

Talked to a buddy yesterday who is a novice Slant racer. He's made a total of 20 passes so far. His lights are all over the place, because he hasn't made many passes. He got canned by a Box car in Clay City. Box guy had an .049 light. Buddy decides he needs a box now and bought a used one off E-bay to run with 4 wheel line locs. He told me he'd never be able to cut good lights footbraking.

I told him the biggest flaw in his theory is he's already convinced himself he can't do it, followed closely by thinking a box will fix his issues.

I'm not a Box racer. But I have been fairly successful foot braking in No Box. The principles are the same. Cut a decent light, determine your finish line strategy, and see what happens. Even in No box the lights are getting tighter and tighter. Not uncommon to see .0X lights and.1X packages. My average light was .030 this year. Only 6 of them beyond .05 all year. Still plenty of room for improvement but getting closer. A brake won't help you at the stripe. There are a lot of racers pretty good at the tree. The other end separates to good from the best.
Doug

I'm a 'box' racer at the starting line and a 'foot braker' at the finish line.

Around here the three main classes are essentially: line lock, trans brake and delay box. The trans brake just allows a driver to rev the engine above the torque converter stall speed without pushing the front tires through the lights, if you feel the need. The delay box just allows the driver to react to an earlier bulb if you think that will help you.

If anyone out there thinks some kind of device will make them a good racer, forget it. Whatever class you choose to run will have everyone using the same rules. If you know what you're doing you should be able to have success in any class. A couple of good topics that could be started are How to cut consistent lights and How to tune and run the car to produce consistent ET's. Once you've got those figured out, driving the stripe gets a LOT easier.

Possibly not so much today but most of your GOOD older box racers were once GOOD foot brake racers. Lol they won without and they win with. Box is just another tool in the toolbox that tightens up your package. You still have to be consistent and have a good car.

Everyone starts with no box. That's how it works. Add a trans. brake? On a good 10.00 or 9 sec.car? I was good for about two races, then the five foot long button happened. Then the long, plastic button on the steering wheel was cooked into a "J" while the wheel basked in the sun on the dash at Famoso. It's tough to leave on the last amber and not go red. And then the work begins...

FWIW I started my son in Super Pro(box). Didn't see the point of starting him anywhere else since his goal was to run fast and eventually get into S/C. We approached it the same way we did with sports. I played college basketball and he had offers to play college baseball. So we took the same approach to racing. We "played up" in the beginning.

Having started in Pro for me and only spending two years there before I moved on I saw no practical reason to start him there. When he was young and had had an affinity for baseball and was a very good player we moved him up with older kids at 9. He played with the 12 year olds. It was a very rough start for him then but it paid off well in the following years. He was forced to get better as he like his father has a competitive streak. Same thing in HS, he decided to try a new position for him as the Varsity team only had one returning catcher left. Same hard start but by the 5th game of the year he was the starter as a freshman. So throwing him to the S/P "wolves" so to speak made the most sense to us. Same thing happened his first year he took a lot of lumps and learned a lot of valuable lessons and got schooled plenty. We tossed him into the big dollar stuff right away. No softballs for him. But he approached it just like baseball. Learn something every pass in the car. He spent a lot of time with me at the finish line watching what was going on and learning the sport. Year two he began winning more and more rounds. By the end of year two he has three wins under his belt. I only see more good things for him. He has been paid compliments for his driving ability for friends of mine who I have the utmost respect for in the racing community. I think starting him off and tasking the same approach we used with sports has paid off. Before he got in the dragster last year he had never raced ANYTHING. Had he entered the points here this year he would have finished 3rd and been in the ROC at the ET Finals. So I think we have made the correct choice. Now everything is apart and the car is getting a remake in hopes he can carry this only to run S/C maybe the end of next year.

Sorry for the long post but proud of what the kid has accomplished. I think approaching this stuff analytically and frame of mind go along way.

The only thing I have to add here are the lessons I have learned racing my daughter in Jr. Dragsters the past 4 years. Racing Jrs is as pure foot brake bracket racing as it gets. She is a very consistent driver and cuts lights like I have never seen. In the past 4 years she has stacked up 8 .000 lights, as well as a slew of .00x and .0xx lights. The trick to being consistent is STAGING, STAGING and STAGING. You can not cut consistent lights NO MATTER WHAT without being consistent in the stage.

I know Jr racing is not Big Car racing, but it is the purest from of bracket racing. She can cut a light and drive the line. She has placed top 5 the past 4 years with culminating in the Championship this year at Numidia. We have won well over 30 events in total over 4 years and placed in the semis and quarter finals twice as many times. Whenever she is having issues on the tree it is always the stage. What has worked best for us is using a properly configured PortaTree to stay "warm" when not racing. You need to have it configured with the proper rollout which is very important if you want to cut good lights in the car.

Just my .02 from the past years coaching a very good and respected driver....

There are some great comments here, but the common thread is "how to cut a better light". In the old days there was a fantastic magazine called Bracket Racing USA (BRUSA). It dealt solely with bracket racing, and offered tons of excellent advice for beginners, which I was at the time. Important factors like staging exactly the same every time, running the exact same air pressure every run, making sure to hit your shift points on a run, and "leaving with the same RPM" all stuck with me. This magazine taught me to keep a log book for all my runs. It also taught me that purchasing a practice tree is cheaper than taking your car to the track to tune your launch practices. I used to attempt make 100 wins on the practice tree every night. I would track my wins vs. losses. I found that as I got better on the tree, my only losses were a very rare slow light, and mostly they were due to going red. Funny thing...in the beginning I tried to cut a .500 light (that's .000 to you young guns). That caused me to go red a lot. It showed in my practice results as well as my actual racing. The practice tree that I used came pre-set to give a win at .530 (.030 today). I found that if I tried to cut a .015 light, I would still go green if I was a bit early, and if I was a bit late, I was still better than .030. .030 lights win lots of rounds. The best advice I could give anyone on here...get a practice tree. I'll be lurking to see what else pops up here.

On your deal with them little bitty front tires, they will punish the driver every time they stage different
Lots of variables on the car and driver that need a lot of attention and work to make a good driver good

Man Al! That's great thinking and parenting by the way. You did Dad right and it shows in your family. Steven's been sending it! To the machine shop...
Practice tree is great but those buttons are nothing like what you have in a car and can throw you for a loop. I guess you could get a full size tree and actually suit up and practice in the car if you had the correct tree distance.
A few JR's I've seen actually have to have a little disc around the outside of the wheel. The spoke rims are so close to the ground that the beam breaks when it's rolling in, turning on the top light, then it goes out because the little thing goes under the beam. Really confuses the kids sometimes. So, yeah, staging is ultra important no matter the size of the front tire.

Dave, you can reset a 7530t box by hooking it to 12 volts for 12 hours. By then the weekend is shot, as you said, a loose crank trigger sensor can cause it to go into limp-in. Ask me how I know.