Fastest speed on pavement with gas

[Franklin]

In April of 1995, I watched Joe Law clock 255 mph with his C/Blown Gas Lakester (370 cubic inch turbocharged big block) during an East Coast Timing Association land speed trials meet at Moultrie, Georgia. By about 2 or 3 mph, that beats the 252 mph speed attained with a Peugeot at the 1988 Le Mans. Law's approximately 3,200 pound car still with its Bonneville gearing was clocked through a 132-foot trap at the end of a standing mile.

[Peter Mallett]

And. What is your point here Mr F?

[yelwoci]

Yawn
Here we go again.
Mind you Franklin Peugot did quite well even by you standards with a 200cu in engine (PM I think that right 3.5L V10 NA?) and did it twice every 3 mins for 24 hours.

Thats nearly 1000 30-220mph sprints in one day. Some drivers even do 3 hour stints.
And they do it in the rain, and at night, and with cars 100mph slower.
About 32 gear changes/lap or average one per 6 secs, approx 14,000 in all (Equivalent to 300 days driving in normal use floor shifter sedan).
Braking about 15 times a lap probably applying 300lbs at the pedal and the 2000lb car slowing from 220mph to 40mph at the Mulsanne Corner every lap. OK they change pads and drivers several times...but this awesome...and people don't even compare F1 to Le Mans, let alone anything Sedan based.

Come on Franklin, even you've got to be impressed.
Mr Panoz is, Chrysler are, GM(Cadillar & Chevrolet) are, Riley & Scott are..............


IanC

[KC]

Franklin, do you think that Joe Law went out with the express purpose of showing those Peugeot engineers just how it is to be done? Do you think his goal was to show the world that C/Blown Gas Lakesters are better than any other race car? I seriously doubt it. His goal was to set a new record for C/Blown Gas Lakester. I doubt he ever really considered what Peugeot did a few years ago.

[Franklin]

The point, KC, is that too many people have no clue about what context in which to place speeds such as the 251 mph attained by the Peugeot because they have such a tunnel vision view of motorsports they have no knowledge whatsoever of what might have been accomplished elsewhere.

[Sparky]

Some of the closest racing I've ever seen had a Vmax of less than 70mph.

And they went around corners too!

[TimD]

Originally posted by Franklin
The point, KC, is that too many people have no clue about what context in which to place speeds such as the 251 mph attained by the Peugeot because they have such a tunnel vision view of motorsports they have no knowledge whatsoever of what might have been accomplished elsewhere.

Absolutely no further comment necessary.

[KC]

When has that ever been in doubt? You never said anything about LSR not being mainstream. When is last time you saw a TQ Midget race or IMCA modified race on TV? These two are the most popularly owned race cars in North America. There are more members of the IMCA than any other form of motorsport on the face of the Earth. If you wanted to complain that no body pays attention to your favorite form of racing, why didn't you just say that? Why go off on some oblique about LSR cars being better than anything else?

[Franklin]

Actually, in the sense of truly being the cutting edge in motorsports for most of the last 100 years, LSR is better.

First wind tunnel designed cars? LSR. For example, Frank Lockhart's Stutz Blackhawk.

First ground effects car? LSR. Bernd Rosemeyer's 1938 Auto Union Streamliner.

First car to use disk brakes? LSR. George Eyston's Thunderbolt.

First major use of sandwich monocoque construction? LSR. Donald Campbell's Bluebird. (In fact, it was discovered during wind tunnel testing for Bluebird that if the ground clearance was below a certain height aerodynamic loading on the tires would be greater than the static weight of the car.)

First cars to use the continuous flow fuel injection that dominated Indy for 30 years? LSR.

[ma]

Ever hear of the Mercedes C111 ?( yea, I expect to be loudly corrected if my memory isn't perfect !). It ran on the Merc test track for 24 hours at 220 on only 195 HP ! Which means that they could have run up around 440 with only 800 hp or so. Might be a problem finding the tires to do that for 24 hours though.

So the question is really this : since when is designing a car that only goes straight "cutting edge" ? It's actually pretty simple, engineering wise. Yes, some things that are now commonplace may have been tried there first, but not having any real rules to have to abide to, as well as a schedule that allows YEARS of thinking about it, makes it pretty easly, comparatively,to get creative. That's why guys like Arfons & Breedlove are able to do it, and the major engineering powerhouses don't bother with it - it's a "so what?" challenge ! All it takes is gobs of HP and a small amount of aero work.

I will give credit to the Thrust guys, though - that was a nicely done piece.

[Franklin]

MA,

A car that tops out at 220 mph on 195 horsepower would in theory need close to 1,600 horsepower to go 440 horsepower. It's that little law about horsepower required increasing with the cube of the speed. In other words, going twice as fast requires EIGHT times the horsepower (i.e., 2 x 2 x 2).

The fact you think doubling the horsepower would double the speed comes as no surprise to me, considering you're the one who yammered on and on and on about pullrod systems being discarded years ago while being so totally ignorant you were completely unaware of the fact that the Arrows F1 team is currently using a pullrod system.

"Pullrods were tried & discarded many years ago for many reasons : hard to get high enough motion ratios in such a confined space, upper a-arm has to be much beefier ( an unsprung weight disadvantage, which adversely affects mechanical grip, as well as much more prone to damaging the tub in a crash), the lower a-arm also has to be beefier to take the cornering loads, and the shocks are almost impossible to get at for easy adjustment, and usually run hotter because of the confinement. Been there, done that, threw away the t-shirt."

[ma]

Amasing, Frank - you actually caught my "mistake" !!!!! Go pat yourself on the back ( if you haven't already broken your arm doing so ) !

Actually you still goofed - remember I specificly stated "averaged" 220. This means a 24 hour run including fuel stops, driver changes,tire changes, etc. Actual top speed was much higher. And don,t forget that the 'cubed' number only pertains to aero drag not mechanical losses or rolling losses. The real hp figure is a lot closer to 1000.

Or can't you read between the lines ?

Note: Pullrod rebuttal is elsewhere - Frank's not worth the time to reproduce it here again.

[Franklin]

"It ran on the Merc test track for 24 hours at 220 on only 195 HP ! Which means that they could have run up around 440 with only 800 hp or so."

So, MA, our choices are either (A) you're such a technical ignoramus you have no comprehension of the basic laws of aerodynamics or (B) you're such an idiot you can't even explain yourself clearly.

[Sparky]

Come on Guys; "..attack the post, not the poster.."

Name-calling won't be tolerated.



Your friendly Moderator

[Slowcoach]

HEY GUYS - yes you two! - regardless of who has been right or wrong and who's the fastest , cheapest most innovative or most ignorant etc etc I have found most of this pretty interesting , whether you "pull your rod or push it" doesn't matter to me but it is nevertheless very informative - basically coz I am a complete technical retard .
I've been reading all these Drag vs F1 vs LSR stuff and if the original post is bull then it gets argued down and along the way I've probably learnt something - it's good to have a good old ding-dong debate about stuff , but it seems pretty pointless to start swapping insults , in the end the chat police will chuck everyone off , perhaps we should have a seperate insults forum - on second thoughts lets not!
Lets keep arguing , but how about we all call a truce on the cussing......unless of course it's very funny !

[Franklin]

Well, in ANOTHER F1 vs Drag Racing vs LSR debate (see Header Flames on http://www.nitronic.com ), someone argued to me that Ferrari or McLaren would beat hot rodders hands down for the piston-engine wheel-driven record because by using F1 technology they could build a car with much lower frontal area, theoretically negating the advantage of unlimited cubic inches which would otherwise neutralize much of Ferrari or McLaren's technological edge.

I responded by pointing out that John Cobb's Railton had thirty square of frontal area and a best one-way speed through the mile of 403 mph while the Summers brothers Goldenrod had twelve square feet of frontal area and a best one-way speed through the mile of 425 mph (a gain of 1.2 mph per square foot). I further pointed out that Al Teague's car with nine square feet frontal area also has a best one-way speed through the mile of 425 mph and that although Ferrari or McLaren could probably build a car with three or four less square feet frontal than Goldenrod, they weren't going to build a car with three or four square feet less than Al Teague's car.