Supercharged nitromethane?burning Funny Cars reach some of the highest speeds on the track, covering the quarter-mile in 4.6 seconds at more than 330 mph. Funny Cars are topped with a composite body in the shape of a stock car. The body flips up like a shell to let the driver in?and reveal the real action, under the hood.

A Funny Car depends on a precisely engineered system?everything has to work together to get up to speed and still fall within National Hot Rod Association rules.

Aerodynamics is an important factor in making these cars so fast. Their huge rear tires drive the machine, but covering the tires with the body gives it an aerodynamic boost.

A plane could take off at a lower speed than a Funny Car reaches, so designers craft in downforce to keep the car on the track. They base their work on a physics principle called the Bernoulli Effect: If a fluid (in this case, air) flows around an object at different speeds, the slower-moving fluid will exert more pressure than the faster moving fluid on the object. A racer uses the opposite tactic from that used in shaping an airplane wing: The air moving under the car is faster, the air moving above the car is slower, so the air moving above the car puts more pressure on the car, keeping it down. But too much downforce means drag?a big slowdown. Design is a balancing act among these factors.

A Funny Car burns about 20 gallons per mile and makes a quarter-mile trip in about 4.6 seconds. How much would it burn during your trip to school? How long would the trip take?
Click for Answer

The 17-inch rear tires used on Funny Cars wear out after about five runs, or two miles. A passenger car can get about 80,000 miles out of a pair of tires. How many sets of tires would a Funny Car go through in 80,000 miles?
Click for Answer

The Feed for Speed

Although Nitro Funny Cars look like street cars, they don’t act like them. Razor-sleek and spewing fire, they’re the fastest accelerating vehicles in the world. A Nitro Funny Car leaves the starting line with a force nearly five times that of gravity—the same force of the space shuttle when it leaves the launching pad at Cape Canaveral.

What fuels this kind of takeoff? It’s not gasoline. Precise fuel formulations are a closely kept secret of many teams, but if you visit the pits you can get some ideas about what they’re doing. Here are the basics:

Top Fuel funny cars and dragsters burn mostly nitromethane. The chemical formula for a molecule of nitromethane is CH3NO2. 

The O2 is what’s important here:  It means two atoms of oxygen per molecule. Oxygen feeds the fire, allowing the fuel to burn longer and stronger. (In fact, the space shuttle’s fuel formulation includes liquid oxygen.) That’s why you see flames shooting out of the funny car—the fuel hasn’t even finished burning when it’s forced out of the engine.

Looking at their chemical formulas and an elements chart in your classroom or library, can you identify these chemicals used at the track?

CH3OH      C8H18      N2O      H2O
Click for Answer

The Top Alcohol Dragsters and Top Alcohol Funny Cars burn methanol only. What is its chemical formula and what are its fuel advantages? Click for Answer

E.T. Racing:  Dial-in to Win

E.T. stands for Elapsed Time. E.T. Racing is also called Bracket racing, and it?s the hottest form of drag racing on the scene right now. E.T. racing gives every racer a fair chance to win, by basing competition on a mathematical calculation of test-run qualifying times. That?s called a driver?s dial-in time. A driver with a slightly slower car gets a head start?so the winning edge goes to those with the sharpest reaction times.

Car A?s qualifying times are 16.49, 16.52 & 16.48 seconds, and the driver records a dial-in of 16.50 seconds.

Car B?s qualifying times are 18.21, 18.26 & 18.24, and that driver records a dial-in of 18.25 seconds.

Calculate the difference in their dial-in times. That will be Car B?s head start. What number did you come up with?
Click for Answer

Race Team members have to make dozens of on-the-spot calculations using reaction time and elapsed time at each race.  Use the following formula to answer the word problem below:

Driver?s reaction time + the elapsed time before the light turns green (.5 seconds) + the car?s reaction time = the overall average reaction start time.

Don’t Let ’Em See You Sweat
As you watch the team working out in the pits, you’ll notice many of them consult with what look like PDAs or calculators, cell phones, or lap-tops. They aren’t checking their e-mail—they’re checking the weather.

They’re not just worried about rain. They’re looking for very small changes in weather variables—because the weather can make or break a driver’s crucial few-seconds’ advantage.

Here’s why: Picture building a bonfire on a crisp, cool night. Now picture doing the same on a humid afternoon. Which will burn better? The first one—because fire needs oxygen, and there’s less oxygen in moist air. And the fuel in your car will burn better as well—so your car will go faster.

The four big factors that influence how much oxygen is in the air are:

• Barometric pressure
• Altitude
• Temperature
• Humidity

Temperature has a direct effect on oxygen levels: Oxygen levels decrease as temperatures increase.  So which temperature is better for racing, 50 degrees or 85 degrees? Click for Answer

Air is denser—more oxygen-filled—the closer you are to sea level, so cars run better at sea level than they do at higher elevations. If you lose .1 second for every thousand feet above sea level, and your car runs a 14.50-second race at sea level, then what would your car race at a track that is 5,000 feet above sea level?
Click for Answer

What’s Your Dial-In for Life?

What do you predict for your future and your career? How well do you think you’ll do? You may find some answers at the track.

Just like the cars themselves, racing teams are a precisely built system, with each part having an important job in winning. Any visit to a race can give you a look at dozens of career paths. Here are just a few:

• Weather software designer
• Human factors engineer
• Aerodynamic engineer
• Fuel chemist
• Mechanical engineer
• Sports journalist

Many racers have careers on the side, or have used their drag racing experience to branch out into other areas.  The pit team member you’re watching could also be a:

• University or technical institute professor
• Video game designer
• Software designer
• Aeronautical engineer
• Defense systems analyst
• Military professional
• Medical technology designer
• Automotive engineer
• …and more

Our Science of Racing COO, Paul Lee, is a Nitro Funny Car driver and entrepreneur with three college degrees: a Bachelor’s degree from the University of Pennsylvania and Master’s of Business Administration and a law degree from Rutgers University.

He believes that when you harness your personal power and steer your life in a positive direction, you can succeed—and earn the chance to challenge yourself in the exciting drag-racing world!

“Surround yourself with positive people and set your goals, especially for staying in school,” Paul says. “Learn what you need to succeed and work toward those goals every day. You will be on your way to the finish line.”