FNG to LSR racing

[Bodacious]

This is a great forum and I hope that this is a proper place for my initial post.
I have a car with which I want to run at Maxton next year. I would appreciate all suggestions and information that you might expect a newbie to this sport to need to know. This would include most importantly safety of course, and insuring that I'll also be compliant with all safety and other rules. I have the rule book already but will still have many questions I'm sure, as I prepare the car over the winter.
First a little about me. I have drag racing experience and a few years of oval racing experience and have run some auto-cross events, but this would be my first attempt at timed high speed runs.
The car is a '95 Corvette coupe with a 388 inch LT1 stroker, fully ported heads, 11:1 CR, all forged bottom end and other related mods one would expect to go with all of that. It's not radically built because it's also a daily driven street car and will remain so. It's roughly a 450 HP car. It currently has a professionally built (by R-D Racing) 4-point roll bar that I'll be adding forward bars to, as I want to make the car legal up to 175 MPH. It's 1.75" w/ .120" wall so I think I'm good there. I'll install a proper racing seat for events and I will need to update my helmet and harness to current standards. It has brake upgrades, engine cooling upgrades as well as engine oil and transmission oil cooling improvements. It's an automatic with O/D and has a 3.07 rear gear. 
I haven't decided on a class yet, still wading through all of that confusion! The body is stock, the engine is obviously not. I won't be using nitrous. But of course the main emphasis at this point is to learn and do it right, not worry about records. I want to have fun and have me and my car in one piece when the day's over.
Any and all pointers re/ class, safety, preparation, driving and generally just what to expect would be very much appreciated so I'll be ready and can enjoy my first attempt. Thanks in advance.

Oh BTW, I have a Nomex suit with Nomex underwear, socks, gloves and a head sock. I assume this is at least adequate from what I've read so far, correct?

 

[Jonny Hotnuts]

The car would have to be built for the speed for what the current record is. If the car was in GT the record for a B motor is 233 and in MS is 246. Even if you only intend to run up to 175 because the record is higher...the car has to be built as if it could break that speed.


Any car built to be safe at these speeds is not streetable.

The fire suit for a car of these speeds will have to be a minimum of SFI 3.2/15 and you really should have a /20.


Get a rule book and look it over.


-JH

[Carl Johansson]

Bodacious,
juan caliente heuvos is correct!

I run an 88 vette on the salt -  with that motor -  you will have to build it to B GT class standards.  You will need alot of safety stuff.  The RD cage is a good start -  Dave built em right -  but it will need to be turned into a 6 point with more lateral support.  The attachment point for the 2 front legs is critical because of where the crush zones are designed into the frame rails. Parachute, Battery cuttoff,  2 fire systems, are basic things you will need to add!  You will have to put on window tabs -  and the targa top needs to be secured better than the factory setup -  you will also need roof rails.  I killed all 3 of those birds with one stone -  the rails extend over the front window as a tab -  and I hardmounted it through the roof into the mounting hardware -  had to fab up some adaptors for that.  You are not running on the salt -  is that correct?  regardless I assume you will need some pretty pricey tires to achieve safety regs there - I don't know how and what Maxon requires there!

Over in the Corvette forum -  in the C-4 section -  a guy named Sunny runs his C-4 at maxon -  right at trying to crack 200 -  he currently has some vidseo posted.  I suspect he would be a great source of info for you!

Carl Johansson

[Bodacious]

So are these like the lowest classes I can run in a stock bodied Corvette with a modified but N/A engine and w/o nitrous? If so, I may have to start out with time only runs. Although it's just a rough guess, I really don't think the car is capable of of reaching 175 in just a mile and likely wouldn't go much over that in any distance.
Carl, I was there (at Maxton) last weekend and met Sonny whom you spoke of. He's still looking to break that 200 mark. Helluva good guy and we've already been in communication since. Obviously I'll be picking his brain a lot. He asked me if I'd help him out there in the spring. Hell, I'm a pretty fair wrench but he's asking me to help him at the track after only meeting me for only a few hours? It's an understatement to say I'm honored by the offer. And of course I'd be willing to lend a hand in anyway I could. If he wasn't 5 or 6 hours from me, I'd be glad to help him a lot more than that. But he's out of Va Beach and I'm near Hickory NC.

[Carl Johansson]

So are these like the lowest classes I can run in a stock bodied Corvette with a modified but N/A engine and w/o nitrous? If so, I may have to start out with time only runs. Although it's just a rough guess, I really don't think the car is capable of of reaching 175 in just a mile and likely wouldn't go much over that in any distance.
Carl, I was there (at Maxton) last weekend and met Sonny whom you spoke of. He's still looking to break that 200 mark. Helluva good guy and we've already been in communication since. Obviously I'll be picking his brain a lot. He asked me if I'd help him out there in the spring. Hell, I'm a pretty fair wrench but he's asking me to help him at the track after only meeting me for only a few hours? It's an understatement to say I'm honored by the offer. And of course I'd be willing to lend a hand in anyway I could. If he wasn't 5 or 6 hours from me, I'd be glad to help him a lot more than that. But he's out of Va Beach and I'm near Hickory NC.

I don't know about Maxon.  I can tell you SCTA doesn't car how fast you think the car gcan go.  it is always held to the standard of the class the car fits into.  So yes - stock bodied 2 seater = GT.  383 puts you in engine class B.  Thems the rules -  and they don't bend em to "step down" safety requirements - even if a car is no where near capable of the record speed.  This year I ran a completely stock body and engine -  with 120K miles on the engine -  pumping out a monstrous 235 hp -  didn't matter -  my safety stuff had to meet 233 mph requirements!

Glad you got to meet Sunny,  we  almost lost him this year in a bad Motorcycle accident -  I'm glad to see he's up and running again! 
5 or 6 hours -  you east Coast Guys crack me up.  5 or 6 hours is an easy drive out here in the west - we think nothing of driving 500 miles to get to a race track!

[Bodacious]

You misunderstood, I meant that Sonny lives 5 or 6 hours from me. Or otherwise I'd be glad to help him more, besides just at the track. The track itself is less than three hours from me.
Maxton allows time/speed only runs. Obviously I wouldn't be allowed to exceed 175 if that's the speed safety level I'm legal for. I wouldn't be competing in a class and would get no points.
It sounds as if that'd be the logical starting point for me right now, for any number of reasons. As I stated before, I really doubt the car could run 175 in a mile anyway at it's current power level. As an example, Sonny's engine is far more radical than mine, plus he feeds it a healthy dose of giggle gas. His best run to date is 197. With spray, he's easily at double my HP level.

[Jonny Hotnuts]

THe 95 vett with a CdA of 6.6-6.8 should be able to make 175 mph with around 300 rwhp.

450-500 rwhp= 200+

[Bodacious]

THe 95 vett with a CdA of 6.6-6.8 should be able to make 175 mph with around 300 rwhp.

450-500 rwhp= 200+

450 is the estimated HP at the crank. Actual RWHP, measured on a Dynojet is just a bit under 400. Some people figure an 18-20% power loss with an automatic but I don't buy that, especially with a C4 Vette. First, the driveshaft is under 30" long and it's aluminum, as are the half-shafts. Plus I have an after-market converter that is 17 lbs. lighter than stock. I'm assuming a power loss of under 15%, hence my estimate of 450 crank HP. Torque should be right around 500~, also figured conservatively. Car weight is at least 3400 lbs. Contrary to popular belief, the more modern Vettes are no featherweights. Also the roll bar and cross-frame add weight too. The cross-frame is an after-market, heavy-duty version of the bolt on chassis stiffener that came on convertible cars. It alone adds nearly 40 lbs. but is well worth it for the additional chassis rigidity that was immediately noticeable after installing it.
I don't even know what CdA is, can you elaborate? Factory crank HP was 300 on these cars. Maybe a tad under-rated but not much. At best they were capable of 170 and I'm sure that wasn't obtainable in a standing start mile. I think we're all aware of what substantial HP gains are necessary to achieve MPH gains of any significance at these speeds. The faster you want to go, the tougher the game gets. If nothing else, over 35 years of hotrodding and over 50 years of life have made me a realist. 

[Jonny Hotnuts]

Weight is a huge factor for acceleration…..not so much for top speed as the aero resistance multiplies exponentially the faster you go. For argument sake lest say at 100 mph your cars body makes 100 pounds of resistance at twice the speed (200) the resistance can be 1000+ pounds (this is purely for example).
I have seen a chart once that showed a 1500 pound car was only about 6 mph faster than the same car that weighed 4500 pounds (but the extra weight can add speed if you have tire slipping issues on the slippery salt).

CdA is the Cd (coefficient of drag) multiplied by “A” (frontal area)

With the CdA of a given vehicle you can formulate the amount of HP needed to achieve a given speed. Thankfully people much smarter than I have already done the work.

http://www.mayfco.com/tbls.htm