Choose your Weapon

So when choosing your blown alcohol weapon with no doors, let's talk about the most common options. Funny car, Altered or Dragster. My first blown car was an Oldsmobile Achiever Funny car with enclosed cabin. The centre steer, limited vision (through small window) and big blower can leave some drivers feeling claustrophobic. I found the Funny car to be very stable and planted, right down the track, with the large rear deck trapping plenty of air. This allows the chutes to hit hardest of all 3 combos. It would have to be the hardest to work on and load, with the body always punching someone in the head and getting in the way. The biggest positive of the Funny car is being, its great looking, a huge billboard and based on a road vehicle, so people can relate to them.

Three years later we removed the funny car body, added and Altered body, with large rear wing and short zooms, leaving the engine and trans unchanged. The car lost 170 pounds and became a lot easier to work on and move around. The car picked up one tenth in ET but lost 5 mph and 2 PD of boost. We attributed poor aero as the cause of the losses and the ET gain to weight saved. Driving the Altered was a great eye opener and an assault on the senses. You could taste the fuel and feel the heat from the pipes. The vision was great, even being able to see the front wheels in the air and hearing your opponent coming from behind. I quickly found that at 200 mph my head was pulled back hard, so we added a chin strap to the helmet and all was good. The Altered is a little more twitchy to get down the track but it is also my favourite for that very reason.

Now looking for another experience, we fitted our engine and trans combination into a Hadman Top Alky Dragster.We were surprised the car only lost 50 pounds. With the longer wheelbase, we got more aggressive and added power a lot earlier that with the Altered and Funny car. The results were another tenth quicker ET, 4 mph faster with 60ft at .998 and half track 3.98, both big PB's. Despite the perception of a Dragster being easy to drive and a girls car, I found it exciting to drive. You find yourself sitting very low, only 100mm from the track and it really feels like your sitting on a bullet, with killer acceleration. The tend to ache around quite a lot and bounce a little in the braking area, but the biggest difference is its so much quieter in a Dragster, with the engine being in the back. Negatives being difficulty in moving it around the pits and loading into a transporter.

So now when you have a spare 80K you can have your weapon of choice!