Fastest 1/4 ET ever in a car?

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That is a full quarter, not an eighth or even the 1000 ft they run today.
That is Santa pod in England, and that is a ROCKET car. They had been illegal in the U.S. for at least a decade when that car ran. It had to be run outside the U.S.
 
Now if it was a "turboshaft" IE wheel powered, then ya'd have somethin'
 
They had a rocket car at the Mopar Nationals about 4 or 5 years ago and damn when that thing hit the afterburner at the starting line I looked over at my son and said are my eyebrows still on?!..
The extreme heat you could see the whole crowd canter backwards when he would hit that afterburner.. and the wind tunnel it would create behind it... There was a garbage can behind the starting line and you can see the garbage flying out of it until the can finally took air...
 
They had a rocket car at the Mopar Nationals about 4 or 5 years ago and damn when that thing hit the afterburner at the starting line I looked over at my son and said are my eyebrows still on?!..
The extreme heat you could see the whole crowd canter backwards when he would hit that afterburner.. and the wind tunnel it would create behind it... There was a garbage can behind the starting line and you can see the garbage flying out of it until the can finally took air...
What you saw was a jet car. Burner pops, and after burner are jet car stuff. Actual rocket cars have been banned, even for exhibition, for decades.
 
Rocket-jet two entirely different animals.
 
Yep, nobody in their right mind stands behind a jet car.
I did see a rocket car, at the original irwindale raceway, in the early seventies. They weren't as popular as the jet cars even though they were WAY faster. Jet cars can put on a flame show with burner pops and blowing trash (and blowing the christmas tree over. I wouldnt want to be the guy out there, holding the tree up!). A rocket is just pushed up to the starting line, staged, flip a switch, boom, gone.
The old irwindale had a couple story tower behind the starting line, sometimes people would sneak out and stand under the tower where tower personnel couldnt see them . When the rocket (dead silent of course!) got pushed up to the starting line, there were a few brave souls who wanted to get a good look. They were warned.
Then the rocket lit. Spectators doused with flaming hydrogen peroxide. Never seen anybody move so fast in my life.
 
Yep, nobody in their right mind stands behind a jet car.
I did see a rocket car, at the original irwindale raceway, in the early seventies. They weren't as popular as the jet cars even though they were WAY faster. Jet cars can put on a flame show with burner pops and blowing trash (and blowing the christmas tree over. I wouldnt want to be the guy out there, holding the tree up!). A rocket is just pushed up to the starting line, staged, flip a switch, boom, gone.
The old irwindale had a couple story tower behind the starting line, sometimes people would sneak out and stand under the tower where tower personnel couldnt see them . When the rocket (dead silent of course!) got pushed up to the starting line, there were a few brave souls who wanted to get a good look. They were warned.
Then the rocket lit. Spectators doused with flaming hydrogen peroxide. Never seen anybody move so fast in my life.
We stand off to the side all the time at Great lakes dragaway it's really nice on a cold night.
 
We stand off to the side all the time at Great lakes dragaway it's really nice on a cold night.
I remember working the flightline at Eielson AFB in North Pole Alaska in the winter @ -40 degrees or colder warming ourselves near the F-16 engine exhaust while the jets were at idle. Fun times!!
 
Buddy on the USS Midway deck had a brass snap on his cranium melt during flight ops. He was a "checkerboard" troubleshooter so he was all over the plane when it was winding up in the cat. Had to be very careful up there.
 
Must have lost his 10mm socket
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They had a rocket car at the Mopar Nationals about 4 or 5 years ago and damn when that thing hit the afterburner at the starting line I looked over at my son and said are my eyebrows still on?!..
The extreme heat you could see the whole crowd canter backwards when he would hit that afterburner.. and the wind tunnel it would create behind it... There was a garbage can behind the starting line and you can see the garbage flying out of it until the can finally took air...
Yep, same thing McCain did on that aircraft carrier as a prank below deck in the staging area. Caused one rocket to fire from his buddies plane while setting it and others on fire, the pilot died. Resulting explosion-fire almost sank the ship but he got off because his daddy was the Admiral on the ship. Lost a bunch of planes and crew members. Look it up.
 
yep remember sammy back in the day when I was racing@SPR, saw it run a few times, he blew all the windows out in the tower once, had to be checked out by the doctor after every run, it was said he had a little blood coming from his nose.
 
I've never seen a jet car leave that fast, wow
 
Just a minor correction, the post should have asked what was the "quickest" or "lowest" E.T Not the fastest. 300 mph is "fast" but it could have taken a minute to get there, depending on what it was done with. The "quickest" car wins not always the fastest.
 
Yep, same thing McCain did on that aircraft carrier as a prank below deck in the staging area. Caused one rocket to fire from his buddies plane while setting it and others on fire, the pilot died. Resulting explosion-fire almost sank the ship but he got off because his daddy was the Admiral on the ship. Lost a bunch of planes and crew members. Look it up.

It was on the flight deck and the rocket trigger shorted in the firing circuit. It was documented in the post event report that the short was a known issue and was found to be repeatable under certain conditions. Also the rocket was not armed manually while on deck as the cockpit switch was found to be off. McCain was a FU ( had a customer in the same squadron) but he was cleared of any wrong doing. Of course the Navy wouldn't want the son of an Admiral to go down for that officially.
 
Just a minor correction, the post should have asked what was the "quickest" or "lowest" E.T Not the fastest. 300 mph is "fast" but it could have taken a minute to get there, depending on what it was done with. The "quickest" car wins not always the fastest.
Fastest...Quickest..I think it covers both! Wonder how many G's it created....
 
The dual motor model (D-90?) is rated at 854 HP with like 780 ft/lbs torque. Amazi g car. Waitinf for the truck to come out. Love it or not, Its a very strange looking truck with amazing specs.
 
That's cause it was a rocket car.


If those rocket powered cars burn hydrogen peroxide then I watched a pair of them at PIR in the mid 1970’s. It wasn’t long after that they were banned. Maybe it was benzene they burned? Something like that. I was probably 10 or so.
 
From what I’ve been told the rocket cars were banned for safety reasons. I guess when you ignite a rocket car it burns whatever fuel it has and shuts of when the fuel is gone. So it relied on the calculation of space needed to get it stopped. Jet cars are shut off by the driver.
 
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