Drag Strips and Antifreeze

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SpeedThrills

SpeedThrills

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Dragstrips say no antifreeze. Then they let a hundred street cars go down the track.

I know antifreeze is hard to clean up.

Do they really mean that they don't want antifreeze, but they know they can't enforce it because no one will show up?
 
I also have been running it for years and I race almost every weekend , a few weeks ago my over flow can was filled and a little dripped out on the burnout. Coming down the return road a track official that stays by the emergency crew at top end just came over and said " you dripped a little coolant " I said Thanks and I emptied my overflow can. They didn't yell or complain same thing when I blew a head gasket top end last year( I hardly put any coolant on the track ) But then again I have been racing there for over 30 years and they know me quite well , if it had been at another track in might have been a different story. Last year at another track I saw a track official walking the staging lanes looking under cars for leaks. A few years ago at the NED Bracket Finals the Sportsman Points Champ from my local track was staging for first round of the Race of Champions and dripped a tiny bit of coolant ( his thermostat housing cracked, he didn't know ) and they threw him out , he was able to fix it for regular eliminations however.
 
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I ran a couple street cars in the late 70's. I raced a street car a LOT in the 80's. I partnered on a stock eliminator car a few years in the 90's. I've run a couple street/strip cars on testntunes since. Only the stocker had water in it (brass freeze plugs). I got thinking about this because I'm going to take the car in my avatar soon. It has antifreeze, and it's pretty much a race car with tags. I won't worry. :lol: Thanks.
 
I've been to division one bracket finals at Lebanon valley and Numidia drag way in 2021 and 22 and it was 29 degrees over night so antifreeze for me.
I don't want to be the guy to put it on the track but it's not worth it not to run it.
 
To meet the rules, I used to run WaterWetter I think it was called in lieu of antifreeze. Helped with heat transfer and anti-corrosion. I wasn't worried about freezing temps.
 
At my local track, you can run antifreeze, but if you leak it onto the track, you're done for the night, see ya next week, without it. Water leak, no big, they just mop it up.
 
DC 340 said:
To meet the rules, I used to run WaterWetter I think it was called in lieu of antifreeze. Helped with heat transfer and anti-corrosion. I wasn't worried about freezing temps.
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Now they are saying they don't want surfactants like water wetter in your car either.
 
I've been going to race tracks for over 30 years and I've never once heard of a tech guy checking a car for antifreeze. It's frowned upon but heck my local tracks barely check anything in tech. They actually check my seat belt date this year, that's the first in a longtime. I've seen guys with delay boxes in their car at NHRA events with NHRA officials around in classes where they weren't allowed to be. All they do is make them remove them, instead of throwing them out for cheating. Tracks don't really enforce anything as they want as much $$ from the racers as they can get.
 
No antifreeze, screw clamps, or flex hoses for me. I hate stupid delays and it’s usually the same guys over and over again.
 
Roundy-round is a nightmare .
Silicon has a very low co-efficient of friction, and doesn't burn, or evaporate .
So tiger torches don't do a thing, and clouds of cement dust at a small track is always a fan favorite .
It's a racer's courtesy to other racer's, - or it was .
 
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SpeedThrills said:
Dragstrips say no antifreeze. Then they let a hundred street cars go down the track.

I know antifreeze is hard to clean up.

Do they really mean that they don't want antifreeze, but they know they can't enforce it because no one will show up?
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Are you referring to the 3 or 4 water downs at Atco last week? Very time consuming to clean up and the poor guys after that were getting crossed up at the big end because they couldn't or didn't clean up the glycol completely.....dangerous
 
That’s what I do, distilled water and rust inhibitor. Antifreeze in the winter. Might just start draining it and leave it empty. I have block petcocks.
 
Aren't coolant overflow tanks required? The cool coolant level can be set correctly in them so that hot fluid is captured and then siphoned back into the radiator when it cools.
 
MopaR&D said:
What kind of hose clamps do you run instead?
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As I’ve said before no hose clamps for this guy. My lines are all handmade. My transmission lines, oil lines, water lines, and fuel lines are all screw type fittings. Summit sells some very nice screw type transmission lines.
 
pittsburghracer said:
As I’ve said before no hose clamps for this guy. My lines are all handmade. My transmission lines, oil lines, water lines, and fuel lines are all screw type fittings. Summit sells some very nice screw type transmission lines.
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I have converted my bottom radiator hose to braided with AN fittings. Will do the same to the top hose eventually.
 
pittsburghracer said:
As I’ve said before no hose clamps for this guy. My lines are all handmade. My transmission lines, oil lines, water lines, and fuel lines are all screw type fittings. Summit sells some very nice screw type transmission lines.
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Ah nice, well I'd like to do that with my car at some point but it's not very race-oriented currently. I do some occasional road-race track days with it but it's mostly a fun street car. I'm curious how screw type fittings would go on the radiator, water pump etc but I suppose that would be another thread...
 
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