Bill,
Do you know the difference between a rocket car and a jet car? I did not say
that the jets were banned, in fact I went to see them at the local track
just a few weeks ago. I do still remember going to watch my first drag race
at the same track 28 years ago, and the ROCKET car that was there that night
ran a 4.93 ET at 344 MPH. This was 28 years ago when the Top Fuel cars still
had the short wings, they shifted gears, and they didn't have the lockup
clutches like they do now. Also thousands fewer ponies too. I can't say what
the TF cars were running back then, but I do know that the 4 second barrier
was not broken until Eddie Hill did it the week after the US Nationals in
1988. He broke the 4 second barrier at the Texas Motorplex running a 4.93ET
if my memory serves me correctly. I was at Indy that year, and Gene Snow and
I believe Joe Amato were in the finals. Snow had run a 5.002 in the semi
finals, and said he would get the 4 in the final, but his throttle linkage
broke right after he launched. Anyway, my point here is that the rocket cars
had got so fast, and I believe I remember hearing about a run that was over
400MPH and in the very low 4 second range, but that I am not sure of. I
think that was when all of the sanctioning bodies started banning the
rockets. Also, the Jets do sometimes hit a higher top speed than the TF
cars, but I haven't seen or heard of a jet that is close to a TF car as far
as ET is concerned, and ET is what counts. Now, I'm sure if someone built an
unlimited jet car based on the newest jet technology, it might be a
different story. I did find this page that only shows the records for a
particular track.

http://www.mirdrag.com/records.htm

It shows a 3 tenths of a second difference in favor of the TF car. This ET
difference at 300MPH equates to 132 feet! Not my imagination at all.

Chris



"L.W. (ßill) Hughes III" > wrote in message
...
> So Chris, what does your imagination tell a jet's standing quarter mile
> ET is? If NHRA banned them I'm glad, they use to take so...... much time
> away from serious drag racing. I been on the drag strip with them, and
> took 8 mm pictures of them while they were there, couldn't even get them
> in the same frame when the light turned green:
> http://www.billhughes.com/temp/jetDragster.mpg
> God Bless America, ßill O|||||||O
>
>
> c wrote:
> >
> > You might be thinking of the rocket cars that NHRA banned several years
ago.
> > The jets do not compare to the current Top Fuel cars.
> >
> > Chris