When Cars go Bad

Just a Few pictures for those who think how hard can it be to drive a car in a straight line!

I mean what can possibly go wrong ??

First of three pictures by Peter Donaldson using a motor drive, from at least 250 metres away.

For those that know the Pod, on the right you can see the rear of the jet car trailer.

This all went wrong way before here, it started a few metres out from the start line when the car took a dive for the centre line and I probably over corrected which sent the car into a bit of a tank slapper.

there was a video on U tube and when played frame by frame it shows that I corrected the car several times, I can claim no skill for this as it was all by pure instinct.

I'm pretty sure at about this point the commentator announced that I'd hit the wall. his view from behind in the other lane would have given that impression, however no contact was made, it got pretty close (fractions of an inch) but thats all.

This young lad is by the lamp post on the right of the picture, note the wide open mouth, there were several in the crowd, also note that his friends probably missed the whole thing as they were looking the other way.

I'm pretty sure that the car kept all the wheels on the floor from this point on. I always think that the car is taking a deep breath on this picture, all the tyres look slightly flat.

Really as soon as a drag car gets out of line you may as well abort the run because unless your competitor is having a worse time than you then you have lost the race anyway. But as a Driver its your decision as to when its out of line too far?

Someone sent me this picture a few days later, I'm sorry I can't give them due credit as its pretty good considering how quickly this all happened.

But as you can see the car was airbourne, Caught between bouncing off the two right hand wheels and landing on the two left hand wheels. (or the other way round).

Total damage for this was a small bit of fibreglass from the body was broken, a cut in one of the rear tyres from the body and one of the rear brake caliper brackets bent slightly which caused a foul condition on the rear wheel, all were rectified with minimal cost and work.

Altereds are known as being a handful to drive, so I thought a dragster was going to be a walk in the park, now I didnt have a problem driving it under power. My problems happened at the other end when I went to slow it down.

First one wheel off the ground.

Then both at about 160mph.

Ive got it figured now, the effect of coming off the throttle and hitting the brakes and chute together can make the car bounce off the floor and as you may well still have your foot on the brakes when it comes down that compounds the problem.

I now drive through the finish line and release the parachute while still under power, when I feel the chute pull I get off the throttle and as the car slows down I apply the brakes gently.

This is how it should look !!.

I'm hoping not to add to this page.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Top Back

Home The Car About Me Contacts Links Pictures Speed Demon Split decision Guestbook The Team Latest News