NITROUS OXIDE ( nos / n2o ) advice forum

Ian bought his car (a 34 Fat boy Ford) - 1993 - his first run was - 13.7sec - using a very tired stock 460 Ford engine on treads.
After that engine expired he borrowed a 429 Ford in a high state of tuned and ran a 10.6sec pass on slicks.
In the process of running this time he won APIRA 2 years in a row & moved from slowest to quickest in class in 1995

In 1996 they raced as the previous 2 years but also raced in the first ever round of Street Eliminator on ordinary hard MT sportsman tires and ran a best of 12.6secs

1997 was their 1st full year in Street Eliminator and now they were using a basic fogger set up and were on slick ‘treads’ producing a 9.89sec best time and despite blowing the gearbox in the last round (a 3 speed C6) they finished 8th overall.

Ian took 1998 off and fitted a glide ready for 1999

In 1999 they raced in Super Street to the10.90 index but couldn’t dial the car in close enough to index so they gave up on that class.

2000 they went back to Street Eliminator using a 429 ci engine and ran a best time of 9.37 and secured 3rd place overall

In 2001 the car was fitted with a 477 ci + 2 stages NOS controlled by 2 timers (from Maplin) and this resulted in a best time of 8.99sec (this was the first ever run in the 8s at Pod in this class) but was soon followed by a gearbox problem which they fixed only to have an oil line problem cause the car to hit the wall @ 130+ and be written off.

By the middle of 2002 the new car with a 429 ci engine was back on the track and within 2 meetings had run 8.98sec and had been backed it up

For 2003 a 477 ci engine was fitted and this ran a best time of 8.79 sec and they finished 4th overall

In 2004 they experienced numerous problems which resulted in numerous piston failures (all unrelated to the NOS nitrous kit) and it was in this year that they replaced the Maplin timers with one of my early Maximiser. This combination produced a best time of 8.67sec and they finished 5th overall.

In 2005 they fitted the new 545ci engine and travelled the world. First to the USA where they ran a 9.0sec with electrical problems, then to Belgium where they won King of Europe with a 9.11sec pass on a closed off public road. By mid summer they had managed a one off pass of 8.57sec but suffered severe tire shake and more often than not ran high 8s & low 9s as a consequence.

It was at this point that Ian came to me and switched from 2 pulsed NOS stages to a fixed NOS kit supplemented by my pulsed system, along with a full re-work of his entire nitrous plumbing.
From that day up to the last 2 rounds of this years championship, Ian has had NO PROBLEM with tire shake and has run quicker and quicker at every meeting, culminating in a new PB of 8.17sec.

Despite suffering piston failure at the penultimate round and having to use a borrowed low power engine for the last round, Ian’s dominance of the class was so great that he’d all but won this years championship without needing to race in the last 2 rounds.

The piston failure, as a consequence of the far from ideal piston design has been discussed in the 'Advanced section' but suffice it to say here, that it's a testimony to the teams tuning abillity and the engine friendly nature of my nitrous systems, that the pistons held up to 500hp of nitrous.

In conclusion; Ian has done well over the last few years in Street Eliminator and achieved a best result of 4th position, with a best time of 8.57sec using two NOS kits, whilst being limited by tire shake. He realised the limitations of his NOS kits and decided to upgrade to my system which stoped the tire shake and allowed him to push his PB to 8.17sec, with even better results to come from a decent engine.

I’ll leave you all to decide if these results prove the superiority of my systems and my knowledge but I wouldn’t waste your time suggesting to Ian that he switches back to the full NOS set up he was using last year.

Ian is in the process of obtaining an aftermarket block (as the stock block he's been racing this year has already been pushed beyond it's safe limit) and the team will be implementing other changes to the heads and pistons to make the whole package more suitable for a LARGE dose of nitrous, all in readiness for next year.

Once again congratulations to the team for winning the Street Eliminator class this year and you'll have my utmost support in your efforts to make it a double.

Regards

Thanks for the history lesson Trev! If anyone wants to know more (including what went on with FB Racing before the '34) go to http://www.fb-racing.co.uk and check out the 'History' page. For an even more detailed story (and lots more pics) carry on to the Biography page. 2006 isn't up there yet but there's a lot to see.
Cheers
Fatty
PS If there's anyone out there who would like to support us in 2007 (and it's NOT expensive) please check out our Associates page. As an Associate you'll learn what it takes to build, tune, race & maintain an 8-second street car and get your name on the FB '34. With the build of our 600 inch engine coming up and the possible installation of more Highpower kit the winter looks real interesting. If any of our overseas friends would like to join just mail me as we can now take Paypal.
Apologies for the ad Trev but I'm sure you won't mind.

Fantastic stuff, well done lads!

Trev has asked us what we're doing for 2007.

Well, I'm afraid that it's not very exciting. The block damage was terminal and we've gone about as far as we can with a stocker. We need a new block with stiffer cylinder walls and more bore (to unshroud valves/eliminate piston design problem). Due to being almost completely broke (in relative terms) I was faced with two choices - don't race or slow down. I have chosen the latter as I am desperate to run with that #1 on the side of the car.

Those that followed the story earlier this year will be aware that we ran down as quick as 8.17 and as fast as 171 before our enforced crap piston design caught up with us and torched not just pistons, but the block as well.

There's a thread on here somewhere where you can view just how bad the piston design is for a nitrous application.

Well. I've ordered another 4 of them! (2 replacements and 2 spares). We will rebuild the engine to last years spec and take some tune out of it. We will spend 2007 seeing what we can get out of our suspension settings and the progressive controller. We'd like to see an 8.2 but, being back on 'proper' road tyres as opposed to Mickey Thompson Drag Radials, that is quite a stiff challenge. To be honest, anything quicker than 8.36 will be a PB on the block treads so we do have at least something that we can realistically aim for.

I'm sorry that we can't give Trev a whole lot to shout about next year (unless that elusive 'big' sponsor comes along v. soon) but, hey, we did win the championship and went quicker and faster than any other SE car with a stock block by a BIG margin. We also made the quickest competitve pass of any nitrous car in the class.

I will keep you posted if there are any developments.

Fatty sorry to here of your problems and if anyone can relate to what your going thru it is I. I wish you luck next year and might I ask as to why you continue to use that old fogger set up when you have more then enough power with 4 pair of Pulsoids and more control as well. I am not trying to tell you what to do but unless you flowed your complete set up together and know what they both do this may be some of what hurt your motor.

If you need help or would like to discuss this please feel free to PM or even call me. I am here to help you in anyway at all sir.

That's very sad news Ian.

Is the change of tire a new rule for next year?

There's one good thing about the tire change, it will be more about power delivery than power alone and it means your engine will be under less load for less time, so it should survive longer.

You could improve the survival chances of your pistons by going to thicker head gaskets and adding some weld to the valve pockets so they can be re-cut leaving more metal than that knife edge, if finances permitted.

Don't think that welded pistons would be a problem, because I've run welded pistons for a full season on huge amounts of nitrous without problems and they were only cast.

Another option would be to use a milder head, even a stock head, because any drop in power could easily be made up with nitrous and then you could avoid the large cut out.

Whatever you decide you have my best wishes for next season.

Regards

Funny you should mention that..............
I was talking to Fatty about removing the fogger system on Tuesday
I feel that now we are back on "real" treaded tyres for next year the extra controlability will be a big bonus.

Couldn't agree more, you should have a word with Mark Fisher who won this years Super Street Bike (SSB) event (European round) at Hockenheim.
He was up against the quickest turbo SSBs in Europe on his blown Busa with my nitrous and Maximiser in less than ideal conditions (on/off raining) and he still managed to run a trio of 7.9s to beat them.

When he got back he phoned me and was forcefully stating that he could NOT have done it without my system and Maximiser, because it gave him such fine control and the Pulsoids responded accordingly.

BTW Mark is another NOS convert (having switched last year to my Pulsoids), who has like yourselves improved as a consequence.
I just wonder how many more results like this I need before the majority of racers wake up to the truth.

Any chance on my engine mod suggestions going through???

Regards

I agree with Martin, Racer 704 and Trevor in principal BUT measuring the impact of upping the Highpower system in terms of potential engine damage is going to be difficult. Don't foget that with those pistons there is zero warning of a serious meltdown (entirely due to the design, NOT the system). We know where we were with the old system when the engine went, I'm not so sure we will in 07. Any hopes we have of a reasonable finish will be destroyed if we break - reliability needs to be our Holy Grail next year.

WRT the engine mods - yes, I understand all that you are suggesting. However I'm not going to spend a penny piece more than I have to on what is an unsuitable combination. I will be putting most of my effort into raising finance for the new block - the ever shrinking dollar makes it look more of a possibility. I have feelers out with several companies right now so please keep your fingers crossed for us.

Cheers

You may have known where you were with the old system but did you know where you were at using it with the WON kit? Do a static test again and only tune off of it and not the fixed hit kit as it can change everything unless you flowed both together properly.

I wish you luck and if I can be of any help here in the states please dont hesatate to contact me.I will help you any parts or info I can

That's the combination we were using last year - the NOS kit provided a simple boost to the base power of the engine (I'll never pulse an 'industrial' solenoid again!) so Martin & I know exactly where we were. And let's put it this way - it was simply a change in the air quality that led to the meltdown - that's how little warning those pistons give us!

Thanks for your offer of help Racer, I'll be in touch if there's owt I think you could help with. My problem right now is simply one of finances unfortunately i we have some irons in the fire however so I've certainly not given up on that big strong 600 inch engine.

Here's the latest piece of hardware for the Fatboys team;



With any luck this little lot will be sat on Ian's new engine before too much longer.

GREAT NEWS from the Fat Boys team, they will be building a new all alloy motor which will have more base power, be stronger and will NOT be fitted with pistons that need such aggressive valve cutouts as to make them TOTALLY UNSUITABLE for nitrous, like the last ones were.

At the Pod today one turbo car and one nitrous car in this class (Street Eliminator), both ran in the 7.8 sec region. Ian ran a best of 8.1 with the old UNSUITABLE engine, so I'm confident the new combination will have the potential to mix it with the best in the class. With a bit of luck he'll have a good chance of regaining the No1 plate that he won last year but has had to relinquish this year, due to being forced to run a borrowed, low powered and fragile engine all season.

Regards

Any news from the Fat boys???

Should have some news in the next day or two.........................


Brain.

Well that's nice!!!! Keep me hanging on a hook why don't you??? lol

Sounds promising and can't wait for a full report.

Regards

The new block & heads arrived today

These are our first brand new block & heads......we've previously been using a modified production block & second hand(severely milled-resulting in a far from ideal piston design)cyl heads.

The new block is from C&C Motorsports and is aluminium rather than the OE Iron one..........saving something like 120lbs(54kg for you youngsters!)
We have also gone from the OE 10.300" deck height to 11.200" which will allow room for a "reverse dome" piston to reduce the compression to a sensible 11-1 and also a longer connecting rod to give a better rod ratio and reduced piston side loading.Other benifits include improved piston stability at BDC(the piston won't be hanging out of the bore as much!) and (in theory) improved cylinder filling due to the piston having more dwell time at TDC & BDC and a higher piston speed in the middle of the stroke( I think I've explained that right!?)

The heads are the same type as our old ones but haven't been molested by a milling machine. The old heads appear to have been milled by around 0.100" (2.5mm) which meant we had an impossible task getting the compression ratio we wanted and had to open up the combustion chambers to reduce it(we ended up with 12.2-1 )the negative side to doing the chamber work was a reduced squish area which doesn't help with detonation control.

The block & heads give us something to get started on(no rods or pistons yet) we can at least make sure the crank fits, get the (minimal) cleanup work done on the heads and finish the intake spacers before it all goes away again for finish machine work (honing,valve seat cutting etc)

Oh,I forgot to mention that the new block has much bigger bores 4.625" vs 4.39" giving a capacity of 605ci(9920cc)vs the old motors 545ci(8930cc)

I'll try & get some photos posted over the next few days but things have got busy all of a sudden..........

Brain.

Oh Carol Carter parts thats not to bad, its a shame you didnt look at the heads from Jon Kasse as i think you may have liked them alot better and made more power. I guess anything is a step up from what you had.

Find out from total seal or akerly and childs what rings are avalable for your bore size and think about your ring stack as far as what you are going to use. I would look to using a -15cc reverse dome on your pistons and this should help with the valve relive as well.

Good luck with everything. For what its worth I use to live about 50 miles from Carol's shop and have been there alot over the years when i lived up north.If i can be of any help please dont hesatate to ask, and i would finsd out also max bore diameter you can go.I would also look at using lateral gas ports instead of top side gas ports.

All these suggestions are just that and not trying to tell you what to do but I have been thru more pistons then i care to remember....

Hi Johnny,

The block & heads did come via Kasse
The heads are Trickflow A460 (Raised ports,revised valve angles etc.the only thing they share with the factory heads is the head bolt pattern!!
I suppose you could say they are the first step on the exotic stuff.....
Anything better means getting into shaft rocker setups =$$$$!!!

reversed dome is -18cc,rings will be total seal,rods will be BME.All the parts have been sorted by Clive Bond over here in the UK(well known Promod motor builder & best Ford man in the country bar none!!!!)

I can't remember much else at the moment but will post details as soon as the rest of the stuff arrives.

I'm looking foward to putting out first "proper" motor together

Brain.

That all sounds GREAT Brian and I wish you all the best my friend. Sounds like your going to be in the ball park.Do your self a favor and flow your nitrous system also so you know where you at with eah tune up .You might look into E-85 if you have it over there. Its cheaper then racing fuel and makes more power and more forgiving also.As stated above if I can help please let me know Brain.

Racing gas/E85 is out,we have to use pump available unleaded which is rated here at between 97-100 octane(our 97 is the same as your 93)

The car should be spending a day or two on a Mustang dyno(rolling road)doing simulated full 1/4 passes(scary )
Hopefully we'll be able to get Trev to attend(I suspect we won't have to twist his arm TOO hard )
Should be able to get a good tune up in a controlled enviroment that way.

We will also have a data logger this year so will be able to keep an eye on egt & O2 etc.

It's going to be an interesting year.........................

Brain.

Isnt E-85 a pump fuel like here in the states or does it say gas only? Just a question i forgot you all have to use that for your rules.

Word of caution dont tune to EGT's but wide band O2 in each cyl is great. If your going to use O2 in the coletor it wont help with tunning with nitrous .

I got my O2 last season and love them...

As i said good luck

Thanks for the update Brain.

Now that's what I call a 'good spec' and after the ET's you managed to run on a completely UNSUITABLE engine on 2006, my guess is mid 7s are going to be a breeze soon.

Regards

Any news on progress Brain?

Progress has been frustratingly slow..........

The first thing we did was put the heads on the block with some mock-up "head gaskets"(strips of aluminium sheet!)to check the inlet manifold fitment with the spacers I have been making(It's a "tall deck" block-0.900" taller than a stock one).They fitted perfectly, proving that I was paying attention a school

Once that was sorted we put the block on the engine stand with the intention of trial fitting the crank, a rod and mock up piston(the real ones haven't arrived yet) to check for clearance issues.We expected to have to do some notching on the bottoms of the liners to clear the rod bolts but found that although the crank will go in the block you can't turn it at all

We found two problems...............
The base of each cylinder should have a large radius milled into it for crank counterweight clearance, 7 have been done,1 missed............
The liners have a corresponding radius,2 done, 6 missed................

Ironically, one of the liners that HAS been machined is in the cyl that HASN'T

The block is in the hands of Clive Bond who is going to get all the remaining machine work done ASAP.

The good news is the manifold spacers are at the 99% stage and Fatty has started the (minor) port work required on the heads before they go for finish machining(cutting valve seats etc).

P.S It's MASSIVE!!!






And finally,I can't wait to see more of this