NHRA Webisode 4

Tony Schumacher and his Racing Team explain what they do to keep the team winning.

We use the most top of the line equipment and fuel to help make the U.S. Army top fuel car the fastest out on the track. Let's take a look at how we mix the fuel that goes in the racecar. We receive a drum of nitro methane from our supplier that is a 90%, which is the maximum amount we can run in our race car. And then we mix it with methanol to the specific percentage that we want to run in our racecar for that particular run. And then, we put it in these five gallon jugs. We have a device that measures the specific gravity of the fuel, at a certain temperature. And we check it with that, and make sure it is exactly what we want.

If we ran our same engine on gasoline, it would maybe make 1200 to 1500 horsepower. We switch it over to nitro methane that engine can make seven or eight thousand horsepower, so the fuel really is the driving force in the power that we make in our engine. The fuel mixture is just one of the things that works together to add the power to the U.S. Army top fuel dragster. Just as the U.S. Army Soldier has a strength like no other, U.S. Army Top Fuel team has a powerful dragster like no other.