9/8/03

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TRACTION CONTROL DETECTION

With all the energy generated by the ignition systems in these drag cars, would it be possible to measure the "ignition signature" of the car from outside, and detect whose ignition is cutting out due to traction control? Think about back in the day before ignition suppression plug wires in your street car. Listening to the AM radio, you'd get a buzz that changed pitch with engine RPM. If you could somehow measure and/or map this, you should get some sort of a normal "noise curve". If someone is using an electronic traction control device that cuts out this theoretical "noise curve" would be different, and detectable. I'm not sure exactly how this would work, and I'm not sure this would work for a magneto-based ignition, but for Pro Stock it might.

Jim Altemus
Forestville, CT

LET"S KEEP THE DRIVER IN DRAG RACING

It's about money. Hell, it's always about money. Racers want to go quicker and faster, both which cost MONEY! They purchase every "trick of the week" item that they can, but soon the well runs dry. So they go after corporate America, convincing them that investment in motorsports is a viable marketing tool to grow the bottom line. Then to show corporate

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America that this investment will show favorably on the ROI report, they get as much exposure for them as they can...which usually means going rounds.

Therefore, a racer will do most anything to go rounds, and some MAY be willing to do more than the other guy to go rounds, which brings us back to where we started....a "catcha 22" situation.

I saw the first 7.20's Pro-Stock pass at Houston, October 1988. By the end of THAT qualifying round, 7.20's were almost passÈ and people were debating who would run a teen that weekend. Fast forward to 2003, "street" cars are running 7.20's. Today, if you can't run 6.90's, you might as well save the diesel fuel and stay home and even at that, the fans want more, the racer wants more, the corporate guys want more, and we are reaching the point where 6.80's are about as exciting as watching Z/SA class run-offs, then the racer needs every edge they can get; "Catcha 22."

I am against traction control, for the most part I am against any device that circumvents the complete input and actions of a human, and I am not talking programming here! I don't mind data recorders, as long as they do just that....record only.

There are some that will argue that TC should be legal since you can purchase TC equipped cars off the dealers showroom floor. OK, that is true, so I am willing to concede. I will accept TC in Pro-stock as soon as Chevy comes out with a carbureted, 500 inch, rear-wheel drive Cavalier for public purchase!

Maybe we should take a lesson from the Bracket racers. They have their foot-brake and/or no electronic races. Wouldn't it be something to see a "foot-brake" national meet? How bad could it be? It would be what drag racing is all about.

In the beginning it was, "drag it out and let's see what it can do," not "boot up your hard-drive and let's see what you got!"

Before long, we will reach the point where the driver is just there to take a ride.

Don Richerson
Somerset, Kentucky