Monday 7 July 2008

Carbon neutral dragster racing

I took the car to the Retro Car show this weekend at Santa Pod and raced it down the strip.
It is a quarter mile, from a standing start.

My car is the white one and was running on 100% recycled cooking oil (from the Bayleaf take-away). I'm racing against a similar car which is running on a mixture of straight vegetable oil and mineral diesel. The commentator also runs his van on vegetable oil.

http://uk.youtube.com/watch?v=Lb5eIX60VwM

Although I managed to snatch second place, I think this probably has more to do with the way I drove it, rather than the capabilities of the car or fuel. I covered the quarter mile in 22.3827 seconds. I may make a couple of modifications to the car, and to my technique, before bringing the car back to Santa Pod next year. One of the other 190D owners at the event explained how to get more power by modifying the air intake and exhaust. It won't break any records, but the performance is already perfectly adequate for everyday driving, and I might just beat the black one next year!