Force

I'm a little late to reply as I have been busy with other things. But as many here have said...and I myself...nitro and alcohol aftermarket engine blocks för drag racing purposes has no water jackets, not even the early Donovan 392 based 417 that came 1971 and the early Keith Black 426 based block that came 1973, they are solid blocks to be as strong as possible and that has been the way ever since. In the early days they used iron production blocks wich of course had waterjackets, later when the aftermarket blocks came they still had water jackets in the cylinder heads to cool them...and in many photos from the early to mid 70's you see one water filling neck on each head, but they did away with that later and the heads are also solid billet pieces machined from a lump of aluminum and they use the large ammount of fuel injected to the engine as the only coolant nowadays. I have seen the process myself when I visited and got a tour of the John Force Racing Headquarters in Yorba Linda, CA in 2003 (before he moved everything except administration and museum to Brownsburg, IN), I was told that each cylinder head took 40 hours in a CNC milling machine and further 8 hours of manual work on it to get a finished product. However, this is a hobby where we build models and you can do whatever you want with your model, so if you want your engine to be watercooled that's okay with me, who knows, you could have an aftermarket block with water jackets specially made for you...no one can tell the difference and mostly everything is possible...it's all up to your imagination. The Sid Waterman Mega Bertha fuel pump from the first photo in this thread is a bit "overkill" for a salt flats engine as it pumps 116 gallons per minute @ 600 PSI of pressure and would drench any engine except for a nitro motor, but there are smaller capacity pumps you can use instead, they looks like that but are a bit shorter...and are red. Waterman (and some others) also has belt driven fuel pumps and even cable driven fuel pumps wich allows you to put the pump virtually anywhere on the chassis..

Impressive build Jaroslav.

If it's a gas or maybe even alcohol burning engine it's no problems at all. And you can cool a Nitro engine with water if you use engine blocks and cylinder heads with water jackets, they did that in the 70's. But modern Nitro and Alcohol engines used in drag racing don't have any water jackets, they are built from solid billet blocks and heads machined from large pieces of aluminum and it's only the large fuel volume injected in these engines that cools them enough so they don't melt...so even a Nitro/Alcohol engine is liquid cooled, but not in the same way. The problem is that an engine block with water jackets is not as strong as a solid block so you have to reduce the power quite a lot to get the engine to stay together as Nitro is hard on parts, and I don't think it's possible to run a Nitro engine for some length of time under power other than the few seconds a drag race lasts without failiure to something...and Nitromethane is very expensive as Dale said and a modern Nitro engine uses more than 15 gallons in a sub 4 second run. So yes, it can maybe be done, but I don't think it's either practically or economically justifiable to do it.

Of course you can relocate the fuel pumps to reduce engine length, they are as said driven from the camshaft on a Nitro and Alcohol engine in drag racing as there are no space issues there, but they could be driven by a belt from a crankshaft pulley and mounted somewhere else on or near the engine.

Yes it is, but Bob's son Billy did use it in the late 90's, and some others, and NHRA did say after the mysterious Wayne County brake in in 1998 that any use of Nitrous Oxide in any form is prohibited in the Pro Stock Class.

I have tried Castrol Super Clean on chrome plated parts and the plating dissappears in minutes and you'll see it go away if the CSC is fresh, it takes a bit longer for the laquer but it will remove that also as CSC also removes paint...at least it did on the plated parts i tried it on (Revell) and I left them in a couple of hours and the result was bare plastic.

Nice build Pavel. I had the same idea for improving the rear wheels as you use on this one when I bought my Revell (ex Monogram) Kenworth and Peterbilt Snap kits some time ago, I haven't built them yet but I didn't like the shallow look on the original kit wheels so I tried Italeri outer rings and it looked a lot better...so that's what I'm going to use when I build my kits too...I don know wich tires to use yet but that will for sure clear up when I start the build.

Those pictures are screen captures from the movie so the original owner of the rights should be MGM as in Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer. MGM Studios Inc. 245 N Beverly Dr Beverly Hills, CA 90210 USA Phone: (310) 440-3000 I'm looking forward to more updates on this build.

I'm following this build with great interest as I'm planning to build one myself in the future. One thing tho' the name of the driver (handle: "Love Machine"/"Pig Pen") of the Paulie Hauling Mack Cruiseliner in the movie is apperantly Bobby and not Paulie. That's the name Martin "Rubber Duck" Penwald says when he wants Melissa to help "Pig Pen" in the meeting with the New Mexico Governor Jerry Haskins when he himself is leaving to get "Spider Mike" in Alvarez TX. Burt Young who played "Pig Pen" has played a caracter named Paulie in the Rocky movie from 1976, and some says that the Paulie Hauling name comes from that and it could possibly be so as the Rocky movie predates the Convoy movie wich are from 1978...but I don't know.

I just got me a set of Bens 2-hole Budds for trailers (casted by Jamie) for an upcomming BJ And The Bear Truck/Trailer project and I have to say they are top notch. I also got a couple of sets of 10-hole wide fronts with high flotation tires at the same time, and I got a couple of sets of Truck Mate 5-hole wheels earlier for my Tyone Malone Transporters...and they are of the same quality,

Well after what I know NHRA Top Fuel and Nitro Funny Car uses 36 X 17.5-16 tire code 2681, they are 36.6 inches in actual diameter, 17.3 actual thread width and are for 16 inch beadlock rim...and of course the hight grows with speed. Pro Stock uses 33.5 X 17-16 with 33.4 actual diameter, 17.4 inch actual thread width and 16 inch beadlock rims. Alcohol classes and Pro Mod use either 34.5 X 17-16 or 36 X 17-16. All this according to Good Year themselves http://www.racegoodyear.com/tires/pdf/Drag_010313.pdf

Great work on the trailer. I have planned to do one sometime in the future also.

The Tyrone Malone trucks, the Super Boss, Papa Truck; Bandag Bandit and Hideout Truck fetches horridious money on "fleabay" nowadays. I also would like to see the old ERTL Great Dane Reefer again.

I've got the AITM Rubber Duck resin kit, it's a very nice kit but unfortunately it doesn't have the correct Tip Turbine air cleander.

Don't know about resin but there is a set in the recent Revell Farkonas, Coil & Minnick Chi-Town Hustler 69 Charger Funny Car. That set has beadlock rings but they are the only ones I'm aware of.

Looks promising. This is one of my favourite kits too.

One more source for starfish wheels for the Son Of Ford is the old Monogram Tijuana Taxi that was reissued a couple of yeras ago, this kit might be the easiest to find.

Very nice, I like what I see so far.

Very Nice!!!

well I think the rules stipulates that Funny Car bodies must have door and hood lines, most of the NHRA Funny Cars I have seen has them, they are very faint but they are there.

A very nice build you have there. Regarding door markings on funny car bodies. It's correct that funny cars doesn't have doors but I have been around funny cars some over the years and I have seen bodies both with and without door and hood markings. And I know John Force and his team cars had these door and hood markings on the bodies up to 2010 as I have seen it in person on some of his cars and I have pictures where they show, you must go close to see them because they are very faint but they are there.

This looks like it will be a cool build and I will follow it with great interest.

Great looking model!!! Porsche 917K is a favourite of mine from that era and I have a couple on my shelf waiting to be built.

I can't wait to lay my hands on this cool truck!

Very nice!!! I remember seeing this car in Hot Rod Magazine many many years ago, I even had a picture of it on my wall.