Drag Racing Online

Ed. Note: Wady Hamam or Pro Mod Wad as he is known in the business is NOS's main nitrous Guru. He has been involved in nitrous oxide injection almost from its inception especially with the Pro Mod division.. He is originally from the Buffalo, New York area and has been involved in all types of racing from flat track motorcycles to fuel dragsters. In his wasted youth he even raced a fuel funny car powered by a blown and injected small block Ford! He and his brother campaigned a front motored Top Fuel dragster and lost a race against Don Garlits at the now closed Niagara Falls Dragway. His advice about nitrous problems is highly sought after but he is hard to get to. He has agreed to answer one question every couple of weeks for Drag Racing Online readers. Email your questions to: promodwad@racingnetsource.com, and he will answer the question he finds most intriguing.

Dear Pro Mod Wad,

I'm seeing more and more bracket racers at my local track using the "spray" on their cars. Best I can tell, they are using it to catch up if they spin the tires, then dump the guy in the lights.

I'm thinking about putting it on my car, which is a heavy four-door '56 Chevy. It has a single four-barrel carb on a built 396 and runs high eleven's on the motor.

If I run a plate and use it every lap, how many laps could I get out of a 10-lb bott? Also, if I run a timer on the nitrous kit, would the car be consistent? I would also like to know which kit you think would be the most consistent and reliable for this kind of us.

Dennis Sutton

Dennis,
You did not mention whether your 396 was built for N2O use or not. I will presume it is not. Depending on the cam configuration and compression ratio you can probably install a Cheater system which will allow you to add as much as 300 horsepower.

I would suggest you start off at lower HP levels and work up. If you run around 200 HP jetting with time you will probably get 3 to 4 quarter-mile runs on a bottle, depending on how long the system is on. You can expect your car to run into the lower 11's and pick up 8-10 mph.

If you decide to run N2O, I would definitely get some good tech advice about fuel, timing, etc. to aid your performance gain. You may even consider turning the system on and off during the run to help your consistency.

Wady