1/4 Times For My 400E! - Page 2 - PeachParts Mercedes-Benz Forum

Flash Gordon · #16 02-12-2004, 08:16 AM

Michael, what you are saying is a RT of one second vs. two seconds has no bearing on the ET?

EuroCoupe · #17 02-12-2004, 02:06 PM

Not to answer for Michael but, yes, that's what he's saying. "For fun" drag nights are only set up to time from start sensor to finish sensor. You could sit in your car after the lights turn green for 5 seconds and not move, the timer only starts once the front of the car starts to move, its all up to you. Watch a full night of drag racing at the local 1/4 mile track and you'll see a few races that one car finishes before the other but the second car wins because they have a faster time, that's only because their reaction time was worse. The other person thinks they win until they see their time slip and realize the guy next to them ran .2 faster even though they finished second!

Holeshot · #18 02-12-2004, 02:45 PM

Sweet! Not bad for a street car that get's driven. I remembe my Mustang GT was a mid 15's car and was considered pretty quick by a lot of musclecar gear heads (for stock that is).

Right now my daily driver will do 10.36 @ 132 MPH (that a standing 1/4 not some ricer-boy 1/8th mile time) with a good driver (according to the latest mags).. but I've not tested it myself. Of course it was made in Italy so figure that alone is good for 3 sec. in the 1/4..

I bet you 400 will smoke a lot of those newer *muscle cars* people are buying right now.. how funny is that!

What sort of tires are you using.. you're starting to get to the traction limits of decent street tires.

- H ( OK, I'll admit it!! I wish my W124 had a V8!!!!

)

Holeshot · #19 02-12-2004, 02:53 PM

Quote:

Originally posted by 90free400e
I think the differential would do more than .2-.3 10's off of the 1/4. In fact, Carl from Bergwerks has told me that the average difference, FROM 0-60, is .5-.7 seconds.

Wow, that big of an improvement with a gearchange? Man.. that's gotta be a lot of bang for the buck. Plus.. you could see about dropping a LSD in there are the same time.

Say.. does Detroit make a soft-locker for that diff?

Flash Gordon · #20 02-12-2004, 04:03 PM

Quote:

Originally posted by EuroCoupe
Not to answer for Michael but, yes, that's what he's saying. "For fun" drag nights are only set up to time from start sensor to finish sensor. You could sit in your car after the lights turn green for 5 seconds and not move, the timer only starts once the front of the car starts to move, its all up to you. Watch a full night of drag racing and the local 1/4 mile track and you'll see a few races that one car finishes before the other but the second car wins because they have a faster time, that's only because their recation time was worse. The other person thinks they win until they see their time slip and realize the guy next to them ran .2 faster even thought they finished second!

My, my, I have never done the "fun" drag race before. It's been quite a while since I last went to a drag strip. But I recall reaction time is everything in drag racing! Quite often a race is won or lost on reaction time--too quick you disqualify, it has to be just right. The "fun" drag takes away a very important skill in drag racing!

EuroCoupe · #21 02-12-2004, 05:24 PM

Jeez, sorry about the poor grammar, I went back and fixed it. But, yes, that's the beauty of your local drag night. If I recall, my best reaction time was about .750 and all the way up to 1.470. I am certainly no bracket racer at this point. I hope to get to the track in the next month or so before the low temps reach 95 here. By the way, the 400E in this thread is one strong car. I was just reading that C/D got a 14.7 1/4 mi out of a 500E in '93. I have read about so many fluctuations in Mercedes track timing that I don't know what to believe anymore! Someone on this thread ran a 13.8 in there 500E and I have heard of other 13 sec 500E's with no mods. The "magazine" drivers are supposed to be some of the best but then again, there's not a ton of skill flooring an automatic. I know the Benzes are all about cool intake temps so maybe conditions were ideal for some of these runs I hear about and not great for others.

90free400e · #22 02-12-2004, 05:25 PM

r/t does influence your time. Often times, a later reaction time yields a faster time, but a lost race. A better r/t will lead to a better 60 foot time, which will lead to a better 1/4. 60' time is really what determines the race.

Michael · #23 02-12-2004, 08:14 PM

In absolute terms, R/T has no bearing on 1/4 mile time. However, in pursuit of that perfect .500 R/T many folks blow their launches (including me)...hence, if they just focus on a solid, non-redlight launch, they'll net the best result against the clock. But they may lose the dragrace in the process!

And Yes, it's all about ideal temps

Subman · #24 02-22-2004, 11:15 PM

Dont be so impressed with your stock times. I ran a 14.89 stock, infact I had my heavier wheels on the car not the lite stock ones, I did have K&N filters in but I dont think they do much. The key for a good time in these cars is a nice cold air temp.
With the 2.82 I had a best of 14.4 as per Gtech, the 14.8 was at a drag strip. (all times were with the heavy wheels and my heavy speaker box in the trunk)

gerryvz · #25 02-23-2004, 05:33 AM

Michael is 100% correct when it comes to the role of reaction times on ultimate 1/4 mile dragstrip times, at least the way that most "test and tune" drag strips (open to the public) are set up.

You could have a 5-second reaction time, and it wouldn't matter because what matters is when you cross the start and then cross the finish line.

However, having a lower R/T does satisfy the ego a bit if yours is better than your opponent's.

0.500 is the ideal R/T to have the way most dragstrip setups are done.

Oh by the way, you WILL get 0.2 or more seconds off your time if you let air out of your stock tires, letting them go to around 20-22 PSI. Will help them bite a bit, particularly if you don't want to get drag tires.

letting air out of your tires is the single best thing you can do. In addition I recommend icing your intake box with a large bag of ice (get it at the mini-mart) and waiting 20-30 minutes between runs; manual shifting, and doing a burnout to heat your tires a bit.

Hammer it when the third yellow light hits, and you'll cross the line when it turns green. Anything at .600 or below is a great R/T.

Most people playing around with the 500E tend to get 14.3s, 14.4s. I would think that with good technique and some racing gas, plus the techniques I outlined above, and also removing your back seat and spare tire (easy things to do) you would be in the 14.4 range pretty easily, perhaps lower with the reduced weight.

My personal best with the 1994 E500 with street tires is 14.02 seconds. Tried like hell but couldn't get into the 13s.

This will all change VERY shortly...

Cheers,
Gerry

gerryvz · #26 02-23-2004, 05:37 AM

One additional thing you can do to get much of the benefit of a shorter rear end ratio, would be to put drag tires of a smaller diameter on the back of the car. Shorter wheels (measured across the diameter) give the effect of an instant gearing change, because there is less wheel to drive per revolution. This means wheels go around faster and results in a small performance gain.

For the drag strip speedo calculations don't mean squat, so you will want to have separate drag tires and wheels that you can change on and off the car. There are a lot of tire size calculators on teh net and you can experiment with different wheel/tire size combos to get a good handle on wheel RPMs per mile and optimize accordingly.

Most drag tires come in the 15" variety so this is probably the size of wheel I would use. Then you want to go with something with a small sidewall, such as a 50-series.

Anyway, something to investigate.

Cheers,
Gerry

90free400e · #27 02-23-2004, 03:54 PM

Gerry, you forgot to tell them the N20 is being installed

You will definately be in the 13's now. Also, I got my first ticket this weekend, pretty bad too. 87 in a 65 with reckless driving for speed only (because it was 20+) Anyways hopefully ill be out to the drag strip soon, ill keep u updated.

gerryvz · #28 02-23-2004, 05:15 PM

you ought to be able to get the reckless reduced to plain speeding. I've never heard of that before -- and I've been nailed for 20+ over plenty of times. I think that moves it from an infraction to a misdemeanor, which you don't want.

With the NOS I'll be in the high 12's with all of the other mods I have done.

Cheers,
Gerry

90free400e · #29 02-23-2004, 08:50 PM

gerry, may i suggest a "Powered by vtec" window banner. I hear they give you 100 hp to the wheels. That should put u in the high 10's. Lol. Man high 12's. I cant wait to see the kind of stuff youll be beating. Make some videos

. if you want to see soemthing funny by the way look at this

http://accordtuner.com/downloads/Vtec03cobra.mpeg

gerryvz · #30 02-23-2004, 09:09 PM

Oh, you don't have to worry about videos. Everything's gonna be nicely documented. Anything below 13.0 seconds and they demand a roll cage. Since I won't do that to my E500, it's gonna get one or two runs and that will be curtains....at PIR. Then I go to SIR up in Seattle, and Woodburn dragstrip outside of Portland.

Then I'll focus on getting my national-record stock time of 15.07 seconds on my 300SEL 6.3 down to the mid-high 14 second area.

It is possible with only a moderate investment, I just haven't put any energy into the 6.3 since I left the utter, ego-ridden pomposity of the M-100 world over a year ago. Everybody is so worried about politics that they forget to enjoy the cars !!

The 500E world and 126 coupe world are so much more fun !!! Every owner I have met is just a bundle of fun.

Cheers,
Gerry