Thread: nitrous oxide

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I have nitrous on my 57 chev but have never used it as I have been
told so many stories I don't know what to believe, but since I do have
it I am dieing to give it a try. Could someone out there tell me if someone
makes a box that will turn it on at different entervials. I already have it
plumbed to the carb using a crossfire. My ignition is msd dist 6al box
with a delay. thanks rdobbs

Call summits Tec department they could tell you whats available.
Lots of new stuff out there. Kurt

This could be a very informative thread.......lots of us have not run nitros and some of us have. I would love to learn about it, and some of the different types, like wet systems, foggers, etc. and also things to do and not do. We all hear terms like single stage, etc but that is about as much as most of us know, I bet.

Teach us, please.

Don

What system do you have, and how big a shot are you wanting to give the car???? A couple different companies making some good nitrous timers, I used a Jacob's on a customer's car some time back and he is quite pleased with it.... Be sure you have a sufficient fuel enrichment circuit to go with the Nitrous!!!! Without an adequate increase in fuel flow when you hit the nitrous, it will lean out the engine and do all sorts of nasty and expen$ive damage to it!!!!! I would also think you might want to consider a timing retard as part of your control circuit.......

This stufff scares me. i was at a cruise-in this past summer, and at the end, some of the muscle car guys decided to have a nitrous burnout contest. One of the guys in a Camaro blew the whole front end and hood off the car. Someone told me he forgot something was left on in the system, and when he attempted to start the car....boom!

study more before you pull the trigger.

have someone who is familiar with the stuff give it a look and let them try it first .. dont do anything blindly ..`iv`e had it on my 429 for 20 years .. love it .. put it on my 351 and blew the motor with the very first hit ... but missing a shift may have had more to do with that

sort of a picture post test .. this is the 351 after the nitrous shot

I'm Like ITOLDYOUSO, would like for others who have used nitrous to
give us their opinion..I've heard all the horrow stories you just mentioned
which is the reason for the inquiry. My car is built for the use of nitrous,
as stated before it is all ready to just hit the button etc.I am using a
cheater nitrous system with the crossover plate under the carb. also
have a 3 degree retard chip in box, and don't know if that is sufficent.
I can put jets in the nitrous plate ranging from 100 to 250.
Denny brought up a company named Jacobs that worked well, and how do
you get in touch with these guys? I could call Summit or Jegs tech, but in
most cases you will get different answers....I have gone this far with
the car and have a little money invested in the nitrous system, but don't
want to blow a $15000.00 engine by doing something goofy...any and all
suggestions would and is appreciated..thank R dobbs

when i first started playing with my system of coarse it had the wide open switch at the carb but i flipped the arm switch inside about half way thru second gear to get a seat of pants feel .. do you have a stick or automatic .. and it is somewhat true that the more power you have the less you will feel from the nitrous .. so 100 horse jets may give you only 70 or so jolt ..

400 turbo automatic with reverse valve body..rdobbs

I'll save the horror stories for another day. I've never run nitrous myself but did a lot of research this summer when I was considering going that route to get into the 10's when Pinks All Out was in town. I do know many who run nitrous with various different systems.

For me, I determined it was not worth the risk or the $$$ I determined it would require to do it right to my satisfaction.

Many run nitrous successfully with systems like you describe... here's what I would consider bare minimum requirements:

only run at wide open throttle above 3500rpm
retard timing 2 degrees for every 100hp shot (250 shot -> retard 5 degrees)
be sure fuel system can keep up... often a good idea to run a separate fuel pump for the nitrous

Next level of precautions:
colder heat range spark plug with short ground electrode to prevent shrouding of spark
RPM window switch that prevents activation below 3500 and shuts off before redline... if you hit a rev limiter on nitrous you WILL have several broken valve springs if not worse
fuel pressure safety switch that shuts off nitrous if fuel pressure drops too low

Next level for consistency in racing:
Bottle heater with pressure thermostat... ideal pressure between 900-1000psi
Progressive controller... add multiple stages and on and on

Some folks run 4 or more stages of nitrous that kick in at different points often based on time delay or gear and RPM... I've seen these cars scream and you can hear each stage kick in from the stands... I've also seen these cars go up in smoke with melted pistons.

For your system, just make sure the fuel system can keep up to the task. With the bottle off, test the fuel solenoid by hitting your switch and make sure the engine bogs. Retard timing as appropriate for your shot. Don't hit it at low RPM and don't hit your rev limit or if no rev limit watch out for red line because it gets there a lot faster. I would run a step colder plug...

As for the Jacob's mastermind, this was the box I was looking at this summer. It's got almost all the functionality I've mentioned here and comes at reasonable price... Edelbrock has one also that I liked the progressive action and has other features but is quite a bit more expensive.

Here are links to both at Summit:

Jacobs

Edelbrock

Funny, Summit only had Jacob's for 4-cyl... I found the V8 version at Jegs

Hope this helps and interested to hear how it turns out... will you be racing this or playing on the street?

-Chris

Edit: also a good idea to run race gas... if you have 2 fuel systems you can run your usual fuel in the main and race gas in the nitrous fuel system.

Thanks for the info Skids72, no I don't plan on racing this car, it's
just a toy i've had 30 years in building..rdobbs

i actually still have the setup on my 351 .. i just will not hit it again .. but the kids still go nuts when i purge before a burnout .. they dont know i`m not hitting it .. my stuff is strickly for the street ..i`ll post pics someday.. when i try i immediately get ( invalid file ) message

If everything is set up the right way, no damage will happen. I've been using this stuff since the early 80's, and have had more fun than you can imagine. I currently run two stages on my Chevy with a total of roughly a 600hp boost.

Some very important things to running a safe nitrous tune up.

1. Retarding Timing
2. Plenty of additional fuel.
3. Start with the smallest tune up.
4. Depending on the tune up size, drop to a colder spark plug.

There are actually a ton of other things, but with a Cheater system I would start ith the smallest tune-up they suggest.