August 23rd 2007, PIR
Photo courtesy of Carol Brown (photogal@iglide.net)
(quote off Youtube comments section from an unknown electric car fan)
Motor: 'Siamese 8' dual armature with selectable series/parallel wiring. (below) Motor bay viewed from passenger side fender area, firewall at left:
Drive type: Direct drive. Electric reverse.
Driveshaft: Single piece all aluminum driveline from 'Inland Empire Drivelines'. Driveline loop:
Rear axle: Dutchman heavy duty Street-strip Ford nine inch rear axle setup with 31 spline racing axles, air shocks & traction bars. Strange aluminum differential housing with Detroit locker. The tall 3:70 Strange gears from the previous light weight lithium-ion version were still installed and raced with at the 10th Annivesary NEDRA races. For the final races of the year, the Steet Warriorz EVent, the 3:70 gears were pulled and replaced with a lower ratio 4:11 gear set (Richmond Gear brand) to better handle the increased weight of this heavier lead acid pack w/roll cage version of the car.
Wheels & tires:Front - Eagle 5 spoke 13 x 5.5 alloys with 4 bolt Nissan rear drive offset and 185/50/13 Pirelli P7 radials.
Rear - Eagle 5 spoke 14 x 6 alloys with 5 bolt Ford front drive offset. BF Goodrich 'G Force Drag Radials' (24" dia.)
Batteries:The 'loaner A123 Systems lithium-ion' battery pack used in the special July version of the car was pulled and returned to the Killacycle team. We re-installed the previous pack of 60, Enersys high current 16 ahr @ 14.2 lbs. each lead acid batteries. Total pack volts 360 (2 X 360V in parallel) and the combined weight of both packs at 852 lbs.
Controller:Zilla Z2k 2000 amp controller with Hairball interface. Programable automatic series-parallel contactor control. Quick-pull emergency disconnect. A small inverter provides 120 vac to run a nearly silent AC aquarium pump inside a windshield washer tank for liquid cooling of the controller.
12 volt system: Custom 40 amp DC-DC converter. 16 ahr Enersys 12V battery as the 12V system back-up.
Other Mods: (1) After going quicker than an 11.5, per NHRA and NEDRA rules, a roll bar system was installed. We decided to go the full 6 point style for the best protection and to also dramatically stiffen the car, but it added about 80 lbs. to the car. (below right) Forklift mechanic and coworker Kelly O'Donnell works around the roll bar to re-install the Enersys 12V modules:
Car weight: ~2652 lbs.
7-27-07 'Shock Jocks' in the Portland Tribune newspaper...a feature story about White Zombie and electric drag racing with color photos headlines the 'Accelerate Tribune' section of this newspaper.
8-1-07...A story about White Zombie and Plasma Boy appears on the front page of The Wall Street Journal. The full story can be found here: http://www.wsj.com/articles/SB118593442187584293
8-17 thru 8-18-07...'NEDRA 10th Anniversary Nationals' EVent at PIR in Portland. Zombie's best ET was Saturday night, with an 11.882 @ 109.58 mph. (below left) White Zombie in the pit area with cameras rolling from various groups of media present for the races. (below center) Getting the tires sticky first. (below right) White Zombie ready to take out a new Corvette:
8-18-07...As part of the 10th Anniversary NEDRA races and following tradition, Saturday morning we all got together for the 'Electric Breakfast' at the Village Inn restaurant in Portland:
8-18-07...White Zombie on 'America's Car Show'...Plasma Boy Interviewed by Thom Torbjornsen on his national radio show about White Zombie kicking butt at the drag track. PB left the above mentioned Electric Breakfast scene, driving his other Datsun 1200 electric car 'Blue Meanie' back to the Wayland EV Juice Bar to do the over-the-phone interview...he then returned to the restaurant.
8-19-07...White Zombie and Plasma Boy featured at 'EV World' website.
8-23-07...White Zombie at PIR's Wed. night 1/8th mile drags (photos by Carol Brown).
8-25-07...'Street Warriorz' EVent at PIR in Portland...This was quite a big car show-racing scene! Check out Wil Christenen's (Plasma Boy's nephew) video sampler of this:
8-31-07...White Zombie on 'The Lazy Environmentalist' radio show'...White Zombie's success at the drag track featured on satelite radio: "Who knew drag racing could go green? Josh Dorfman interviews "Plasma Boy" John Wayland, who is out to prove that electric cars can compete in power and speed with any other vehicles on the road today. His success points the way toward a future that is fun, fast and clean!" (http://www.lime.com/radio/the_lazy_environmentalist/audio/16043/electric_cars)
9-1-07...'Motor Age' magazine runs feature story in 'Pit Pass' section about White Zombie and electric drag racing: "Saddle up 374 volts at 2000 amps and hang on for the ride of your life. For John Wayland, shop and life experience working with electric motors have brought both insight and innovation to the street and his sport. Wayland, owner of Plasma Boy Racing and an electric car drag racer..." (http://goliath.ecnext.com/coms2/gi_0199-7011674/Sucking-amps-PIT-PASS-CONVERSATIONS.html)
9-23-07...'Speed Records' cable TV show features White Zombie's 11.555 1/4 mile run at PIR.
10-11-07...White Zombie included in an Associated Press story...What started off as a Portland based story gets distributed world-wide and appears pretty much everywhere!
11-25-07...The 'New York Times' runs a nationally distributed story about White Zombie and NEDRA electric drag racing.
11-30-07...The 'Denver Post' runs a short story about White Zombie and Killacycle.
12-17-07...White Zombie appears in 2007's year end issue of 'ESPN magazine'.
Working with the writer over several weeks of back and forth dialog, a full story was developed that was promised to be a big deal in the sports magazine - by the time the managing editor got through with it however, 90% of the story was on the editing floor and we ended up with an obscure thumbnail in the lower corner of page 68 - guess ESPN isn't all that interested in EVs yet!
At the Street Warriorz EVent during the highlighed race of the night against a red Z06 505 hp Vette, at the far end of the track after White Zombie had beat the super car all the way down the track, the Siamese 8 motor had a major failure when the front motor section's commutator bars lifted, creating brush bounce at high voltage and high current. Tim shut the car down as the Vette roared by at an incredible 123 mph with an 11.827 ET and the win, as White Zombie coasted across the finish line to a 12.074 ET and just 102 mph.
....cranking the Zilla's battery current limit up to the full 1500 max. available amps from the pack, we did manage to get two good runs in with an 11.97 @ 108.56 mph for our first run of the night (running an 11 for the first run of the night has never happened) and an 11.882 @ 109.58 mph for the final run we got in. The 11.8 was the quickest ET any street legal electric car has ever run on lead acid batteries! We still had the 3:70 gears in the car left over from last month's experiment with the lithium batteries. The 2580 lb. car's weight was dropped to just 1858 lbs. in July, and with the car being so light, even with tall 3:70 gears (and a current limit of 1400 amps) the 60 ft. time was an impressive 1.58 seconds. Tim and I reasoned that with the lead pack back in the car and the additional ~ 100 lbs. of the 6 point roll bar, that with the now ~ 2652 lb. curb weight (28 lbs. saved due to an aluminum rear end swap-in), that we should have put the 4:11 gears back in...we were right. The 60 ft. time, even with extra battery amps dialed in, suffered and went up to 1.74 seconds :-( We lost nearly 2/10 seconds right there, so it's reasonable to assume that had we put the 4:11 gears back in, that the 11.8 might have been an 11.6...not too bad, considering the car being nearly 2700 lbs.! The Enersys 14 lb. batteries (formerly Hawker) dished out the 750 amps each without any trauma whatsoever. We 'did' fan cool the packs between runs to keep them from fogging the Lexan covers, and it worked as planned.