Drag Racing CBR250R Dragster

Well, sort of...

Popped in to the NZ Nationals while touring around in NZ. The Kiwi's have always fascinated me as they are fearless when it comes to doing things outside the "norm".

NZ Drag Races are no different. In Australia and most other countries there is a class called "Junior Dragster". It's a class for youngsters wanting to drag race. The class was actually "invented" by the Kiwis in the late 80's and the rest of the world picked it up along the way. Google "Junior Dragster" if you want full details about the class, but the basics are a rear engine dragster with a 90-150 inch wheelbase and powered by a single-cylinder Briggs & Stratton engine developing 3-8HP depending on the tune and configuration. They are raced over an 1/8 mile and can go as quick as 7.9 seconds! All the cars look the same other than paint and wings etc. Why am I telling you this? Well, those Kiwis aren't happy with the "norm" and I found several vehicles that I wanted to share with the forum.

First up, and my favourite, is a junior dragster designed around the FED (Front Engine Dragster) layout. This thing runs a CBR250R engine and pops 3 foot wheelies on the launch. The young lady that drives it (that's her cleaning it) has run a 10.3 over the 1/8 mile and hopes to go quicker (I'm sure she will).

I'll add some more vehicle when I get a chance, so for the timebeing please enjoy something very different.

 

Unfortunately, it started raining soon after I took these pics, so never got the chance to take video of a run. I'm guessing there'll be some on youtube soon enough.

 

Sorry Spot. I should have been more specific with model numbers. Murdo has clarified what I meant.

I was talking to the builder (the girls father) about his creation. He was saying the whole setup is new and they haven't started working on the engine yet. I asked why he didn't have a set of wheelie bars on it and he said that was his next job after this meeting. He didn't realise it would wheelie like it does. The engine is in a very poor state of tune and he says it tends to run on three cylinders and the forth one joins in when it feels like it!

 

Okay, next vehicle...

This vehicle isn't anything to do with 2fiftycc, but it is something a few of us keep suggesting ANDRA or the IHRA do in Australia. It's a Junior Dragster Motorcycle. Again, aimed at 15 years and under people that want to drag race a motorcycle over an 1/8 mile. A few people in Australia have tried getting this idea off the ground, most notably Heathcote Park Raceway that ran an "Outlaw" style 250cc class for the young ones a few years back. I posted a pic of one of the bikes that raced in that class somewhere on this forum.

Anyhoot, the following Junior Dragster Bike is a 125cc 2-stroke engined bike built using a pit bike for quite a few of the bits (forks etc). The young man that rides it looks about 14 and weighs about half my weight. He's running 13.5 on the 1/8 mile and again, his dad and friends are looking to make him go faster. I saw him run in qualifying and he was on a solo, but I expect they'll let him run against the junior dragsters as he's the only JD bike out there. He looks pretty cool when he's on a run too.

 

Lucky last...

It had started raining so my wife was keen to bugger off, otherwise I would have taken a few more pics and had a chat to the owner/builder. This is a Junior Dragster Funny Car. It was running with the other junior dragsters, so a little more variety for the show. It's no secret that many people in Australia feel the Junior Dragster class is boring unless you're participating, but I'd bet more people would be interested in watching if instead of just one style of vehicle there was rear-engine dragsters, front-engine dragsters, funny cars and bikes all running! Hats off to the Kiwis, it looks like they're evolving the class to its next logical level.

As for the Junior Dragster Funny Car, I guess it's just a rear engine dragster with a body on it and modifications to the front wheels etc. A bit like the mid-engine Funny Cars of the seventies that never amounted to much (other than Jim Dunn's car).

There were no 2fiftycc bikes running, but there were a lot of supercharged 500cc bikes. I don't want to post too much non-2fiftycc stuff on the forum, but I will add to this thread if others want me to.

Cheers

 

Hi Greg,

Thanks for your post. Does the FED Junior Dragster look familiar to you? The owner said the engine isn't in good shape and he hasn't done any work on it yet.

 

Okay, for all the folks that want to see a few non-2fiftycc pics from the drags I've put most of the ones I think are interesting in this post, so anyone who isn't interested can skip the entire thing.

First up are some of the bikes from the meet. I didn't include the normal street bikes as we all know what they look like. Instead I was surprised at how many supercharged bikes there were. In Australia we tend to turbo our drag bikes until you get into the Nitro class and then it's supercharging as the norm. At this NZ meet, I found many supercharged bikes in the pits. some were quick, but nothing earth turning. It was just interesting to see such variety.



The only Nitro bike in attendance (as far as I could see) was this Harley. In fact there were no Nitro vehicles at all! no Top Fuel or Nitro Funny Cars. The only Funny Car was a jet powered exhibition vehicle.



There was quite a few Alcohol vehicles and, as a Nostalgia fan, I was pleased to see some of them were in the FED configuration.



And lastly, the oddities. Vehicles that you might not see too often, let alone being drag raced. For Jo (@Jo Verhelst) and our European friends I included a twin-turbo Vauxhall. Enjoy.

 

Hello Cindy, Welcome to the forum. Thanks for uploading the pics of you driving your special FED Junior Dragster. How did you go? What was your best run? There are heaps of CBR250R people on this forum, so your dad can ask any questions he wants about tuning etc. There's also a good guide to teardown and rebuild for performance at this link

https://www.dropbox.com/sh/x1m7hzedjmceysg/AACtUSSb5MLZDe8Hbr3DoJFQa?dl=0

Frank