Top Fuel Dragsters and Funny Cars are the most rapidly-accelerating vehicles in existence on the planet, at least as far as cars that put power down through old fashioned tire-to-asphalt friction. Over the past several decades, modern fuel cars have taken what began as a wildly diverse smattering of setups, combinations and layouts in the infancy of the class and fine-tuned the bodies, engines and drivetrains into the current cookie-cutter dragster and Funny Car we all know today. Cookie-cutter isn’t meant so much as an insult here as it is to describe the uniformity in the class. Walk through the professional pits at any NHRA event, and without sponsorship livery and paint schemes, I seriously doubt you could tell one car from any other.

The recipe, despite its lack of diversity, is an effective one; 526 cubic inch Hemi engine, big top-mounted roots supercharger, direct drive transmission, mega fuel systems, huge wings and monster tires. Some estimates have power outputs of a single blown Top Fuel engine at upwards of 8,000 horsepower. Crew chiefs know the combination so well that they make minute adjustments to the clutches and fuel system and can dial that ridiculous power in almost as consistently as a bracket car.

Now, imagine if Dale Armstrong, Tim Richards, or Alan Johnson had spent decades with the same kind of dedication to extracting as much power as possible from a similar turbocharged combination as they did blown combination we all know so well today. Just think about it: in almost all cases where supercharged combos are paired head-to-head with turbocharged entries, turbos make more overall horsepower and generate considerably more top end speed. The only area where blown entries really have an advantage is the first 150′ or so, after that, the boosted cars pull away consistently.

At first it seems almost silly, but before you write off the notion of boosted fuel dragsters, check out this video.

That’s right, folks. All the way back in 1984, somebody actually had the notion to try a turbocharger mounted atop a nitromethane-fueled engine. From what we can tell, the car was driven by a fellow by the name of Ron Smith, but not much more info is available. The results are obviously inconclusive at best, given the only footage we could find of the car show runs ended in early tires moke, but you can certainly tell by the tone of the engine and the launches before tirespin sets in that the car had a LOT of power. During our reading about the car, we also found some information on another early innovation that shaped the way these cars are tuned even to this very day.

Image credit: Jim Hatley Racing

The same year the turbocharged ‘digger’ in the video was being put through its paces, Jim Hatley was developing one of the earliest data acquisition systems used in drag racing, and his website about the Data Logger points to yet another turbocharged Top Fueler, this one equipped with his data logger box. It would also appear that the same car featured in the video above was, at some point in the 1984 season, equipped with a device similar to Hatley’s. If you look closely at the rear of the car, you can spot what was deemed a “fifth wheel” that was used as a sensor for the data acquisition system to measure speed and acceleration. As Hatley points out, the wheel would sometimes bounce and skew the data, but once they got it set right, it served as a great tool. You can see more of Hatley’s devices here.

If you or anybody in your circle of gearheads knows anything about these cars, or any other boosted fuel cars from eras past, please comment below. We would love to know, and share, more information about these awesome cars and what could have been if the technology had been pursued.