How do I launch an automatic?

Hey, I was wondering how I should launch my automatic, (like they do in drag racing, or in the fast and the furious, like the very last drag race, with the black car, before the light turns green, both engines get very loud, and then take off very quickly.
To do a manual I know you somehow use the clutch, but how would I go about doing that on an automatic? I've tried holding the brakes and bringing up the rpms, but then the back wheels just start spinning, and I just sit there. Should I put it in neutral then raise the rpms and put it in first? I also tried that too, and it sounded pretty funny and jerked very hard. And also, how much should I bring up the rpms? I'm getting a new engine put in my car in a couple of weeks. It's going to be a 383 with over 550hp. Thanks for the help.

it's called a brake stand..... you take your right foot and press the gas while also taking your left foot and pressing the brake enough so that the car will not move foreward. bring the rpms to about 2500rpms, or enough so that when you release the gas, your motor doesn't bog, and you scoot off the line with just a slight chirp of the tires. that's about it. i'd manually shift the automatic through low, 2, and then into drive to hold it high enough into the power band.

whatever you do, DO NOT do what is known as a "neutral drop" that's where you rev the motor up in neutral, and drop it into drive to launch.... you'll drop that tranny onto the pavement lickity split, buddy.

good luck, and remember- launching a car is an art.... it takes a lot of practice. most importantly, learn to feel what the car wants you to do, as they each have their quirks.

hey, thanks for the tip, but now I have a few other questions...
When I let go of the brake, how much gas should I give it? Should I floor it immedeantly, or do I just ease on it, and how quickly? I was also wondering if I were to shift it manually from first to third, can I hurt the engine or transmission any, and if not, should I ease off the gas before I shift, or just throw it up into the next gear while flooring it? Thanks for the help!

you should keep the throttle at the position that it is in. let the tires hook up, and go foreward. as the car comes off the line, and as the front end starts to settle down, nail the gas. if you floor the gas when you release the brake, all you're gonna do is sit and burn up your tires. you want to get the car to launch right in the area between bog and spin. how you shift depends on your transmission. experiment, and see what works best, and gives you the quickest, firmest shifts with the least amount of part-throttle or no-throttle time.

FASTER THEN YOU!!

Nicely put!! I have a quick question about the neutral to drive thing.
I did that coming out of Fast and Furious just to see what would happen, and the car clunked and then started to move.......how come the
tranny didn't break??

You may need more deatils and such, but i just figured i'd ask.
Post a reply in one of my threads if you have an answer, i've got a few of them out now.

Thanks man, and nice lookin Chevelle!! :sun:

Dude asking the question:

Just so you know, with a manual, you put the clutch in, and hit the gas to about 1500 to 2500 rpms. Then when you want to go, let the clutch out and like FASTER THEN YOU said, hold that gas pedal steady until after the tire spin or you'll burn out.

That's all there is to it.

student- it usually takes more than one time to blow up a tranny from neutral drops... it will happen though if you continue doing it. way back in high school, i knew this jerk-off with an '87 5.0. he'd be runnin around revvin the thing, doing neutral drops, and all kinds of stupid crap. the thing lasted a couple months (maybe 3 at the most) before the tranny blew and he blew a head gasket... the thing was still sitting in his driveway last time i checked, and he had a new one that he was thrashing into the ground

brake torque to 2500 rpm that what i do

altho that does tend to mess up you engine sometimes

nice blanket statement.
that tends to mess up your engine sometimes.
actually, it wont, it would wear your tq converter quicker, but not much else.

Well, I got to thinking today...and I realized that 550hp is a lot for this car. The transmission (witch I think is a 400, but it could be a 350, I'll find out tommorow), the driveshaft, rear axle, and practically everything else in the car is probably not made to handle that much power. I was wondering if anyone knew if the new engine could it damage any parts in the car if I just step on the gas?
I've also seen some people, in much heavier cars, with a bit less horsepower do wheelies....so if they could do it, I don't see why mine could not. My dad said it would probably break the transmission before it did one, but if it were to, how much might I expect the front end to lift off the ground, and when it landed, could it damage anything? Practically everything is stock except a new suspension system (nothing fancy), and some good shocks. I'm not going to install wheelie bars, so if it will do a wheelie, then I'll just have to let off the gas a bit.
I'm also planning on taking it down to the drag strip, and full out racing it every once in a while. I was wondering if there is much potential for anything to happen to the parts in the car, or the engine, especially while flooring it. I'm getting a heavy duty flywheel put in, so that might help a bit, but how often to engines blow or throw a rod or anything?
I would appreciate all your help. I really just want to know how far I can push it, without having to really worry about it, mostly because I drive it every day, and it's my only ride.

Hey welcome to the 'vette community!! I gotta '75 stingray which is still going under some fixing after getting rearended by a drunk last winter. I drive a manual and do stupid things all the time but if ur driving an automatic with 550 hp, there is no reason to even care about peeling ur tires like in fast+fur. All that stuff is for show anyway and will maybe cut ur time a bit but not by much... Just floor it baby!! Maybe u won't get the cool smoke and smell of the tires but u'll definately burn many many people. If u do want to do silly stuff I suggest looking into converting ur manual into an automatic. Alright, hope u have fun with ur car!!!!!!

Do not try to do a wheelie, man. if you do one most likely you will break the axels. Follow what fasterthanu said. I know from experience my friend drive a lightning and its going well into the 12's now. The first run we had we just held the brake then revved it to 1600 RPM and floored it and man he was spinning his wheels all over the place. no traction whatsoever. The best way is just to hold the break rev it till low 1000's then when u feel the wheels grip good floor it works all the time.:ylsuper

oh yea i forgot one more thing, leave the tranny in drive dont drop it to first or second gear. You will be going so fast u will most likely not shift right and either loose time or just watch the tranny fall apart behind you.

I disagree with the last comment here.

Power shifting is an excellent way to race, i do it about 67% of my races, and i kick some serious ass doing so. The drive thing is really
only for guys that don't know how high they can rev their engines, or if they don't have an RPM guage.

The power shifting saves a precious few seconds, and you can ride the gears high and when you pop them into the next the car kicks and you get another 10-15 mph in less then a second. Not to mention you pull
all the power out of the car you can when you shift that way.

The only thing to be carefull of is that you don't hit it hard in 1 or L as
if the car has a good torque to power ratio you'll just sit still and the tires will spin.

That's all from my experiences. :rolleyes:

lanceh007. I just dont put it on 1st gear cuz a smaller gear makes a higher RPM which means blown motor. If you do shift properly you actually loose a lot of time just shifting and you lose a lot of power since the RPM actually go down more if you do it manually. If you let the comp do it the shift will be a lot faster. The greatest benefit is that usually you get much better grip than you do with regular drive. But I mean the best way is to try both ways and see which way you like better its really just personal preference.

Oh yea forgot to say this is crazyjaen for some reason i could not login after the 4th time which was weird:confused:

:finger:

HA letting a comp do the shifting, and I thought owning an old school auto was bad. You guys are lucky though... my first gear wont kick in unless the throttle opens real fast, since the trans kick down cable is attached to the throttle. I do have 2nd, D3 and D4. I just wish I had "1st"


oh and manual shifting an auto is better once you get the hang of it.
My car revs nicely to 7,200 rpm but untill i get my new cam most of my power lies at 5,500 rpm. :)

How many of you have actually gone to a fucking track and raced on a real track. Cuz if u guys ever have its just not smart to do old school shifting. You either get a an air assisted tranny or an auto and u just floor it. :flipa: :finger:

Hey, i've been to the track in my big car, and i do both. Straight line, i just leave it in drive, but when i driving the actual course with the turns and stuff, i use the manual (ie power) shift with my automatic.

I can control the power myself and i've done better then alot of other guys with autos because of it.

:flipa:

ummmmm dude, i've been to the track as well, not to mention i know all the ins and outs, and do's and dont's of racing. first off, when you manually shift a tranny you will get a better ET because you can rev further up into the powerband rather than letting the torque converter pull you out of it and into the next gear too soon. secondly, it will not hurt an automatic tranny to manually shift it provided that it is a tranny designed for high powered/high torque cars. most of the trannys that fit this description are older models made in the 60's such as the TH-350, TH-400, Torquflite, Powerglide, and C6 (these are what is currently used in 99% of drag cars). most of these tranmissions are modified with a higher stall torue converter, reverse manual valvebody etc. for cars putting out over 600-700ft/lbs. these other trannys stock will handle up until that point very reliably. modern trannys, however, aren't very good at all for continuous abuse because they simply aren't engineered for it in terms of the rugedness of their parts

Whats up guys. I'm pretty sure you guys are muscle car dudes but i have an import... sry. I want to know if this power shifting this is ok for me to do im my 2002 Honda civic ex auto. Should i put it in 2...launch the car...then click into 3rd...then into drive, is this ok for me to do.

Originally posted by PoisonFangs
Whats up guys. I'm pretty sure you guys are muscle car dudes but i have an import... sry. I want to know if this power shifting this is ok for me to do im my 2002 Honda civic ex auto. Should i put it in 2...launch the car...then click into 3rd...then into drive, is this ok for me to do.

were not all muscle car guys here... i prefer imports. anyways...

i would think to just leave your car in "D". it would be good if u could get on a track and compare times doing it both ways, or at least use a friends car as a baseline of some sort and race him a few times both ways.

Will it hurt my engine in any way if i do it

your engine? no, not unless u hold the gear and redline the hell out of it or bounce off the rev limiter all day. if u have any i.q. at all it wont hurt your engine. your transmission might be another story...

Dude sorry i did not write the word transmission, It was very early in the morn. give me a break bro.

it SHOULDNT hurt your transmission either, but i dont know for sure if it would for your specific car, so im not gonna say for sure.

ok geniuses, this is how it's done.

faster cars (350 hp plus) run faster with a manually shifted automatic because a stock transmission is setup to shift the car if it had a stock powerband. with a modified engine, you move the power band up so you must manually shift it.
also, the torque converter has absolutely nothing with where the transmission shifts gears in relation to the rpm band. a torque converter's effect on a vehicle disappears as soon as the rpms climb above that of the converter's stall speed.

and for those of you who have seen a car older than 1995, a transmission as old as a th400 or th350 does not have a computer (crazy jane). it has valve bodies, pistons, springs and valves that control the shifts and the firmness of the shifts depending on the line pressure of the fluid inside the transmission. air assisted transmissions such as lenco's and jerico's cost upwards of 14000 dollars american and are not built for street duty.

and there isn't a stock transmission that exists today that will handle 700 ft /lbs torque race cars, at least not for any length of time.

Originally posted by chebbiesux
and there isn't a stock transmission that exists today that will handle 700 ft /lbs torque race cars, at least not for any length of time.

i have an article of a toyota supra running 1400hp on the stock 6-speed.

hell theres a camaro in my backyard with a stock turbo 400 putting out around 600hp and 700-750 torque on spray. had that tranny for 3 years now, and its a drag only car so u cant say its been driven easy.

okay, well, i shouldn't have been so outright in my opinion on stock tranny's.
i myself have never seen a stock one that can take that much power, but i get surprised every day by shit that i didn't think was possible so, forgive me

by the way, is it just me or do those half headlight covers make your subaru look stoned all the time?

Originally posted by chebbiesux
by the way, is it just me or do those half headlight covers make your subaru look stoned all the time?

ha! its better than the way they look stock! :hehe:

theyre not covers actually i took the headlights apart and took out the trim ring inside of them and painted it.

well, that's actually really cool.
yeah, i agree, they look way too happy when they are the factory appearing way.
but, to each his own i guess

Originally posted by chebbiesux
yeah, i agree, they look way too happy when they are the factory appearing way.

in a dodge neon sort of way... :rolleyes: but i like the way they look now that i painted them

I used to drive a manual as well, it was a 2000 v6 mustang (yes, a v6 mustang but it still had a decent amount of power). Just like what student said, I had the clutch in and revved it to about 2000 RPMs at least (for that car other than 1st gear, the power started kicking in at at least 2500 RPMs). Then I would just dump the clutch and start power shifting all the way up to 5th gear. I've never done it with an automatic before but I know that my friend drives a '94 mercedes e320 and all he does is floor it right from idle. Now I drive an automatic IS 250 and am now wondering, can I just rev it up to 2000 RPMs (just like what I used to do with my mustang) while braking and then just launch from there? Or should I try to find where my stall point is? Oh and I'm planning on using paddle shifters, I don't plan on using just D. I tried flooring it from idle and it just wasn't fast enough for me.