Watch as this NHRA supercharger gets rebuilt between rounds

Just about anyone who has taken on DIY projects has some familiarity with working on a deadline. Whether it’s your spouse needing to be able to drive to work on Monday or salvaging the tiny amount of joy left in a road trip by quickly patching something up to get moving again, the concept of not only needing a job done but done right now is familiar to us all. Yet even in our most hurried moments, we are positively glacial compared to an NHRA Top Fuel competitor’s pit crew. Need proof? Watch in real time as John Force Racing’s Hunter Hagen services a supercharger between rounds.

Top Fuel engines are carefully contained sticks of dynamite, and even when a quarter-mile pass goes as intended, there is still a lot of work to be done between rounds. Every component of the engine comes off or out and is inspected before rebuilding, replacement, or reuse. The massive supercharger force-feeding air into the eight cylinders is no different and gets a full refresh after each run. Hagen is the man who single-handedly takes care of this job, and does it quickly.

The process starts by pulling the blower and mounting it to a custom fixture at the end of a table, a safe distance from the even more hectic work being done on the engine as it is still mounted in the chassis. The front and rear covers are pulled, then the pair of rotors is yanked out and taken into one of the team’s large trailers. Inside is a bench specially set up for removing and installing the seals on the rotors, and Hagen makes quick work of stripping, replacing, and finally precisely trimming the fresh seals. After a quick wipe down and lubrication, it’s back out to the table outside to start putting everything back together.

Watching the process along the way, I was surprised by the, well, aggression with which the parts could be handled. Just minutes after using a dial indicator to set fraction-of-an-inch specifications to the rotor seals, those same rotors were being “pressed” into the case with big blows from a soft-faced hammer. Racing is always a balance of skill and bravery. I’m not sure I’m brave enough to whack anything on a car that goes over 300 mph with a hammer, but there is a reason Hagen has that job and not me.

This process seems simple at first glance, but that is more than likely the experience and confidence of a well-prepared crew shining through. This video appears to be filmed at a more relaxed race weekend, not between knock-out or final rounds at an NHRA championship event, but even while he’s being peppered with questions and distractions while working, Hagen has the supercharger ready to drop onto the engine long before the 45-minute mark. Impressive rebuild and impressive time.

Of course, 3.91 seconds after the green light, it’s time to do it all again.

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