With racers trying to push 1,000-horsepower shots of nitrous into a single stage system, Nitrous Express is boosting the flow capabilities of its bottle valves and solenoids.
The company showed off a lightweight NX Lightning 500 bottle valve that fits in any sized nitrous bottle with a standard thread but helps keep the juice in a dense liquid form longer before being injected into the engine.
“You get more nitrous flow with less weight,” explains NX’s Ryan Lewis. “It’s also maintenance free, unlike ball-valve style units that need rebuilding over time.”
Comparing cutaways of the NX Lightning 500 and traditional valves clearly demonstrates the advantage of the new design. The fluid makes just a 45-degree to exit the bottle while others can require a 127-degree turn in addition to 45 degrees, and another demands three right-angle turns. Any sharp bend can cause nitrous to prematurely expand from a fluid into a gas. When this happens, the cooling effect happens in the bottle, not in the intake manifold where it’s most effective.
“Lightning 500 also has a .500-inch inside-diameter orifice and piston lift, which is larger than any other bottle,” adds Lewis.
The siphon tube measures .625 and can be trimmed to fit inside any standard nitrous bottle. This allows racers to use up to -10 AN fittings with no restriction.
The Lightning 500 is machined from billet aluminum and is approximately one-half pound lighter than brass or comparable valves.
NX also showed off its new Lightning 375 nitrous solenoid. It too is engineered with only a single internal 90-degree turn in the nitrous flow path and offers a true .375-inch orifice.
“It can flow enough to make a 1,000 horsepower,” says Lewis. “It’s designed for racers in restricted classes that need a lot of flow but are limited to a single stage.”
The Lightning 375 is also designed for progressive use and comes with a -10 inlet and -6 outlet fitting. It’s also offers CNC billet aluminum construction for the base and a true carbon fiber coil cover. NX says it’s about 1.3 pounds lighter than a standard solenoid.