This is a collection of pictures of Doyle Shoenbergers Nissan Maxima after the Nitrous Express bottle ruptured in his trunk inside his garage.
The event pictures below occurred at 4:30 PM EST, Saturday September 4th. The apparent situation is that Mr.Shoenberger intended to race his Maxima that Saturday, but because it was not running perfectly decided not to. At some point that afternoon Mr.Shoenberger left the switch to his bottle heater turned on. He estimates that the heater was of for approximately 2-2 1/2 hours prior to the failure of the bottle. The bottle heater is advertised as producing temperatures up to 400 degrees. Because the bottle valve was turned off, the thermostat for the bottle heater did not "know" to turn off. The heater continued to elevate the pressure inside the bottle as it was intended to do. At some point the the safety valve on the bottle failed to release the pressure. The pressure continued to rise until it caused the bottle to rupture in an explosive manner.
Currently it is not known if this failure was due to a manufacturing flaw, or if it was due to improper installation of the system. Mr.Shoenberger did not have the system installed at a Nitrous Express certified dealer, therefore Nitrous Express cannot be sure that it was installed correctly. Nitrous Express is currently attempting to recover the pieces of the system for analysis.
Nitrous Express Marketing Director assured me that this is only the second failure of a nitrous bottle ever recorded. The first recorded failure was a NOS brand bottle. This is a very unusual occurrence. It simply reinforces the fact that you must have attention to detail when using Nitrous Oxide. I still believe that this is one of the most cost effective ways for the average drag racer to add horsepower. Nitrous Express, and Nitrous Oxide Systems (NOS) are the most knowledgeable companies in the market. They make the highest quality kits available. They are very safe if used properly. Be smart, and be careful.
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All pictures property of Doyle Shoenberger. No copies or reproductions are authorize without express permission of the above.