 |
A rear-wheel-drive production car shouldn’t be able to put down 840 horsepower fast enough to hit 1.8 g’s of acceleration — but Dodge’s Challenger SRT Demon does exactly that. Engineering Explained breaks down the actual physics behind the feat, down to the equation governing tire grip, while also unpacking a rollout-measurement detail that makes the Demon’s 2.3-second 0-60 time even more impressive than it looks. Dodge’s own executives confirmed the correction directly to the Detroit News.
Not every SEMA show car is built to be photographed, this 2016 Camaro SS was built to be tested. ScottieDTV’s coverage reveals it served as the actual development mule for GM’s new LT1 engine before Lingenfelter Performance Engineering added a Magnuson supercharger and reshaped its output entirely. The wheels and exhaust came almost as an afterthought. What LPE actually did under the hood is the part worth understanding before you write this one off as just another show floor build.
This 1963 Chevrolet Nova looks like a clean product of the Kennedy era until you notice the LS engine, custom wheels, and aggressive stance underneath, then the comments start arguing about something else entirely. ScottieDTV’s walk-around at the 2017 World of Wheels in Birmingham caught visible cracks in the two-tone paint, sparking a debate over whether it’s a build flaw or trailer transport damage. The interior, though, drew nothing but praise. Which side of the argument would you land on?
John’s widebody Hellcat Challenger cost $83,000, and according to this video, it’s developed damage again — the kind that’s split his comment section between “take it to the dealer immediately” and “that’s just modern Hellcat ownership.” Between an electrical tape debate and a stability control fault viewers are tracing back to the shocks, this is less a build reveal than a real-time look at what owning a heavily modified, six-figure-adjacent Mopar actually involves. Watch to see what breaks next.
A 1956 Buick Special barn find doesn’t usually come with a $900,000 price tag, but this one earned it: twin turbos strapped to a 401 Nailhead V8 push output to roughly 800 horsepower, backed by Ride Tech suspension and a Corvette C6 independent rear end. The Nailhead’s origins as a quiet 236-horsepower luxury engine make the transformation even more remarkable. Here’s what makes this one of the more unexpected restomod builds in the muscle car world.
Dodge’s Demon shipped on genuine drag radial tires straight from the factory, a first for any production street car, but those tires were too wide for the main assembly line to handle. Read on to find out how Dodge solved a manufacturing problem nobody had ever faced before, and why owning one comes with a strange winter-storage rule.
At an RT66 Test N Tune event in 2015, Rich Kent’s E85-fueled 1962 Mercury Comet did something a brand-new 707-horsepower Dodge Challenger Hellcat never expected: it beat it clean off the line. The video’s own description reveals the Hellcat had run nearly three seconds quicker just a week earlier, turning a simple grudge race into a years-long argument about driving versus horsepower. Watch to see the run that started the controversy.
Ford built the Shelby GT350’s Voodoo V8 to rev to 8,250 rpm with zero turbochargers anywhere near it. A shop in Martinsville, Indiana had other plans, bolting on twin turbos for staged packages up to 1,400 horsepower. Read on to find out what it takes to nearly triple a purist engine’s output without losing what makes it distinct.
The Ranchero occupied a strange spot in Ford’s lineup — part car, part truck, and rarely taken seriously by muscle car buyers chasing a Mustang or Torino instead. This 1969 GT changes that calculation entirely by packing a 428 Cobra Jet under the hood. Read on to find out how a car-truck hybrid ended up with one of the most feared engines of the entire muscle car era.
Adam Savage and Jamie Hyneman set out to answer one of engineering’s stranger questions: can square wheels actually deliver a smooth ride? The catch is what they had to build to make it work — a custom road shaped by a very specific mathematical curve. The result reveals a surprising truth about the relationship between wheels, roads, and ride quality that applies to more than just square tires. Watch to see the geometry in action.
An ’08 Smart Car running a boosted Toyota Paseo engine lined up against a Shelby Mustang on a Colorado test-and-tune night, and the first run nearly ended in a wheelstand before the car even left the line. By the second pass, the tiny hatchback had cut its time to 12.53 at 107 mph and put the Mustang on the trailer. Drag racing regulars in the comments call it one of the purest sleeper builds they have seen. Watch to see exactly how a car this small pulls it off.
This 1970 Pontiac Firebird now runs a 632-cubic-inch big block making 853 horsepower on pump gas, built by Bulletmotorsports with no expense spared and featured on a magazine cover. But according to commenters with apparent firsthand knowledge, the car originally ran a smaller Butler Pontiac engine already making 850 horsepower and running 9-second quarter miles, sparking a real debate about whether the swap was an upgrade or a mistake. Watch to see the build and decide for yourself.
The 1965 Buick Riviera Gran Sport was the first year Buick attached that badge to its personal luxury coupe, and the package hid a genuinely serious performance setup under all that plush trim. Dual four-barrel carburetors, a stiffened chassis and a limited-slip rear turned a two-and-a-half-ton cruiser into something that could embarrass much lighter cars. This particular build adds a custom interior, aftermarket wheels and a lowered stance without losing what made the car special. Read on for what the Gran Sport package really included.
A 1968 Mustang fastback is already one of the most recognizable shapes Ford ever built, so what does a pro-touring build actually change? Almost everything you cannot see. Modern stroker small-blocks, independent front suspension, four-piston brakes, and a chassis stiff enough to use real tires turn a fifty-year-old body into something that runs with contemporary performance cars. Here is what separates a serious build from a repaint with wheels.
This 1929 Ford Model A pickup keeps its century-old shape but swaps everything underneath for modern Ford hardware: a 351 Windsor crate V8, a C6 automatic, and a Ford nine-bolt rear end, all tied together with four-wheel disc brakes. The all-Ford drivetrain is a deliberate choice in a restomod world where builders often mix brands freely. 1929 also marked the year Ford introduced the closed-cab pickup, quickly overtaking the open roadster body this truck wears. The result is a genuinely drivable classic built around one brand’s parts bin.