Imagine working for Dodge in the late 1950s, where a small group of engineers at the Chrysler Engineering Institute were OBSESSED with going fast. They spent their free time finding ways to make cars go faster, and they would eventually develop the now LEGENDARY 426 Hemi.
The engineers involved called themselves the Ramchargers, and they went on to build some of the fastest, nastiest cars the world had ever seen. Fast forward to today, and Dodge has given us the most unapologetic car to ever roll off ANY factory floor: the Demon.
The Demon is a purpose-built, no-compromises, BARELY street legal drag car that ALMOST didn’t happen. It’s Dodge’s way of sending off and celebrating the end of their V8 powered muscle cars.
With the changing landscape towards stricter emissions standards, Dodge found themselves in an interesting position. They knew they needed SOMETHING to take the Viper’s place as their halo car, but they were NEVER going to get approval to build anything from the ground up.
So, the team at SRT channeled their inner John and Horace and, with a little inspiration from the Ramchargers, decided to build the nastiest car they could think up: the Demon.
This car is 200LBS lighter than the Hellcat and has a built-in line lock system to make warming up your rear tires easy. It also has a built-in trans brake – the first time ever a factory option from any automaker. But making a car that heavy go that fast took more than just a 2.7-liter supercharger with an intercooler that literally uses the air conditioner to drop intake temps.
The Demon 170 runs on E85, pump gas, or a mix of anything in between. It’s making 40% more boost than the Hellcat and does 0-60 in just 1.66 seconds and the ¼ mile in 8.91 @151.7 MPH. It’s THE FIRST 8-second production car in history and rides on Carbon fiber wheels wrapped in outrageous Mickey Thompson Street R drag radials.
Dodge committed to a fully electric future, and this will be the last of the devilishly crazy huge horsepower fossil-burning machines to come from the madmen at Mopar. The Demon is a legendary muscle car built by madmen, and we’ll never see cars like these built like it ever again.
