1,400-HP Twin-V8 Monster Truck With Radioactive 2,500-HP Jet Gets Stuck in Snow

Cody Detwiler is the YouTuber renowned the world over for his shenanigans with absurdly expensive equipment – he bought an exact model of the Killdozer. He hauled it to the town of Grandby, Colorado, just for the fun of it. He also talked to locals who eye-witnessed the rampage in June 2004.

A couple of years ago, he bought a tank from England. A proper main battle tank, which he promptly converted to a remote-controlled smasher and crusher. And before that, he built a monster truck. It is a humongous machine with two Duramax diesel engines, each producing roughly 700 hp. After several adventures where the oversized vehicle experienced its fair share of mechanical abuse and destruction, the YouTuber decided to upgrade it, power-wise.

With the possibility of adding a third reciprocating-pistons engine being relatively slim, the solution came in the form of a fighter jet powerplant fitted under the truck’s bed. The British-developed Viper 11 fires 3,000 lbf of thrust (13.3 kN), enough to push the massive pickup truck through six feet (1.8 meters) of snow in the mountains of Utah. That’s where the popular vlogger took his jet-powered toy to play with a bunch of other social media content creators.

Surprisingly, the giant vehicle isn’t the best tool for driving in deep snow – its fat tires quickly dig through, and the Monstermax gets stuck. That’s when having a jet engine handy comes into play – the big truck pushes through – only to get stuck again in deeper snow. Luckily, the YouTubers’ gathering was logistically backed by a heavy-hauling vlogger (HeavyDSparks) and his snow-rescuing equipment. The second video is a pretty accurate depiction of what it's like to tow the enormous truck around.

The Monstermax is a constant source of mechanical challenges for its proprietor – mostly because he thrashes it around like it’s purposefully striving to destroy it. With the rear combustion engine temporarily out of service – due to overrevving mishaps that ended in a belt flying off its pulley – the Monstermax truck has to make do with the front diesel powerplant.

I must admit, few things are more epic than this abomination rolling coal from all its exhaust pipes while simultaneously shrieking like a fighter jet doing a low pass. Obviously, playing in the snow is not a custom monster truck’s cup of tea, but lighting the campfire is an easy finger-snapping job (having a flame-thrower of an engine mounted to its underbelly helps).

The gargantuan pickup truck has two classic V8 Duramax LBZ diesel engines, 6.6 liters and 700 horsepower each. It might sound like an overkill, but the whole thing weighs in at 22 tons – the axles alone account for 12 of those tons (six on each axle).

Two 75-liter fuel tanks feed the engines to keep the tires rolling – the largest agricultural tires Goodyear can supply, the Optitrac LSW1400 / 30R46 by Titan Tire from the Goodyear Extreme Flotation series with Low Sidewall Technology (LSW). Each tire weighs around 680 kg (1,50 lbs), and triple 30-inch-travel shocks are affixed to each wheel.

As for the jet engine, it’s a British design developed in the early 50s and improved over the years, with the last iterations being retired from service in 2011. According to its owner, the version installed on the monster contraption develops around 3,000 lbs of thrust (a rough equivalent of some 2,500 hp).

One killer feature of this jet powerplant is that it's slightly radioactive, being built from thorium alloy. Watch the Geiger counter crackle like fireworks when the YouTuber takes a reading of the radiation levels emitted by the outside casing of the engine.