During a recent test-drive event organized by Dodge, a certain fellow undressed the blown 6.2-liter HEMI Hellcat V8 of another secret, a pretty big one to be frank. Believe it or not, this mill delivers a mammoth 411 pound-feet (557 Nm) of twist from 1,200 rpm.
Yes, it's not the 707 horsepower and 650 lb-ft (881 Nm) full nelson, of course, but that's a lot of torque from way low in the rev range. Thanks to this low-end chunk of torque, 2015 Dodge Charger SRT Hellcat chief engineer Darryl Smith declared that this is for the best for both street and track use.
Whereas the full potential of the 6.2 supercharged HEMI Hellcat V8 can be experienced from 4,000 rpm upward, those 411 lb-ft built up at just 1,200 rpm translate to almost instant throttle response. Thanks to that, the low-end grunt helps with driving SRT Hellcat models smoothly in stop and go traffic.
For comparison's sake, the original 5.7-liter "new HEMI" produces a peak torque of 410 lb-ft round at 4,800 rpm, while the Hellcat isn't even unleashing its full potential at a mere 1,200 revs. To boot, the Hellcat mill shares just 10 percent of its components with the naturally aspirated 392 (6.4L) HEMI V8.
That's because SRT added bigger and tougher everything to handle the extra oomph offered by the 2.4-liter IHI supercharger, which runs at 14,6k rpm at over 11 psi of boost. On an ending note, it's pretty impressive how the supercharger takes 80 horsepower from the engine just to put it in motion, while the entire engine assembly sucks up 30,000 liters of air per minute to produce those 707 hellish ponies.
After a 1:43 scale model of a Ferrari 250 GTO sparked Mircea's interest for cars when he was a kid, an early internship at Top Gear sealed his career path. He's most interested in muscle cars and American trucks, but he takes a passing interest in quirky kei cars as well. Full profile
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