Mustang Gets a 2,000-Horsepower Big Block V8, Becomes Burnout Machine

All that did not stop Westen Champlin from building a 1,500-horsepower Mustang just to do burnouts. Unfortunately for him, the first version of the build blew up after just ten minutes. In case you are unaware of this, doing burnouts is extremely stressful on the entire driveline, as it involves having the engine at high revs, but without the cooling that comes with speed.

The transmission is equally stressed when doing burnouts, and we have not mentioned half shafts, differentials, or clutches yet. Any of those components may fail during a burnout, and if they do, the failure is a ferocious one.

If you have never seen a video of a flywheel explode, together with the bell housing of the transmission, you might understand why sitting close to a vehicle doing a burnout is incredibly dangerous, and doing a long burnout is a bad idea even in a vehicle meant to do those. To be fair, it was not the case with Westen's build, as something else blew up.

Fortunately, nobody was injured in the first attempt at making a burnout Mustang with a big block V8. The vehicle was then left on a field until Westen managed to find a different way of making his dream come true. While he did not mention any figures of his previous build, a 540-Cui (ca. 8.84-liter) blown V8 that delivers over 1,400 horsepower costs about $35,000.

The price we mentioned is for a forced induction big block Chevy V8 made by a company that specializes in building such units. Usually, these blown big blocks are deployed in drag racing applications, which are an entirely different kind of load for a vehicle. A drag race takes just a couple of seconds with this kind of horsepower, while doing burnouts can take as much as the tires will hold.

In the case of this build, the tires did not fail fast enough to save the engine so Westen got himself a 2,000-horsepower blown big block V8 that runs on alcohol, which is a layperson's term for E100, or pure ethanol.

Purely as a reference, the same company that quoted the 1,400-horsepower engine mentioned above, Steve Schmidt Racing, also sells a 2,000-horsepower big block V8, and it is priced at $49,950. While Westen's build may have had a different price for the engine, it probably was in the ballpark of this value.

Do not forget to account for a specialized transmission to withstand all that power and torque, as well as stiffer half shafts, driveshafts, and a strong rear axle. Overall, this may become an expensive build, and we have already blown past what a stock Mustang used to cost. Get used to the idea if you ever want to get involved in motorsport.