Then known as Fiat Chrysler, the Auburn Hills-based automaker wowed everyone in 2014 with the introduction of the 6.2-liter supercharged HEMI. Better known as the Hellcat engine, this cam-in-block design was taken to an insane 840 horsepower in the Demon.
Produced in 3,300 units for the 2018 model year, the Challenger SRT Demon is the world’s first production vehicle designed for octanes higher than 100. The unleaded race fuel is the secret to the 840 horsepower mentioned in the introduction, joined by 770 pound-feet (1,044 Nm) of torque at 4,500 revolutions per minute.
Industry firsts don’t end here, though. The Demon is the first production vehicle to be installed from the factory with street-legal drag radials. The SRT Power Chiller is designed to redirect air conditioning refrigerant to the chiller unit. What’s more, the After-Run Chiller uses the cooling fan and low-temp coolant pump to lower the charge air cooler temperature, minimizing heat soak.
TransBrake, Torque Reserve, narrow front runner wheels, front passenger seat delete, and rear seat delete also need to be mentioned. A high-octane unicorn, the Demon is no longer in production. The most powerful street-legal Hellcat engine available in 2023 makes 807 ponies and 707 pound-feet (959 Nm), with said engine used in the sixth of seven “Last Call” special editions.
The seventh should have been ready for the Consumer Electronics Show, but alas, it will debut on March 20th at The Strip at Las Vegas Motor Speedway during the Dodge Last Call Powered by Roadkill Nights Vegas.
Described as “the ultimate Dodge special edition vehicle,” the mystery car has been teased in the guise of a red goblin of sorts. The video doesn’t reveal anything about said vehicle, but we can safely assume that Dodge prepares to retire the LX platform with a huge bang.
Last year, during the 2022 SEMA Show in Las Vegas, big kahuna Tim Kuniskis revealed that Dodge ran into a few engine-related issues. The chief executive officer told the media that his engineering team grenaded seven Hellcats to certify the powerplant in the yet-unnamed “Last Call” muscle car. He also let it slip that said high-output engine powers the Challenger, not the Charger.
It would’ve been very simple for Kuniskis’ engineering team to shoehorn a Hellephant under the hood, but as you’ve probably guessed by now, the 7.0-liter crate engine wasn’t designed for production vehicle duty cycles. That’s why no fewer than seven Hellcat engines were blown up during testing, with Dodge ironing out potential issues before the start of series production.
The big question is just how much horsepower can we expect from the (let’s call it) Goblin specification? 900? Maybe 1,000? Aftermarket companies have already taken the 6.2 to the 1,000-horsepower mark. Hennessey Performance Engineering comes to mind with their HPE1000 package, which is backed up by a two-year warranty. Whatever the actual horsepower figure may be, there’s no denying it’ll eclipse the Demon’s 840.
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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