We're living in a new golden age of performance pickup trucks, but it's not the first one. The Hellcat-powered Ram TRX was preceded not just by the concept from a few years back but also the SRT-10 truck.
It's easy to understand why so many Dodge and muscle car fans obsess over the SRT-10, even though it's only a footnote in the history of Rams. After all, naturally aspirated V10s are currently only found in the Lamborghini Huracan and its Audi sister car.
In the crazy month of January 2002, Dodge introduced a preview concept at the Detroit Auto Show, with the first production model ready by November 2003. It's worth knowing that the SRT division didn't even exist until the following year. Before that, it was known as SVE (Special Vehicle Engineering) or PVO (Performance Vehicle Operations). Basically, these were the engineers who made the Viper and the Prowler.
So the SRT-10 is the foundation of the modern SRT brand. And that means it's connected to the Viper with or without a V10 engine involved since the sports car eventually became the standalone SRT Viper rather than a Dodge.
This next rendering video from YouTuber TheSketchMonkey tries to connect the two by doing a swap of the Viper's "facial" features onto the TRX truck. As the artist explains initially, it's not as easy as overlapping two photos and getting rid of what's not needed.
The light reflections can make a rendering appear uncanny. And in this case, the TRX has red and blue highlights, while the shot of the Viper is simpler. Also, the Ram truck has a clear separation between the lower bumper and the grille to suggest it's nothing like a regular car, and the artist tried to preserve some of that. The artist wants to keep that but needs to turn the Viper's nose into sliced bread.
We don't think Ram will ever put a Viper motor back into its truck. In fact, it's more likely that the next TRX will be some kind of hybrid with the way things are going. But one can still dream of twin-turbocharging a V10 truck.
In the crazy month of January 2002, Dodge introduced a preview concept at the Detroit Auto Show, with the first production model ready by November 2003. It's worth knowing that the SRT division didn't even exist until the following year. Before that, it was known as SVE (Special Vehicle Engineering) or PVO (Performance Vehicle Operations). Basically, these were the engineers who made the Viper and the Prowler.
So the SRT-10 is the foundation of the modern SRT brand. And that means it's connected to the Viper with or without a V10 engine involved since the sports car eventually became the standalone SRT Viper rather than a Dodge.
This next rendering video from YouTuber TheSketchMonkey tries to connect the two by doing a swap of the Viper's "facial" features onto the TRX truck. As the artist explains initially, it's not as easy as overlapping two photos and getting rid of what's not needed.
The light reflections can make a rendering appear uncanny. And in this case, the TRX has red and blue highlights, while the shot of the Viper is simpler. Also, the Ram truck has a clear separation between the lower bumper and the grille to suggest it's nothing like a regular car, and the artist tried to preserve some of that. The artist wants to keep that but needs to turn the Viper's nose into sliced bread.
We don't think Ram will ever put a Viper motor back into its truck. In fact, it's more likely that the next TRX will be some kind of hybrid with the way things are going. But one can still dream of twin-turbocharging a V10 truck.