Imagine it’s 1973 and you’re an aspiring racer/car builder. Working out of your little shotgun shack, single-car garage, you’ve welded together a pretty sweet little sports racer. Your surfer buddy, who’s good with fiberglass, has fashioned you a sexy and light body to drape over your putative race winner. Despite your lack of resources, you’ve managed to single-handedly cobble together the foundation of a potentially potent Can-Am racer. All the ingredients are there to launch your career—and maybe even a new racing brand name—but you lack the defining component…a serious powerplant. But what if I told you, you could jump into your Country Squire station wagon, drive down the street to your local Volkswagen dealership, and for the cost of a new 911, buy—over the counter—a brand new Porsche 917/30 motor with 1,110-hp, just like the ones the Penske team are currently campaigning? Could that have potentially changed the arc of racing history?
Porsche’s sophisticated, but complicated, turbocharged, 5.4-liter, 12-cyldiner 917/30 motor produced 1,100-hp.
As completely impossible as this scenario may sound, at this year’s SEMA show, FCA (Fiat Chrysler) basically announced the modern day equivalent when they unveiled their upcoming, over-the-counter, performance crate motor, the “Hellephant.” In the first quarter of 2019, you’ll be able to waltz into a Dodge dealer and pick up a brand new, turn-key, supercharged, 426-cu.in. HEMI V8 crate motor that comes from the factory with 1,000 horsepower and 950 lb-ft of torque! According to Dodge’s Mopar performance division, this is the most horsepower ever offered as a crate engine kit by an original equipment manufacturer.
