The Dodge Viper may have bowed out a few years ago, but it's still fresh in minds of performance fans. In a world of high-revving V10 supercar engines, the big pushrod 10-pot has a sound all its own. Catching a Viper doing dyno pulls is a great way to capture the engine's essence, and that's exactly what we get in this Hoonigan video.
The car in question is a 2014 Viper GTS. It carries the thumping 8.4-liter version of the V10, generating 640 horsepower (477 kilowatts) at a relatively lazy 6,200 RPM. Torque is 600 pound-feet (813 Newton meters) at 5,000 revs. Compared to the 5.2-liter V10 in the Lamborghini Huracan Evo, the Viper's engine has a redline over 2,000 revs lower. And lest we forget, the Viper's engine was originally developed by Lamborghini way back in the 1980s. 10 cylinders, but two very different ways of using them to make big power.
Speaking of which, that's the focus of this video. It's part of the Hoonigan's Dyno Everything series, where guesses are made on power output prior to the car making three pulls. Figuring an average driveline loss of 15 percent, a stock 640-hp Viper should show around 544 hp at the rear wheels. The owner of this car says the only upgrades are an exhaust system and an engine tune, so power should be at least a little bit higher than normal. The big question is, how much higher will it be?
Of course, chassis dyno numbers can vary significantly depending on the type of dyno used, atmospheric conditions during the test such as temperature and humidity, and the information entered into the computer. Errors are certainly possible, lest we forget the early C8 Chevrolet Corvette dyno test that showed significantly higher stats than expected.
For this session, three guesses are offered ranging from 558 hp to 599 hp. The first two dyno runs see 549 hp, but what about the third? Do you have any guesses on whether the last pull is higher or lower? Regardless, everyone wins thanks to a V10 soundtrack that sounds as good now as it did in 1992 when the Viper first hit the streets.
Need more horsepower? Check out the Rambling About Cars podcast with the Ram TRX Havoc and more, available below.
