For its farewell to the fossil-fuel era, Dodge has revealed what it claims to be the fastest-accelerating production car in the world, capable of smashing the 60mph (97km/h) landmark in as little as 1.66 seconds.
The Challenger SRT Demon 170 is “the seventh and final Dodge “Last Call” special-edition vehicle, and history’s first-ever eight-second factory muscle car,” said the American automaker.
The intimidating Dodge delivers a mountain-shifting 764kW and 1,281Nm from a supercharged 6.2-litre, V8 block on an E85 ethanol-fuel blend and turns the rear tyres only via an eight-speed automatic gearbox with patent-pending TransBrake 2.0 technologies.
TransBrake enables the transmission to select both first and reverse at the same time when lined up for a drag, allowing the driver to hold down the throttle without transmitting power to the drive components.
During its official acceleration run, the Demon 170 clocked the highest G-force of any production car before it at 2.004 gs whilst completing the quarter-mile (402m) drag in 8.91 seconds at 243km/h.
These figures result in an official NHRA (National Hot Rod Association) violation letter for running a sub-nine-second quarter-mile without a safety cage and parachute.
Only one part left untouched
It’s not like the standard Demon was anything to scoff at, it produced 626kW and was the fastest quarter-mile car ever built when it launched in 2018, but that wasn’t enough for this Last Call halo model.
To produce the monstrous power figures the 170 is capable of, Dodge reworked nearly the entire drivetrain with the standard Demon’s camshaft being “the only significant part untouched,” said the manufacturer.
The most notable upgrades from the original to the Last Call are extensive and include a modified 3.0-litre supercharger with a larger snout, a 30%-stronger rear prop shaft, half-shafts with revised heat treatment, revised rear suspension with drag optimisation, and fender flares.
On top of this, the 170 sees an entirely new driveline with strengthened housings, a larger ring and pinion, a 53%-stronger rear axle, a reshaped differential housing, larger cover-mount fasteners, and an increased case depth.
To make sure the apex Demon doesn’t lose grip when sending all its power to the tarmac, it gets Mickey Thompson ET Street R drag radials, too, which have never been offered on a production car before, and the option exists to swop out the standard 17-inch alloy rims for two-piece carbon fibre wheels for additional weight savings.
A bunch of finer adjustments were also made to the engine power components as well as the fuel rail and its injectors, allowing the Dodge to burn through 242 litres of fuel in an hour should it want to.
Apart from the underlying components, the burly muscle car underwent cosmetic changes through the removal of the front flares to cut 7kg from the kerb weight, as well as the installation of a model-specific “Air-Grabber” hood and “Air Catcher” headlights that maximises air intake.
Furthermore, it boasts the SRT Power Chiller feature that diverts cool air from the climate control system to the supercharger intercooler for optimal temperatures when running drags.
An updated Drag Mode is also included, as are “performance pages” in the infotainment system that provide customisable settings for the transmission, suspension, steering, and more.
Even the purchasing experience is bespoke for the Last Call Challenger.
Each buyer of the 3,300 units that will be produced gets a commemorative Demon decanter set with personalized and serialized owner information and an available customized Goodwool car shell.
Owners of the original 2018 model who secure a 170 allocation will also be able to match the same vehicle identification number as their first Demon.
The muscle car starts at a not-that-bad-but-still-expensive $96,666 (R1.76 million), with 3,000 examples earmarked for the US market and 300 for Canada.
Dodge Challenger SRT Demon 170
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