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Sunday, November 11, 2007
Strictly for the hard-core: an even faster, furious-er Viper.
BY STEVE SILER, November 2007
We Americans are not exactly known for our prudence. We don’t solve problems or manage our dilemmas by cutting back on excess but rather through shocking, awe-inspiring displays of brute force.
Case in point: the Dodge Viper SRT10, a beast with an innate piss-on-the-world brashness we needn’t explicate any further. And so, when we heard that Dodge had readied “the ultimate Viper for road and track,” did we expect Dodge to use exotic materials and strip the big coupe of needless weight, à la Ferrari Scuderia or Porsche 911 GT2, or simply add massive aero appendages and buckets of horsepower? The latter. Duh.
Whoops! Not so fast. This time, the SRT folks pulled a Colin Chapman on us and added not horsepower but lightness in creating the new Viper ACR. It is only 40 fewer pounds than the 3450-pound Viper coupe, but that’s still lighter. And if there’s a car that doesn’t need a horsepower boost, that would be the Viper.
Indeed, the standard Viper’s 600-hp, 8.4-liter V-10 with 560 pound-feet of torque produces as much raw output as most hyper-tuned, track-only racers, and thus SRT left it alone and kept other mods simple but effective. This also helped Dodge keep the car at an as-yet-unannounced target price point of less than $100,000.
Now, 40 pounds might not seem like a lot, but beneath that figure are two important considerations. That amount is the net weight saving after some 20 or so pounds of aero bits and other minor hardware additions were tacked on, and then you subtract some 60 pounds of weight loss of the unsprung rotating variety, i.e., tires, wheels, brake discs. This is not an insignificant sum and a measure that promises terrific braking and suspension reflexes.
Specifically, the ACR swaps the Viper’s standard wheels for lighter, sexier, glossy black forged-aluminum Sidewinder wheels. Behind them are Brembo brake calipers like those on the stock Viper, only they clamp down hard on two-piece, slotted lightweight rotors.
BY STEVE SILER, November 2007
We Americans are not exactly known for our prudence. We don’t solve problems or manage our dilemmas by cutting back on excess but rather through shocking, awe-inspiring displays of brute force.
Case in point: the Dodge Viper SRT10, a beast with an innate piss-on-the-world brashness we needn’t explicate any further. And so, when we heard that Dodge had readied “the ultimate Viper for road and track,” did we expect Dodge to use exotic materials and strip the big coupe of needless weight, à la Ferrari Scuderia or Porsche 911 GT2, or simply add massive aero appendages and buckets of horsepower? The latter. Duh.
Whoops! Not so fast. This time, the SRT folks pulled a Colin Chapman on us and added not horsepower but lightness in creating the new Viper ACR. It is only 40 fewer pounds than the 3450-pound Viper coupe, but that’s still lighter. And if there’s a car that doesn’t need a horsepower boost, that would be the Viper.
Indeed, the standard Viper’s 600-hp, 8.4-liter V-10 with 560 pound-feet of torque produces as much raw output as most hyper-tuned, track-only racers, and thus SRT left it alone and kept other mods simple but effective. This also helped Dodge keep the car at an as-yet-unannounced target price point of less than $100,000.
Now, 40 pounds might not seem like a lot, but beneath that figure are two important considerations. That amount is the net weight saving after some 20 or so pounds of aero bits and other minor hardware additions were tacked on, and then you subtract some 60 pounds of weight loss of the unsprung rotating variety, i.e., tires, wheels, brake discs. This is not an insignificant sum and a measure that promises terrific braking and suspension reflexes.
Specifically, the ACR swaps the Viper’s standard wheels for lighter, sexier, glossy black forged-aluminum Sidewinder wheels. Behind them are Brembo brake calipers like those on the stock Viper, only they clamp down hard on two-piece, slotted lightweight rotors.
Labels: Automobiles Reviews
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