Sam pits a 1000-hp supercharged Hellcat Challenger against a tuned McLaren 570S Spider in a half-mile drag race. The Hellcat weighs 4,400 pounds; the McLaren, 3,300 pounds with over 760 hp after tuning. The McLaren won two of three runs, hitting mid-to-high 6-second times.
Questions this video answers
Half-mile drag race (best of three), all runs from a rolling start.
Roughly 1,000 hp at the crank (full bolt-ons: pulley, intake, exhaust, tune, bigger injectors, meth).
A little over 4,400 pounds.
562 bhp from a 3.8 liter twin-turbo V8 (stock).
About 3,300 pounds.
Chapters
Sam. Alright, so today we've got another interesting race matchup. Now, normally we try to do stock cars as much as possible because there are a lot less variables involved which can affect the outcome. And if you're trying to shop the cars, it usually lets people make a better decision with less outside factors. Plus, you know, not every single car is going to respond the same to a certain brand's tune, intake, downpipe, whatever. So what that means is One company's phase two setup might perform slightly different than another company's stage two setup. Yeah, I'm looking at you guys, 1, 2, 4, crowd. But I'm sure this applies to every other car platform as well. Anyway, in this episode I'm going to put two commonly modified sports cars against each other to see how it plays out. I'm talking about none other than the widely popular amazing bang for the buck made in America Hellcat Challenger as well as the relatively affordable race inspired British made McLaren 570s. And of course we'll be doing a half mile drag race down our lovely little airstrip. Best out of three runs takes the cake. And this time around we're doing them all from a roll because I don't think the Hellcat's going to stand a chance from a dig, even if it wasn't packing so much power. Speaking of power, let's take a look at who we got today. First up is the SRT Hellcat Challenger in my favorite color, destroyer gray. This is a 707 horsepower supercharged monster in bone stock form, or 717 if you buy a 2019 and newer. But like I said, we're talking about modified stuff today. So this car is essentially full bolt on and then some. In our case that means pulley intake, exhaust, tune plus bigger injectors and meth all in. We're told that it makes roughly a thousandth of the crank. That means it's one of the most powerful cars to come on the channel so far. But here's the problem. Hellcats are heavy as balls. So at a little over 4,400 pounds, we're looking at a power to weight of 4.4 to 1. Still, that's nothing to sleep on. On the other side of the ring is the slightly classier McLaren 570s Spider. It's the most affordable McLaren that you can buy and frankly, it's probably one of the best bangs for buck in terms of entry level supercars. Stock, it only makes 562 brake horsepower with the 3.8 liter twin turbo V8. But at 3300 pounds. It's over half a ton lighter than the Hellcat. Now, the beautiful thing about turbos is that a tune in downpipe does wonders. And in this case it adds over 200 horsepower. That puts the powder weight at a very competitive 4.36. So on paper, this could be a pretty close one. Anyway, let's get this party started. But of course we'll need to do a burnout in the Hellcat. Just to get those nettles in the back warmed up. Sam, Ra. It. It's. I don't know about you, but I think those are some pretty good runs. In that last1 the McLaren had to top down for giggles, since he had already won the first two out of three races anyway. We already know how easy it is to make big power with the Hellcat platform, but I wasn't really sure that the lighter 570s would be able to pull on it on the top. Then again, I think the McLaren just dead hooked with no spin at all. So that's already a pretty big advantage right there. I'm actually more surprised that the Hellcat didn't cause any traction problems. I mean, doing a second gear hit at 45 miles per hour with 1000 horsepower is going to be a little bit dramatic, especially since it wasn't exactly a warning. Warm day out and he's running close to stock tire width on the tires. But yeah, it's got to be a combination of the aero and the turbos. Probably have a little bit more punch in the top than a supercharger. But in my experience, Hellcats also have a lot of top end. Maybe the gearing advantage in the McLaren, I don't know. But let's take a look at the V box data to see what we got. So Here are the 6. 130 times for all three runs with these cars. Not bad on paper. It was pretty close too. So they're basically mid to high 6 seconds cars in this range. And theoretically it comes down to driver reaction time. But let's take a look at what happens if we expand this range out to something like 50, 150. This is where aero and gearing plays a much bigger role. And you can see that in the last run with the top down, it obviously hindered the times on the McLaren. Nonetheless, like I said, I think there were some pretty solid runs and both cars performed great. The Hellcat is easily half the cost of the McLaren, maybe even closer to a third, but was able to keep up with the thing in a straight line, so not too shabby. Of course someone down there in the comments is going to say, well, take a coin to the Hellcat and see what happens. Yada yada yada. I know, we get it. The doors go up on the McLaren too. Either way, they're both cool cars in my book. But what do you guys think? Spend the extra coin for the McLaren or save it and get almost as good straight line performance out of the Hellcat? Let me know in the comments below. Well, that's it for this one. And as always, I'll catch you guys next time. Hey guys, if you liked this video, help her brother out by giving it a thumbs up. If you have any questions or if I said something weird, let me know in the comments below. You can also support the channel by sharing our stuff or maybe shop in the merch store. And if this is your first time here, don't forget to check out some of my other stuff. I produce all sorts of cool cinematic car content, so if that's your jam, hit that subscribe button and ring that bell. Icon for new episodes every week. Thanks for watching.
