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One of the amazing things about a high displacement motor is the amount tq it can make. And how fat the power band is. The power isn't peaky(although the vette isn't bad). So you don't have to have a big peak number to have it moving. . There is just gobs of power everywhere. Even as low as 1500rpm, many stock Vipers (GenII...think GTS) never make less than 350-370rwtq.
It's damn near impossible to lug the motor. I've tried. the car has so much tq that you can idle up a hill in 4th gear...and it will not stall. that..is tq. i can cruise in 6th gear close to 100mph around 2k rpm with no lugging.
The durability testing at Chrysler for the Viper had a V10 doing 300 consecutive hours at wide-open-throttle on an engine dyno... Other than Porsche, I doubt many import engines would fare well in that kind of test... They'd be lucky to make 40 hours and survive. This is where it's hard to beat a push-rod low BHP/liter engine. They just keep on going like the Energizer Bunny.
I get a kick out of manufacturers term "hand-built" engines. All engines are hand built for chrissakes, no one uses a robot. The only thing special about the way the ls7GM engine is built or the Ford GT engine or the Ford Mustang Cobra engine for example is that only one or two people build the entire engine up as opposed to regular high volume engine builds where you have maybe 30-50 people building up the engine. Marketing ploy I guess. I mean if you are only building let's say 8 cars a day that use this engine of course you don't set a line up with 30 people to build it, you probably only need one or two people. So the manufacturer puts in their ads that these are hand built engines. Haaaaaaa. Same goes for other car makers in Europe or whatever, they are all hand-built engines the only difference is just how many hands are involve
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