There has been a lot of speculation about what exactly Stellantis is up to with the Mopar brands we’ve become attached to—given rumors of the end of Hemi V8s and L-platform cars, what some see as the impending doom of an electrification takeover, chip shortages, hybrids, and such. Perhaps it’s time to breathe for a moment and look what Stellantis has already revealed (some of which is already here), particularly on the STLA Large platform.
As much as we love the current V8 cars, they will not be with us much longer. However, the brand that brought us the Hellcats is making it clear that they’re not leaving us in silent EV darkness. The media site has an article stating clearly that “The Hurricane twin-turbo I-6 is the primary internal combustion power plant of the future in North America for vehicles using the STLA Large and STLA Frame platforms.”
For most of us, that’s not really news, especially given that Stellantis broke the story of the Hurricane being used in the next-generation “LB” Dodge Challenger. Still, let’s pause and look at the Hurricane family of engines.
The Hurricane Standard Output puts out 420 hp and 468 lb-ft of torque, using midgrade fuel (like the 5.7 Hemi). The High Output puts down 510 hp and 500 lb-ft of torque, with premium fuel (like the 6.4 and 6.2 Hemi). These numbers are higher than the Hemi V8s they will probably replace—not to mention GM’s LT2 6.2 V8 (495 hp and 470 lb-ft of torque)—which in turn completely destroys the Ford 5.0L V8 in horsepower and torque. (Ford promised a Dark Horse Mustang with a target of 500 hp, but the Coyote V8 is extremely low on torque when compared to any of the pushrod engines or Ford’s own V6 Ecoboost).
With the Hurricane Six’s torque and all-wheel drive, we have a genuine recipe for a potent American performance car.
Most likely, Dodge will slot a 4xe hybrid below the two Hurricane engines; the 4xe, with its 2-liter gasoline engine and electric motors, generates 375 hp and 470 lb-ft of torque, and in practice is much quicker than the 5.7 Hemi. (Stellantis announced an upcoming Wagoneer 4xe model as well. Since the Wagoneer is on the STLA Frame platform, this brings the possibility of a rumored Hurricane Hybrid—but we won’t dig too deeply into this since there is so much “what is” to be discussed to get into “what if.”)
At this point, there’s no ignoring the elephant (motors) in the room. While the name “Elephant Motor” is usually the legendary 426-Hemi V8, but now I’m referring to the upcoming battery-electric powertrains.
Jeep’s 4xe Day revealed the new concept Wagoneer S, an electric car boasting up to 600hp and an impressive 0-60mph acceleration time of 3.5 seconds—the same number claimed for the Hellcat Durango. It is on STLA Large, unlike the “regular” Wagoneer. Stellantis earlier reported on three different power configurations for new electric muscle cars.
If Stellantis is targeting new electric cars to out-perform those with the Hemi V8, including the Hellcat, they’re close. A Hellcat Challenger has a 0-60mph rating of 3.4 seconds; the Wagoneer S is nearly equal to that, despite being an SUV. It doesn’t have the E-Rupt drivetrain or Fratzonic sound chamber, which Tim Kuniskis said the Dodge would have.
We all know Dodge doesn’t do well with losing on its home turf, the drag strip, and we’ve all sat and watched countless painful videos of Plaids outperforming Hellcats on the drag strip. With Dodge’s statement, we can rest assured that one of these loud electric cars is going to be aimed at taking the crown back. Could a new 1320 package now mean 1,320hp along with the number of feet in a quarter mile? Only time will tell. Consider, though, Dodge’s slogan for the new electric vehicles: “Performance made us do it!”
Electric performance cars are quickly growing; Tesla and Lucid are being joined by European brands such as Audi and Porsche. The Dodge will have an electro-mechanical drivetrain and sound to make it feel more like a conventional car.
The true design of the car has yet to be revealed, the Banshee Concept suggests that it will pay homage to the muscle car era with trick aero design pieces that will help the car be truly competitive. In a recent interview, a Stellantis rep said they hoped that the production car would look very similar to the concept. Hopefully that means it will be a little more sculpted and tweaked to perfection.
We know that we are going to see several different models on the STLA Large platform—muscle cars, SUVs, a minivan, and a midsize truck, at the least. Two factories appear to be dedicated to it. The blend of hybrid, pure ICE and electric powertrains really does allow for a variety of customers gives a balanced array of options for different markets to choose from.
It’s possible that there are really two STLA Large platforms, one for hybrids/gasoline engines and one for battery-electrics. This would explain why there is an LB Challenger with Hurricane Six power as well as a battery-electric Charger which will not support a gasoline engine.
The last thing to address is Direct Connection, whose relaunch suggests that whatever the names of the new performance Dodge vehicles that are coming out in the next few years, they will still have performance upgrades.
Coming up: STLA Frame…
Maybe you should do an article on the I6 Hemi from Australia that Americans don’t seem to know about. The Chrysler Valiant was an Australian muscle car with a Hemi I6 that could smoke a lot of V8s from Holden and Ford Australia. Also, maybe Dodge should tap into this and relay it to their fans that Mopar has had a high performance I6 before. An I6 is the best engine configuration period. It’s probably why every tractor trailer uses one. The I6 is a good engine. Yes the Hemi is a legendary engine and it shouldn’t leave, but that doesn’t mean the I6 is a bad engine. I honestly don’t see why the Hellcat engines can’t stay since the 5.7 and 6.4 are leaving. The 6.2 SC is a specialty engine made in low enough quantities that it shouldn’t effect CAFE once the 5.7 and 6.4 are gone. The 6.4 truck engine will also be around for a while too, so I see no reason to kill the Hemi completely. But, I don’t run Stellantis either…
Great comment, Josh. Never knew about the Valiant (the Chrysler not the Plymouth). Straight sixes, smooth as silk and torque monsters by design. Anyway, guess it’s time to sell my Ute. Take care and stay on board. Your knowledge is invaluable. Be safe!
Thanks for the reply. I am safe, as hurricane Ian recently swept through my state. Trees did fall over though. Eventually I may move out of this state, because hurricanes come through every year.
I’ve actually made comments before about them when Stellantis first came out talking about this engine. Australia has a lot of performance vehicles with performance inline engines. Inline-5 cylinder and inline-6 cylinder powertrains are very common and popular in other parts of the world. America is actually fairly late to the party. While we have used them and still use them in certain capacities, we are somewhat behind the times when it comes to using “other than V8” performance.
To be honest, I completely agree with you on alot of this. Although I could be wrong, I feel like this is more to appease and comply with not only our own governmental mandates, but also to move the brand globally. A lot of countries are killing off all of their V8’s, just look at the Australian brands like Ford’s FPV, Holden’s HSV and even the Chrysler Brand in Australia, along with Mercedes Benz, Toyota and several others. Ford gets away with the 5.0L V8 because it’s pretty much the only gasoline V8 it offers. Now I know they have the 5.2 and the Godzilla V8 in the HD trucks but the majority of their lineup is four and six-cylinder turbo engines and they offer them globally. To address the other aspect of the comment, yes it would be cool if Dodge were to resurrect the Hemi-6 engines of yester-years and have them in all three sizes, the Hemi-215 (3.5L), the Hemi-245 (4.0L) and the Hemi-265 (4.3L). With those kinds of cubic inches of displacement with the Hurricane HO technology, who knows what kinds of numbers they could produce, especially with hybrid Technology assisting them. It would be an easy way for the brand to comply and still go by the old say “There’s no replacement for displacement” seeing that no one offer’s 6-cylinders with 4-liters of displacement or larger. Now these would be a cool way to stay true to the brand as they’d stay true to the Hemi name and image by being the biggest, baddest engines in their class with the most horsepower, they could still be emissions compliant and they’d be more than powerful enough for HD truck use. Just to put it into a bit of perspective, the Cummins 6.7L diesel is an inline-6 with 408cubic inches of displacement, so a high powered 4.3L Hemi I-6 would fit under the hood of a pickup with no problem and offer loads of torque and would be more efficient than the 6.4L Hemi all the way around. Of course this is speculation but truthfully, it wouldn’t be a bad idea. It fits into the new direction by being electrified and being smaller than a V8.
@VBJr No need to thank me. I knew you would make it to the big leagues. Congrats!
Thank you!
When it comes to drawing, lets get one thing very clear, I’m no Chip Foose or Ralph Gilles or anyone with that level of skill. Now that we’ve gotten that out of the way, I took a few moments to sketch out something that’s been bugging me since I’ve seen the Banshee concept in all of these videos and pictures. I’ve been looking at the Stellantis EV day slide at the outlines of what is supposed to be the upcoming Charger and quite frankly, they don’t completely add up. Especially when it comes to the front end. While I feel the Banshee does give us the general idea of the car, I don’t think it’s the final product. The EV day slides gave very clear looks at what the Hornet was going to look like and it’s pretty much spot on and everything else has a similar design language that this banshee does not share. While I feel it did show us the R wing and the overall general design, I feel what I drew is a better representation of the car in the slides. Again it’s no where near exact and it’s just my crazy idea. But another thing the slides show that was also in the first teaser video and not on the Banshee concept show car was the rear spoiler. The slides show a fairly large spoiler on this car, which I did my best to portray here.