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If you’re into cars and you’ve not yet heard of American Racing Headers-well, fluff that pillow of yours and go back to sleep.
ARH has been at the forefront of exhaust system technology, fabrication and manufacturing since 2005. True to their name, ARH makes some of the finest 100% American-made stainless steel headers on the market, along with full exhaust systems for most domestic and foreign performance cars.
ARH has become known for their direct work with major car manufacturers in developing big power making, yet emissions legal, systems for the newest and best offerings from the factory.
Taking the second word in their title quite literally and putting their headers where their mouth is, ARH has been a leading supplier of exhaust components to multiple class winning SCCA [3] Corvette race teams, among others and dragged their own 5th-Gen Camaro to record-setting times, the first of which to break into the 7s.
ARH has also been an exclusive header supplier for the Chevrolet COPO [4] Camaros and for its present day, Dodge Challenger Drag Pack and Ford Mustang Cobra Jet [5] competition. Now, ARH has undertaken a lofty task to say the least, transforming the poster car for efficient green energy, into a fire-breathing hell-spawned track demon.
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Known as the PriuSRT8, ARH owner/founder Nick Filippedes is heading-up this build for the ages, utilizing the best the automotive performance market has to offer. As seen in the ARH supplied video, the PriuSRT8 is under construction with a ways to go, but enough has been completed, to give an idea as to the end product.
The custom-fabricated NHRA- certified tube chassis is the skeleton of the beast, one that will enable the little Prius-paneled hellcub to accept and deliver upwards of 1000hp from it’s Dodge Hellcat-sourced 6.2L supercharged V8. The increase in horsepower comes from a larger 4.5L Whipple twin-screw blower, (a stock Hellcat has a 2.5L unit) and it all gets to the tarmac via a Tremec six-speed manual transmission and a Mark William’s-built Ford 9-inch rearend.
According to Nick’s video narration, the PriuSRT8 has a Chris Alston’s Chassisworks [7]suspension, Farks Supercars floor, tubs and chassis/cage fabrication (Farks helped the ARH 5TH-Gen Drag Camaro into the 7s), Wilwood brakes, additional AC and cooling components from Security Dodge in Amityville NY, and what appears to be a set of 4th-Gen Firebird Trans Am front bucket seats.
Not only will the end result be as Nick so poignantly states in the video, “Arguably the most politically-incorrect car ever built”, but with a stock Prius weighing in at around 3200-lbs with driver and passenger and a Hellcat Charger/Challenger pushing the scales at almost two and a half tons- (4700-lbs) from the factory, the PriuSRT8 Hellkitty’s performance is expected to be absolutely ridiculous-definitely 9s, maybe 8s or even 7s in the 1/4-mile, your guess is as good as mine.
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For all those naysayers out there, don’t forget, kittens may be small, cute and cuddly, but they have razor sharp claws that’ll cut you open. Lets just wait and see what this thing does at the track.