Engine builders and backyard hot rodders love a good “what if” scenario, especially when it involves mixing potent parts from different automotive families. Calvin Nelson from the Nivlac 57 YouTube channel recently explored just such a question.
He strapped his fourth-generation 6.0-liter LS engine, now topped with a Dodge Hellcat-style supercharger, to the dynamometer to see exactly what kind of power this unusual combination would make.
Calvin Nelson reminded his viewers, “This engine has been around the block, we’ve run it naturally aspirated, we’ve run it twin turbo, and we’ve now run it supercharged.” setting up a cool three-way power shootout.
After some baseline pulls with the supercharger, Calvin’s team started carefully bumping up the ignition timing, trying to crack the 700-wheel horsepower mark.
They also tested a tip from tuner Jeremy Formato, who commented, “Our air intake was way too small… we needed to go 5 inches plus because we’re just giving up horsepower.”
The LY6 engine itself is a tough iron-block 6.0-liter General Motors (GM) truck motor with LS3-style heads and a Sloppy Stage 2 camshaft – a popular combo for boost. The dyno laid out the numbers clearly.
Running naturally aspirated, Calvin recalled, the engine “was kind of a pig; it made 367 wheel horsepower.” Bolting on the Hellcat-style supercharger woke it up significantly.
Initial Dyno Run
Interestingly, Calvin reported their old twin-turbo setup on the same engine, using common Amazon 7875 turbos, previously “made 773 wheel horsepower” at a similar 18 pounds of boost, giving the turbos a slight edge in peak numbers for that comparison.
Final Dyno Run
Even without quite hitting 700-wheel horsepower with the current tune, the supercharged LS was undeniably a handful. Calvin admitted the throttle was initially very hard to manage, describing it as “kind of like trying to drive the car with a toggle switch. It’s either 300 horsepower or it’s 700 horsepower, and it’s a very harsh transition.”
Calvin Nelson‘s dyno day definitely put some solid numbers behind a cool LS and MoPar pairing . Nearly 700 horsepower at the wheels from that Hellcat-supercharged 6.0-liter LS is nothing to sneeze at, even if his old twin turbos edged it out slightly in that particular test.
What’s your take on the dyno results for this unique MoPar + LS mashup?