A 1971 Dodge Demon in Hemi Orange, featuring one of the great giant-slayer small blocks of the Muscle Car Era, Mopar's 340cid V-8.
The single-4bbl version of the 340 had a 10.5:1 compression ratio and was ridiculously underrated at a claimed 275bhp SAE Gross horsepower.
How do we know it was underrated? Well, there are two big clues.
First of all, when you stuck it in one of these little A-body coupes, they were running legit high thirteens off the showroom floor...on bias ply street tires. That was normally the province of the more wild-eyed big blocks.
The other way we know that it was underrated was that in 1972 they went to heads with smaller ports and a lower 8.5:1 compression ratio for emissions and fuel economy reasons, and switched to SAE net horsepower ratings. Somehow this only resulted in a drop to 240 SAE net, indicating that the "275" number had probably been closer to the net output all along.
