2021 Dodge Charger Redeye review: When in doubt, power out

At this position, Dodge could promote the latest Charger for an additional decade and I really don’t feel everyone would mind. The enterprise honed a very simple but effective strategy of incrementally strengthening its hella-aged comprehensive-sizing sedan with great styling updates and the just one issue all people loves: much more energy. Like, a large amount much more energy.

You have presently study the headlines: The 2021 Dodge Charger SRT Hellcat Redeye hits the highway with a frankly foolish 797 horsepower and 707 pound-ft of torque. It’s absurd. It’s wonderful. And with its standard start manage, it’s significantly swift. The Charger Redeye can accelerate to sixty mph in correct all over three seconds and it’s going to top out at a supercar-beating 203 mph. It’s so dumb and I really like it.

Dodge’s six.2-liter supercharged Hellcat V8 is the star of the display, nestled under a redesigned hood that has a bigger chilly air scoop and two warmth extractor vents. The Redeye enhance arrives with Dodge’s Electricity Reserve characteristic, which pre-pressurizes the intake manifold for much better throttle response, as nicely as the Electricity Chiller, which uses air conditioning refrigerant to help great the intake air. It’s a huge motor in a huge motor vehicle creating huge energy, and it’s an absolute beast in motion. You will by no means, ever, ever want for forward thrust in the Charger Redeye. The dependable grownup in me feels it’s required to position out that it’s borderline harmful to present a 797-hp something to the basic public, but the laughing-his-ass-off enthusiast in me just claims screw it, let’s go.

2021 Dodge Charger Redeye has huge energy and a broad stance

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The Hellcat V8 is effective in conjunction with an fantastic eight-velocity automatic transmission that is completely adept at preserving the motor humming in the coronary heart of its powerband (which, presented the output, is basically in all places). There are chintzy minimal half-paddles attached to the steering wheel should really you come to feel like shifting for oneself, but these metal protrusions are rarely fulfilling to use. Just leave the transmission alone.

You can customize a complete mess of functionality options to your liking, from the steering body weight to suspension stiffness to transmission mapping and much more. You can even inform the V8 to settle the hell down and prohibit its output to five hundred hp, not like that definitely makes much of a change in the grand plan of factors. My preferred tune is to leave every little thing in Avenue but set the steering in Activity, and by natural means, leave the motor on comprehensive blast. This gives the wheel a bit much more body weight without feeling overly cumbersome, and retains the adaptive dampers delicate enough to make the Charger a genuine peach on very long drives.

Truthfully, as much as the Charger Redeye is typecast as a learn of straight-line shenanigans, it’s shockingly able when you toss it all over on a winding highway. The Redeye will get the Widebody therapy, which adds three.5 inches of extra keep track of width and fifty further great factors about a typical Charger. Far more importantly, this allows Dodge to suit meaty 305/35ZR20 tires at all four corners, however, weirdly, they’re all-year tires, not stickier summers.

The underlying feeling of “if I give it as well much gasoline coming out of a corner I’m going to spin and crash in a ball of flames” by no means definitely leaves you though hustling this 797-hp monster with two-decade-aged underpinnings. But with good energy arrives good accountability, and the adaptive dampers and broad tires do a wonderful job of preserving factors copacetic in corners. You will find a ton of opinions as a result of the steering wheel, as well, so you’re normally informed of how much grip is out there at all situations. I wouldn’t phone the Redeye agile by any suggests, but it’s way considerably less of a raucous, chunk-you-in-the-ass hellion than you may well feel. Plus, it’s got two-piece, 15.7-inch front brakes from the good people at Brembo, which is really sound peace of mind.

I guess I should really mention gasoline overall economy, even however it’s irrelevant in any Hellcat-driven motor vehicle. Specifically no just one is obtaining this issue with performance in mind, and that is a very good issue, simply because even the EPA ratings of twelve miles per gallon city, 21 mpg highway and 15 mpg put together are a minimal optimistic. Get employed to viewing numbers in the small teenagers on the normal. Really don’t forget about the $2,100 gasoline guzzler tax, possibly.

The complete Redeye enhance is technically just a $eight,600 possibility package deal on the standard Charger SRT Hellcat Widebody. You get all the go-fast stuff as nicely as a 220-mph speedometer and some distinctive badges, but every little thing else carries about unchanged from other Charger styles. Vibrant brake calipers and matte black roof and decklid therapies are out there as incorporate-ons, but the only way to definitely inform a Redeye from lesser Hellcats is to location the purple eye inside the Hellcat emblem on the front fender. (Get it?!)

That suggests the Redeye’s inside is no different than the foundation Hellcat, which alone is just not much much more specific than the entry-stage, V6-driven Charger. Certain, you can incorporate factors like a carbon/suede inside package deal ($one,595), but there’s no hiding the truth that this cabin is aged. Actually aged. You are going to generally recognize affordable plastics on the door playing cards, and the buttons on the center stack glance and come to feel like the 20-calendar year-aged areas they are. At least those supportive front seats are endlessly comfortable, and they arrive standard with heating and ventilation. The rear seats are heated, as well, however you will be stunned how minimal legroom there is for a motor vehicle this substantial.

Each Charger Hellcat will get the Uconnect infotainment suite, housed on an eight.four-inch screen in the sprint, with standard Apple CarPlay and Android Car. This is Fiat-Chrysler’s more mature multimedia software package, however, not the new-and-improved Uconnect 5. Continue to, this final-gen technique has a ton of operation and the touchscreen rapidly responds to inputs. It’s aged tech, but at least it’s very good tech.

Driver-help systems are handful of and considerably in between. Blind-location checking and cross-traffic detection are standard, but that is about it, and contemporary conveniences like adaptive cruise manage usually are not out there. (You are going to recognize the 3 dead buttons on the correct facet of the steering wheel where by those options should really be.) Then all over again, you acquire the Charger Redeye simply because it makes 797 goddamn horsepower, not simply because it’s comprehensive of gee-whiz tech.

The 2021 Charger Redeye charges $eighty two,a hundred ninety — that is $sixty nine,995 for the Hellcat Widebody, $eight,600 for the Redeye enhance, $2,100 for the gasoline guzzler tax and $one,495 for desired destination. Throw on a handful of extras and you can get just one of these up about $ninety,000 my slightly much more restrained Hellraisin (yes, that is definitely the identify of this shade) tester charges $87,one hundred sixty five.

Sure, that is a ton of income for a Dodge Charger, but very good luck getting this much energy for this minimal hard cash from any other automaker. Besides, if Dodge has demonstrated something about the final handful of several years, it’s that folks really like these factors, and the base line definitely would not make any difference. That “shut up and just make it more quickly” mind-set is a scarce issue in the motor vehicle environment these times, and a little something we should really embrace as very long as we can. Flawed as it may well be, I wouldn’t have the Charger Redeye any other way.