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00:00 Hit it!
00:02 This time on Roadkill, it's 100% more mayhem!
00:07 Both of them.
00:10 [ENGINE REVVING]
00:35 For the general mayhem, it's the '68 Dodge Charger that I traded for a set of cylinder heads,
00:40 and then we built it up with a used 440 engine from a motorhome,
00:44 as well as some leftover parts from our '73 Plymouth Fury that we'd raced at 24 Hours of Lemons.
00:49 There, I solved that problem.
00:52 We ended up taking the Charger to Dirt Fish Rally School in Washington and going full dukes with this thing,
00:58 turning the car into a legend and creating what was probably the best three minutes of Roadkill action of all time.
01:05 Oh!
01:08 In August 2015, it was time to make the legend of the general mayhem even bigger.
01:21 We got into a bloodthirsty drag race battle with the TV heroes from Gas Monkey Garage,
01:27 building up to a cutthroat drag race at our first ever Roadkill Nights event.
01:32 Now, this deal was a parking lot race at a homemade drag strip that we put together at the Silverdome in Pontiac, Michigan.
01:38 10,000 people showed up to watch.
01:42 The stakes were high, the tension was in the air, and it was huge as we pulled to the line against Gas Monkey Garage.
01:55 But we're not allowed to show you that.
01:57 Nope. Big-time TV politics stepped in and prevented us from even filming these guys.
02:05 We are not even allowed to show you the results of the race.
02:09 Never mind that it was all over Facebook seconds after we crossed the finish line.
02:13 Never mind that right now you can probably find 30 videos of this race on YouTube.
02:18 And never mind that you probably already know what happened.
02:22 Nope. We're not allowed to show it to you here. That's reality TV for you.
02:27 But what we can do is show you the behind-the-scenes debacle that got us into this whole thing.
02:33 It all started back when we got our sponsorship from Dodge.
02:36 And what's the first thing you do when you're in that situation?
02:39 Well, scam a 707-horsepower Hellcat drivetrain, of course!
02:43 Our plan was to put that engine into the general mayhem and then road trip it from Detroit to Washington to go back to the Dirt Fish Rally school.
02:51 We knew it was going to be a huge job with the drivetrain swap, though, and we didn't have time to finish it.
02:56 And so we sent the car to our buddies at Diversified Creations in Brighton, Michigan.
03:00 This is Diversified Creations, home of our buddy Mike Copeland, who is an expert at putting new stuff into old cars.
03:11 And he's going to take everything that makes the SRT Hellcat amazing and put it in the general mayhem and make it more awesome than it already is.
03:19 Because if we tried to do this, the episode would come out two years from now and the car would be on fire.
03:25 That car right there is a donor, and I know what you're thinking.
03:28 It's like, "These guys at Roadkill are going to wreck another brand new Hellcat Charger to make this stuff happen."
03:33 Nope, that's actually a crusher car. Dodge is going to squeeze this thing no matter what we do, and so it's no big loss.
03:39 We're not taking another Hellcat out of circulation by doing this.
03:42 The plan is absolutely gut that car to death and put everything out of it into the general mayhem.
03:48 And now we're going to send off this poor 2015 Charger with an epic set of burnouts.
03:54 Did you see Copeland freak out there?
04:15 Yeah.
04:16 How soon before the police get here?
04:18 I have a feeling he's got them on the payroll.
04:20 Around Detroit, they don't care. The cops come watch. It's pretty good.
04:24 Bye-bye tires. Nice going, dude.
04:41 Well, as much as I hate to do it, I think we should take it apart.
04:44 All right.
04:46 Impressive. Wow.
04:50 I don't know if you realize this, but someone's been doing burnouts in your parking lot.
04:53 What?
04:54 Allegedly.
04:55 Oh, my God.
04:56 Allegedly.
04:57 We're done with a bunch of good tire smoke, and now we're actually disassembling this thing.
05:00 It will never move under its own power again until it's revitalized in the general mayhem.
05:04 We're taking the battery out. Battery's in the trunk.
05:06 There you go. Lights out. It's all over.
05:09 Terminator's dead.
05:10 Yep.
05:11 All right. I guess we can get an airplane to leave.
05:13 Okay. We're done.
05:14 Good work. All right.
05:16 All right. We're rolling up on this wood.
05:21 It is so weird that we're not doing this by ourselves.
05:24 We're going to get so much criticism from you, the audience member, but I don't feel bad because Freehemi.
05:30 Well, there it is. So we'll get it down and get it off the curb.
05:38 Rough day. Want to have a beer?
05:39 Yeah, I'm tired.
05:40 I'm tired.
05:41 We left Diversified with one plan, and when we came back a couple weeks later, the whole thing had changed.
05:47 We made a Facebook post pointing out that Dodge sponsors both Roadkill and Gas Monkey Garage,
05:52 and that turned into a Roadkill fan issuing a challenge.
05:56 Two of us from Roadkill, two of the stars from Gas Monkey, one junkyard,
06:00 and a build-off to see who could build a better car out of trash in three days.
06:05 Of course, the superstars ignored that.
06:07 But then Dodge compelled them to pay attention because we had a Hellcat swap in the works, and so did they.
06:13 So the game changed into a Hellcat versus Hellcat showdown.
06:17 And we'd been setting up an eighth-mile drag strip in the parking lot of the Silverdome for Roadkill nights,
06:22 so we decided that was where it was going to go down.
06:25 Gas Monkey publicly taunted us that we could make any rules we wanted, and they would come and win.
06:31 And so we posted this.
06:32 What we're going to do is an eighth-mile drag race.
06:34 Oh, yeah.
06:35 Street race style. One and done. Single pass, flashlight drags.
06:39 Rule number two, you've got to drive. It's your car.
06:42 Yeah, that's right.
06:43 It's your brand. It's your tequila. All that.
06:45 No reality show BS. Richard's driving the car.
06:47 3,500 pounds without driver. Stock suspension concept.
06:51 12 inches on the ground, and you've got to run a Hellcat engine and transmission.
06:55 Did I get everything?
06:56 See you in a couple weeks.
06:57 See you soon.
06:58 Of course, the TV guys ended up ignoring 100% of the rules that we gave them.
07:02 However, we stuck with it.
07:04 We didn't want to hack up the General Mayhem into a full-tube chassis drag car,
07:08 because we eventually want to be able to take this thing back to its roots.
07:11 So this is absolutely everything out of the donor car?
07:15 Pretty much, yeah. There's some of the stuff that we didn't put in, but overall.
07:19 Oh, wait. Look at this. The projector lights are in there.
07:22 Yeah, go ahead.
07:23 Just like the old ones.
07:33 Wow.
07:34 They put them in the housing?
07:36 Yeah.
07:37 Yeah, we would have gotten this done in three or four years, I think.
07:39 That's probably about the time it would have taken.
07:41 You're being generous.
07:42 You know, we integrated all the original radiator, transmission cooler, intercooler into the front of the car.
07:48 Wow.
07:49 You know, on the E85, with the crazy tune and everything else, they'll make 800.
07:54 Okay.
07:55 Yeah, maybe a touch over 800.
07:56 This right now, I have 250 horse pills in it, so we're at 950, 975.
08:02 We're not safe. We're not sane. But we're not completely insane.
08:06 But you need to look inside.
08:08 Wow. That's awesome.
08:11 It's a brand new car.
08:13 Wow.
08:14 We've got newfangled 2015 stuff splattered all over the interior of the '68.
08:19 Most of it even works. I mean, we've got every possible warning light going on, but we have a functional touchscreen.
08:25 We can control the transmission in here. The start button works.
08:27 We even have a USB plug and cup holders.
08:31 The rear of the car, this is true roadkill to extremes.
08:34 You can see the gas tank in the trunk.
08:36 Yeah.
08:37 I love it.
08:38 We keep all that stuff functioning.
08:40 Obviously, all the electricals back here, Optima battery.
08:43 It runs uphill a little bit.
08:45 Yeah, but they fill from the bottom.
08:47 So they vent the tank out to the top of the fill neck.
08:49 Nice.
08:50 So that's how you fill the car with gas.
08:52 Oh, man. This is cool.
08:54 None of the aftermarket K-Members work with this kind of application.
08:57 Yeah.
08:58 So we modified that, built their own engine mounts. It's solid mounted.
09:00 The headers are roadkill, true to form.
09:04 You beat them and then flashed.
09:06 To clear the torsion bars, we put them in the vice, heated four tubes with a torch, and twisted it over.
09:11 The guys integrated exhaust pass-throughs in it, trans mount.
09:15 We took the original driveshaft, cut it apart, and we took a one-ton Dodge end, and then integrated it and welded it in and created a CV.
09:24 So this runs true to its, and then we put the slip yoke into the rear driveshaft.
09:28 It's a 410 gear with a spool, 35 spine axles, Caltrack springs, Caltrack bars.
09:34 The brakes wouldn't fit, so I had to get these, and I knew what to get because we went through that with my Jeep.
09:40 Did you see how big a meat is on the back?
09:42 God, those wheels cost more than this car originally.
09:44 Yeah, the wheels are expensive.
09:46 Obviously, my guys knocked it out of the park. A lot of long nights.
09:50 I hope you give them all raises.
09:52 Let's not get carried away.
09:53 They deserve it.
09:54 You haven't got your bill yet.
09:56 Slave driver?
09:57 [laughter]
09:58 Can we go drive it now?
09:59 What's left?
10:00 [music]
10:13 This thing's insane.
10:15 This is utterly insane.
10:17 [engine revving]
10:18 Now, the first thing we're going to do is head to the drag strip and get our very first passes at Milan Dragway.
10:23 I'm going to have a look at the starting line because we told them not to prep the track at all.
10:27 Yeah, this is more realistic.
10:29 I think this is more to what we're going to see.
10:31 Plus, we're evaluating this, so if we can make it leave on this, then I think we're in pretty good shape.
10:37 The first thing we're going to face here is big traction problems because we're going to be racing just on an almost unprepped parking lot.
10:44 The line out here is a little bit better than that, but still, we have somewhat of a small tire on the car, a lot of torque, and a 471 to 1 first gear,
10:53 which is really low in that TorqueFlight 8 speed, especially with our 410 rear gear.
10:57 So we're going to try and leave in second and see if it'll actually hook up.
11:01 Now, if I can get it to hook in first, it'll be amazing, but we're just assuming that's not going to happen.
11:05 So that's what I'm playing with.
11:06 [Engine starting]
11:26 It leaves. It definitely leaves.
11:29 So, it doesn't have enough wheel speed in second to do a burnout.
11:32 I had to go to third because it just goes straight to the rev limiter, as you heard.
11:37 Even if it goes, you know, three, four hits to the rev limiter, let it hit.
11:41 Okay.
11:42 [Engine starting]
11:47 Wow! Dude, that leaves good. That leaves really good.
11:51 I'm wondering about putting more gear in the car. Put a 488 in it or something like that.
11:57 I think that that would be a detriment when we go on the juice.
12:03 I'd actually like to go the other way.
12:04 Plus, this is working.
12:05 I think the car might be faster with a 373 in it.
12:08 Since this will probably be the last hit, I'd like to take another pound of air out of the tires.
12:12 Let's go down to eight and let's see what it leaves like then.
12:16 Do we have nitrous in the bottle? Is it worth hitting the blower case with it?
12:19 The bottle's full. I don't think it's worth it.
12:23 Do you think we should take those out?
12:25 The bricks?
12:26 Yeah.
12:27 No.
12:28 Is it worth throwing dry ice in the cooler tank or having a bigger cooler tank?
12:31 Probably not.
12:33 You're shooting down all my speed tips here.
12:36 I know. I know. I've tried most of your speed tips.
12:39 Not working?
12:40 Some of them do.
12:41 [Engine starting]
12:45 [Music]
12:58 It felt like it got loose.
13:00 Yeah, it looked like it was doing this.
13:02 We don't have any air with us, so we can't blow them back up.
13:05 But we could click the shocks if you want to make another hit on it.
13:08 Okay. Let me back out of the water.
13:11 [Engine revving]
13:15 That picked up four hundredths in the 60 foot.
13:18 Okay.
13:19 And it looked like it drove much straighter and it wasn't hopping.
13:21 Yeah.
13:22 I definitely like that adjustment.
13:24 We'd only been running eighth mile times at Milan instead of a full quarter mile,
13:28 and it was a little bit frustrating because we were right at the 7.0 at 100 mile an hour number.
13:33 We were dying to break into the sixes, go a little bit faster than 100,
13:37 but still a huge success for a freshly built car on its very first day at the track.
13:42 [Music]
13:45 See, the smart thing to do would have been save the car, tune on it, make it faster, win.
13:51 But this is Roadkill, and so we're going to road trip it.
13:54 I've got the right angle of the dangle and squeeze of the trigger to keep this from leaking.
13:58 Wow. That might be the shortest rain I've ever seen, but it'll still stop us
14:03 because we apparently have this wiper, sort of.
14:06 Oh, maybe not.
14:07 It's all about me.
14:08 And we have no windows, except this one.
14:14 Don't be scared.
14:16 And now we're heading off for our second test, which is 200 miles away at US 131 drag strip.
14:22 I was going to chicken on the rain and Finnegan said go for it.
14:26 Now I'm getting wet.
14:27 Good.
14:28 As you said, I'm fine.
14:30 I told you I'd drive.
14:32 Come on.
14:33 Chinese fire drill.
14:34 [engine revving]
14:38 [music]
14:43 I could drive faster if you don't want to see your kids again.
14:46 This feels good. We haven't been in grave danger in a long time on Roadkill.
14:50 Yeah.
14:51 [engine revving]
14:52 [laughing]
14:54 Nice.
14:55 Was it muddy?
14:57 [laughing]
14:58 What a jerk.
15:00 So the rain cleared up, which was nice, and then Roadkill struck.
15:04 Here's the good news.
15:06 We're not dead?
15:07 Right.
15:08 [laughing]
15:09 We're not off that side of the road sliding sideways in a ditch.
15:12 Wow, look how bad it smashed the fender.
15:14 We came down hard.
15:15 Yeah.
15:16 I'm surprised it didn't knock the emblem the right direction.
15:19 How fast were we going, like 80?
15:21 At least, yeah.
15:23 We put on some old tires so that we wouldn't have to run on the pizza cutters,
15:27 and it turned out that they were dry-rotted, and this thing just destroyed itself.
15:32 Look at that.
15:33 Nice one.
15:36 At least we're not using wrenches to hold these lug nuts on.
15:40 [music]
15:45 Next we're changing the tire.
15:47 No problem.
15:48 It was fun.
15:49 It was the most excitement I've had all day.
15:51 We worked on the car!
15:53 [music]
16:13 This is US-131 Motorsports Park,
16:15 which is the scene of the end of the very first Hot Rod Drag Week in 2005.
16:20 It was really good.
16:22 You're old.
16:23 It's before my time.
16:24 I'll get the tools.
16:25 This is our second track day with the General Mayhem.
16:28 What we're going to do today is re-baseline it from what we did out at Milan,
16:32 and then we've got some different rear gears.
16:34 We panic-ordered overnight a new center section from Mosier with 373s in it
16:39 instead of the 410s that are in the car.
16:41 We're going to find out if that makes a difference in the way the thing works.
16:44 The reason Copeland was thinking that the car might go quicker with a higher gear ratio,
16:47 which is a lower number, is because with the Root Supercharger,
16:50 it's got a lot of torque.
16:52 It can really grunt against the gears,
16:53 and right now it's just going through the gears really quickly.
16:56 Copeland's one of those guys that's usually right, so we'll find out.
17:00 [engine revving]
17:09 That was good!
17:11 Much, much better.
17:13 You just picked up 6 miles an hour to the 8th.
17:15 Okay.
17:16 It ran at a 7.06, which is our quickest to the 8th.
17:18 Yep.
17:19 And that was not our best 60 foot, even though it barely hit the rev limiter.
17:22 Oh, dude, it was hazing it the whole way down.
17:24 Did you see me driving the car?
17:25 Yeah.
17:26 Yeah.
17:27 I'm glad for that because it's more like what it's going to be like.
17:29 Once we swapped out the 410 gears and installed the 370s,
17:33 initially it didn't look like we had really gained anything.
17:36 [engine revving]
17:41 But then Finnegan got to the fine tuning on these QA1 shocks
17:45 that are adjustable for both jounce and rebound,
17:48 and we dialed in the traction.
17:51 We cut a 168 60 foot time.
17:53 We were still running in the 7.0s in the 8th mile,
17:56 and all the way out the quarter it was running 11.0,
17:59 which was so frustrating because I was dying for this thing to get into the 10s.
18:04 But then the weather cooled down, and we brought out our secret weapon,
18:08 our 2015 Charger called the General Maintenance,
18:12 because that's all you ever have to do with it,
18:14 and right now it's going to go head to head with the General Mayhem.
18:18 [engine revving]
18:34 Ah, he is pulling away.
18:36 [engine revving]
18:46 10.90 at 125.
18:49 It just keeps getting faster.
18:50 Let's do some big smoky burnouts and get out of here.
18:52 This was a good day for me.
18:55 I thought we were racing for reaction time here.
18:58 [engine revving]
19:24 Now in this whole episode, right here is the big win.
19:28 This is our first ever Roadkill Nights event.
19:31 It was held during the Woodward Dream Cruise Week in Detroit.
19:35 Our little web show pulled off a miracle.
19:38 We got permission from the city of Pontiac, Michigan,
19:41 to create an 8th mile drag strip in the parking lot of the old Silverdome football stadium.
19:47 Dodge brought in a full on thrill ride event,
19:50 putting people in Vipers and Hellcats for this drag and drift thing.
19:53 They also brought in a band, gave a whole bunch of Roadkill shirts away.
19:57 It was a blowout hit.
19:59 We got tons of local media and more than 10,000 people showed up.
20:04 But we still couldn't film the race with the TV guys,
20:07 so we had to find the next best thing.
20:09 Well, there's a TV show right over there whose name we still can't mention,
20:13 but what can you do?
20:14 So we're going to go out here and see if we can find somebody
20:16 who either has the hair gel and the jewelry or the T-shirt, right?
20:19 And is willing to be on our little web show.
20:21 Oh, that's right. They have to be willing to and sign the agreement.
20:24 Right. Not just go on the internet and talk about it.
20:26 Right. I dig that.
20:28 Dude, the Eagle Wagon. Oh, it's not the wagon. It's the hatch.
20:30 Yeah. Ooh, for sale.
20:33 Roadkill, how much is it?
20:34 It's $8,500.
20:36 What?
20:37 Oh.
20:38 I mean, it's amazing, but why is this $8,500?
20:40 Because he's a legend. It says so right here.
20:42 Oh.
20:43 Oh, dude.
20:45 Dude, his hair could be slick.
20:47 And he has the shirt on.
20:48 Yes, he does.
20:49 We need to ask this guy what's up.
20:51 Yeah.
20:52 Are you racing here?
20:53 Yeah.
20:54 You are?
20:55 Can we see your car?
20:56 Yeah, it's right over there.
20:57 Show us your car.
20:59 Our TV star stand-in is Jim Bowman,
21:02 who's driving John Pappas' '69 Dodge Charger Daytona,
21:06 a factory NASCAR wing car.
21:09 This thing was shipped to Australia in 1973,
21:12 converted to right-hand drive, and came back to the States in 2003.
21:16 And now it's here at Roadkill Nights, ready to go head-to-head, Charger to Charger.
21:20 If we went and got some pomade or something,
21:22 could you do the hair and maybe get some more jewelry?
21:25 Stand there and do this?
21:26 It would be really good.
21:28 Why don't you get yourself some of that or whatever?
21:31 We got our man.
21:32 I think we got our guy here.
21:33 All right, we're good.
21:34 Thank you very much.
21:35 Thank you.
21:36 That's perfect.
21:37 We should take a seven-second race and chop it up
21:40 so that it looks like it took three minutes,
21:42 a bunch of different camera angles.
21:43 Yeah, camera-camper-curious.
21:44 [MUSIC PLAYING]
21:48 [TIRES SCREECHING]
21:51 [INAUDIBLE]
22:07 [MUSIC PLAYING]
22:11 [ENGINE REVVING]
22:14 Is your dog slow, fat, and lazy?
22:23 Get Dog Dog Food and see the difference.
22:25 Go to dogdogfood.com and order today.
22:28 [MUSIC PLAYING]
22:38 OK, go ahead.
22:40 [MUSIC PLAYING]
22:43 [ENGINE REVVING]
22:51 Nice!
23:03 I think we won.
23:06 Well, that might have been a shallow victory,
23:08 but at least it was a victory.
23:10 We didn't do so well when we entered an eight-car showdown
23:13 of the fastest Dodges on site.
23:16 The winner was Brandon Phillips in this '69 Super B,
23:19 and he took home a free Hellcat powertrain,
23:22 including the engine and a six-speed manual trans,
23:25 all courtesy of Dodge.
23:27 So what did we learn from all of this?
23:29 Basically, watch your mouth on the internet,
23:32 and don't get involved with reality TV.
23:34 People ask us all the time why "Roadkill" doesn't show up
23:38 on a cable network, and this is why.
23:40 Here on the web, we are totally in charge of our own destiny
23:44 and our own show.
23:45 No lawyers, no contracts, no private planes,
23:48 no hidden clauses, and no faking it.
23:51 Even so, we have to admit it was a pretty good time.
23:54 And if this kicked off "Roadkill Nights" as an event series,
23:57 it was all totally worth it.
24:00 And we've got to admit, those guys from the TV show
24:02 built a really cool car.
24:04 These days, everyone is asking us,
24:06 "What's next for the General Mayhem?"
24:08 First, yeah, we get it.
24:10 We have to get rid of those 2015 Charger taillights
24:13 and go back to the Stalkers.
24:15 But next, we want to return the whole car to rally race trim
24:19 and head back to Dirt Fish with 707 horsepower worth
24:23 of Hellcat-blown Hemi.
24:26 Will that ever happen?
24:27 I don't know.
24:28 If it does, you'll find out right here on "Roadkill,"
24:32 and not on some cable show.
24:35 [static]
24:38 The good news is, it's not hot anymore.
24:41 The bad news is, my right arm is soaked, and I'm furry,
24:44 so that just means I smell like a wet dog.
24:47 This car doesn't even feel that illegal.
24:49 It's got an airbag.
24:50 The radio still works.
24:52 It's the darndest thing.
24:54 How does he know where we're going?
24:56 [laughter]
24:58 In case you're wondering what we're referring to--
25:00 planes, trains, and automobiles.
25:02 Quality flick.
25:03 Uh-oh.
25:04 [rain pouring]
25:07 That is a lot of rain, really fast.
25:10 [static]
25:12 I was just asking myself on the way in,
25:15 are there any unmentionable television stars
25:17 that might have driven their car 200 miles this morning
25:20 to a drag strip to test and tune?
25:23 We don't think so.
25:24 This is an interesting door.
25:26 You need to see this tech tip.
25:28 This doesn't work, see?
25:30 Not working very much.
25:32 Nope, the roadkill version of slamming doesn't work.
25:34 You have to use the gentle click.
25:37 All good.
25:38 Very gentle.
25:39 It's the gentle mayhem.
25:41 You did say swing around, right?
25:44 [engine revving]
25:47 Assuming they don't mind that.
25:49 [laughter]
25:51 Are we low on gas? It just stalled again.
25:53 It's a little bit.
25:54 [laughter]
25:56 [engine revving]
25:59 What did you do?
26:01 [laughter]
26:02 (upbeat music)