News
Dodge “Demon” looks to dethrone Tesla’s title for “quickest production car” in the world
Tesla sent shock waves through the automotive world in February when Motor Trend crowned the Model S P100D the quickest production car in the world after a 2.28 second run to 60 miles per hour. Do a few hundredths of a second really matter? In the real world, no. But in terms of image, they matter a great deal. Tesla garnered an enormous amount of valuable publicity from the Motor Trend story, and subsequently many 1/4 mile world records being set in a P100D.
Dodge has now responded to the marker laid down by Tesla. Starting this fall, it will offer a special edition of the Dodge Challenger SRT called the “Demon”. Dodge says it can scamper to the magic 60 mile per hour mark in 2.1 seconds, which will allow it to claim the title of quickest production car in the world.
The Demon features a great honking beast of a V8 engine topped with an enormous supercharger and compound intercooling. The Demon engine has 808 horsepower and 717 lb-ft of torque when running on 91 octane pump gas. Put 100+ octane racing fuel in the tank and it’s capable of 840 hp and 770 lb-ft of torque. There’s a big button on the dash the driver can push to change the engine mapping in order to extract maximum power from the racing gas.
The Demon comes from the factory with a driver’s seat and a two speaker stereo. It has almost no sound insulation and no carpeting. The car has smaller brakes and hollow antiroll bars to save weight. If the customer really needs a passenger seat, one can be added for $1 when the order is placed ($1,160 if purchased later). A back seat is available for another $1. A 19-speaker sound system can also be specified.
The Demon is the result of a two year campaign by a small team of 25 Dodge engineers. Compared to the engine in the Hellcat, the Demon’s power plant has 97 new parts including a new crankshaft, new connecting rods, new pistons, a new steel camshaft, and a new valve train. A larger supercharger is fitted and boost pressure is raised from 11.6 psi to 14.5 psi. The engineers also altered the software that controls the eight speed automatic transmission to add a transbrake function. In Drag mode, it allows the engine to build power while the car remains stationary until a flick of the paddle shifter unleashes the beast.
- Credit: Dodge
Photo credit: Motor Trend
“Sometimes you need to ignore the data, disregard the focus groups, and build a car that can define itself,” says Dodge President Tim Kuniskis. “A lot of halos don’t have the greatest business cases.” The halo effect the Hellcat did not go unnoticed in the Dodge board room. While sales of the Hellcat were minimal, orders for the Scat Pack, a special appearance package comprised of stripes, stickers and decals, exploded. 17% of Dodge Challenger buyers now opt for the Scat Pack, an idea that harks back to the muscle car days of the 1960’s.
The Dodge Demon may be a production car, but its numbers will be limited. Only 3,300 will be built — 3,000 for the US market and 300 for Canada. It is definitely intended for serious racers. It can be ordered with The Crate, a box full of go fast goodies that fits in the trunk and includes skinny wheels and tires for the front end on track day. It also contains a special air filter, a tire pressure gauge, and a leather bound manual with tips on how to go drag racing and pages to record data from each run.
There is no doubt the Dodge Demon is an awesome car with brutal acceleration. Its 0-60 run in 2.1 seconds has been verified. But as Motor Trend points out, that feat was achieved at a drag strip, where years of racing have coated the track surface with sticky rubber. The Tesla Model S P100D record was achieved on a public road. The Model S also seats 5 in supreme comfort and is just as happy taking the family to Easter dinner as it is performing banzai runs to 60. The Models S is also a zero emissions vehicle. The Dodge Demon? Not so much.
Still, bragging rights are all about one thing — being quicker than the other guy. Once the Demon hits the streets, we can expect P100D drivers to challenge the new Challenger. Let the Dodge Demon versus Model S drag racing videos begin!
Cybertruck
Tesla is ending Cybertruck production
Tesla is ending Cybertruck production sometime in mid-2027, according to CEO Elon Musk.
Musk made the announcement on X last night, which came as a shock to many. He said that the Cybertruck will end production “to make room for increased Cybercab production” at Gigafactory Texas.
It is a huge blow to the fans of Tesla who have come to love the Cybertruck and identify with it as a symbol of their fandom. It has been the best-selling electric pickup, but it has had an underwhelming sales performance in terms of what was expected. This is mostly due to Tesla not meeting the prices it planned to offer the Cybertruck, as its unveiling and actual release were four years apart.
Tesla will be winding down production of the Cybertruck at Gigafactory Texas around the middle of next year to make room for increased Cybercab production
— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) November 6, 2026
Overall, the responses were mixed. Some fans understood the move toward Cybercab production, especially as Tesla is truly pushing the autonomous future through its Robotaxi platform. However, others did not understand it.
“Damn, how many Cybercabs do you guys need?” one response read. Another said it was “Sad but understandable.”Even analyst Gary Black had responded to the news, stating he hoped Tesla planned to replace it with a traditional pickup design.
It doesn’t seem like that will be the case.
Tesla is so hell-bent on delivering autonomy and eventually providing a driverless service that owning a car seems like an arbitrary idea, according to their thesis. Instead, Cybercabs will be available to pick you up and drop you off on demand, safely, without any human help.
As a result, Tesla has thinned its lineup considerably, and one can only ask where the vehicle lineup goes from here. Eventually, it seems like Cybercab could be the only vehicle that Tesla will sell.
Elon Musk
SpaceX’s next Starship flight set to make history on Friday the 13th
SpaceX is targeting Friday, November 13 for Starship Flight 15 and its first ship catch.
SpaceX is targeting Friday, November 13 for Starship Flight 15, the mission the company plans to use for its first attempt at catching the ship itself with the launch tower.
SpaceX Vice President of Launch Kiko Dontchev shared the date on stage at the UP.Summit on Thursday, according to Ars Technica’s Eric Berger, who was in attendance. It is the first launch target to come directly from a SpaceX executive. Until now, the public schedule had relied on FAA air traffic planning slides, which listed Flight 15 for no earlier than November 8 and later November 12. SpaceX has not posted an official mission page yet, and no launch time has been shared.
The date lands inside the window Elon Musk sketched out last month. Speaking at Giga Texas on October 10, Musk said the flight would “probably launch a little bit before Thanksgiving,” as Teslarati reported. On SpaceX’s third quarter earnings call ten days later, he confirmed that Flight 15 would try to catch both the Super Heavy booster and the ship, and put the odds of a successful ship catch at “more likely than not.” SpaceX also aired an animation of the maneuver during that webcast, showing the ship swinging vertical over Starbase before dropping into the tower’s chopsticks.
The hardware is ready. Booster 22 fired all 33 of its Raptor engines for a full duration static fire at Pad 2 on October 25. Ship 42 followed with a single engine burn simulating a deorbit maneuver on October 26 and a 60 second firing of all six engines the next day, according to NASASpaceflight. Ship 42 had already rehearsed the catch in September, when the Pad 2 arms lifted it into position and crews connected the quick disconnect arm while the vehicle hung from the tower.
The remaining hurdle is regulatory. The FAA’s Starship page does not yet list a Flight 15 license. SpaceX President Gwynne Shotwell said in October that, after “significant constructive engagement with the FAA,” she expects the license to cover a return to the launch site and a tower catch for both stages. Bringing the ship home means a reentry path that heads toward land, rather than ending over open ocean as every Starship flight so far has.
SpaceX has caught Super Heavy three times, on Flights 5, 7 and 8, but the ship comes back from orbital velocity and has never been caught. Flight 14 on September 28 was the first Starship to reach orbit, deploying 26 Starlink V3 satellites before splashing down despite an early engine shutdown that Musk blamed on engine computer software.
Musk has called a successful ship catch “the first time that there’s been full recovery of an orbital class rocket,” and he has already named the step after it: a Flight 16 where both the booster and the ship fly again. NASASpaceflight reports that Ship 43, the next vehicle in line, is set for static fire testing in December.
News
EVgo taps Tesla Superchargers for mass charging expansion
EVgo has tapped Tesla Superchargers for its most recent efforts to expand its charging presence in the United States, a move that seems logical based on the effectiveness of the automaker’s own infrastructure.
EVgo opened its first Supercharger site in Illinois, a 12-stall station near downtown Chicago at 3145 South Ashland Avenue in the Riverside Square & River’s Edge center, right beside a grocery store. This marks the start of the company’s plan to deploy hundreds of Supercharger stalls across the United States, primarily at grocery-anchored Regency Centers properties where drivers can shop, eat, or run errands while they charge.
We’ve opened our first EVgo Supercharger location in Illinois, marking the start of our plan to add hundreds of Supercharger stalls across the U.S.
Designed for both NACS and CCS vehicles with Magic Dock technology, these new sites help make fast charging more accessible and convenient for all EV drivers. Learn more: https://t.co/V92t5FDryQ
— EVgo Fast Charging Network (@evgonetwork) November 5, 2026
The new location uses Tesla’s Magic Dock technology so both NACS and CCS vehicles can plug in natively without drivers needing to carry their own adapters. Peak power reaches 325 kW at this site, with pricing set between $0.25 and $0.35 per kWh depending on the hour—the same rate for Tesla and non-Tesla drivers.
The stalls also appear in Tesla’s in-car navigation and Trip Planner, making them easy for Tesla owners to find and route to. Illinois has seen EV registrations rise nearly 60 percent over the past two years, and EVgo’s broader network has experienced more than 700 percent growth in charging demand over three years, so the timing fits the market’s trajectory.
Choosing Tesla hardware through the Supercharger for Business program turns out to have been a smart, practical move.
Tesla’s V4 stalls and cabinets deliver high, reliable power with a proven track record of strong uptime, while Magic Dock delivers true dual-standard compatibility in one package. Because the sites show up in Tesla’s navigation tools, EVgo instantly gains visibility among millions of existing Tesla drivers, which should raise utilization and help the company double its addressable market as more vehicles adopt NACS. EVgo still owns the stations and sets pricing, yet benefits from Tesla’s established hardware, longer cables, and operational support.
The result is faster, lower-risk infrastructure expansion that serves every EV driver—Tesla or otherwise—with convenient, high-power charging at everyday retail locations. For drivers, that means fewer adapters, more predictable stops, and a denser network just as electric vehicles become everyday transportation.

