Want to ride like a 1970s Las Vegas show singer but drift like Ken Block? You’ll probably want the keys to this 1978 Rolls Royce Silver Shadow dubbed “Slay Poupon” by its creators over at Hoonigan. As the build reached completion, they did a full retail video, and we were shocked not only by its Hellcat motor, but also connections to the Chevy Camaro and Honda.
Hoonigan didn’t directly build this luxury drifter, which was actually sponsored by the exhaust company Borla. But they did come up with a cool Slay Poupon logo to go on shirts and stickers, which will sell out after this Rolls starts doing burnouts at events.
The name is a reference to Gray Poupon from the old mustard commercials which cemented the old money feel that comes with Rolls-Royce ownership. But let’s dive into the build’s cool details. The star fabricators are Alex (@grimmaro) and Suppy (@suppymk4). One is a Camaro specialist and the other is deeply involved with Honda dragsters, which left its mark on the car in strange ways.
But let’s start with the chassis, which came in the form of two small frames from Art Morrison. Alex made CAD mounts for the Hellcat motor, and then parts were liberally added like it’s a mobile game where everything goes. The 6.2-liter Hellcat V8 would have made about 707 horsepower, but its stock induction has been replaced by a largerย Magnusonย supercharger, so she’s making 850-900 hp. Like a real Dodge, this sucks air through what would have been a headlight but is now a hole with mesh.
SEMA-worthy Rolls-Royce
And they went crazy with the cooling after that. The Hellcat has a water-to-air heat exchanger for the intercooler, one regular radiator plus two more which would have been used on racing Hondas. We just love the precise welds on its water and overflow tanks.
The power feeds to a custom differential for an independent setup designed for 5th-gen Camaros. Yeah, that’s unexpected. Normally, you’d expect an LS swap and maybe a Ford axle in any restomod such as this Rolls-Royce. But Alex is the Camaro specialist who also made this 1000 horsepower big-block Camaro Z/28 for Hoonigan.
The Rolls-Royce body is just there for the show, because this is basically a tubular frame race car that’s somehow still a 4-door, 4-seater. Borla also had to pipe some custom pipes (Switchfire exhaust), which somehow make the Hellcat motor sound even more menacing.
The classic 1970s Rolls-Royce lines are brought into the custom car world with a satin white wrap, lowered stance, and golden Rotiform wheels. All the original trim is there minus the bumper, which was replaced with a lighter aluminum custom unit with cleverly hidden intakes.
The interior is far more exciting than any old Rolls-Royce. It’s got a custom handbrake system. Press it forward to line lock the front tires and back to lock up the rears. So you can burn rubbers or trigger slides super-easily.
