As you might’ve noticed, lifting sports cars of all sorts has turned into a bit of a trend. And no, people can no longer blame the ongoing health crisis for this. They simply need to take responsibility for their chopping actions and admit they enjoy mixing the sensations two-doors offer with the spoils of overlanding. Even if it sometimes means converting a Dodge Viper ACR to perform the kind of duties that are normally reserved for a Ram TRX, this time in a rendering.
At first, this pixel play might seem a bit extreme. After all, it does start with a Gen V Viper ACR, a beast that set over a dozen lap records last decade, which, as mentioned above, it takes down the TRX route.
In the mid-2000s, Dodge Ram SRT-10s borrowed the V10 heart of the time’s Gen III Viper. But nowadays Ram’s halo model is the rugged terrain-biased TRX and it seems like the time has come for the truck to repay its debt.
We’re sure the opinions would be split if we asked enthusiasts if they preferred such a build—the hypothetical real-world version—with the Viper’s 645 hp N/A 8.4L V10 or the TRX’s 702 hp supercharged 6.2L Hellcat V8. As we know from when the Hellcat motor was introduced back in 2014, this is too wide to clear the frame rails of the supercar, but hey, we’re playing the imagination game here.
Nevertheless, if you ask us, graphic designer Jim (aka jlord8) had the skills to portray what many of us were thinking of, namely a Viper that can go anywhere—okay, maybe that ACR take, with its added downforce and its carbon bits is a bit too much (you’ll find the original in the image gallery).
The Viper TV show of the mid-1990s brought an off-roading twist to the V10 supercar
One might say the Viper was born to master off-roading and the proof lies in the YouTube video at the bottom of the story. This brings some of the beast scenes from the original season of the Viper TV series that aired between 1994 and 1999.
The plot of the four-season show involves a high-tech vehicle simply dubbed Viper that’s used to fight crime in a futuristic city. The machine can go from its street car form (Gen I roadster and, later on, Gen II coupe) to the Defender mobile fortress, which is more than capable of driving over many types of terrain. And, unlike in the case of most action movies involving tricked-out cars, the halo vehicle was created by the automaker itself rather than by the film specialists.
Enthusiasts in the comments section of Jim’s rendering-showcasing Instagram post, which you’ll find below, were also quick to point out the Viper TV show, even though a part of them don’t enjoy the idea of giving the Viper such a treatment.
The RPM (real project in the making) potential of the CGI? Let’s say 1/10
The latter category mentioned above probably has no reason to fret. With the Viper having been discontinued back in 2017 and the entire car market currently seeing prices skyrocketing, one of these ACRs could set you back around $250,000, even without the Extreme package that made the aero even more aggressive (not pictured here).
As for the early models, first-gens used to trade hands for around $50,000, but multiple public sales completed recently have pushed values to more than double. And while those might simply be spikes, the collector value of America’s V10 supercar is clearly increasing, so we’re not exactly expecting people to grab the hacksaw.
