Several years ago, Jesse James, the self-proclaimed “Glorified Welder” at West Coast Choppers, had his hands in a little bit of everything. If you turned on the TV, you would either find him building crazy choppers or hosting the Monster Garage hit TV show which premiered on Discovery in June 2002 and concluded in June 2006.
Monster Garage was full of attitudes, miscommunication, egos, and, best of all, some monster builds. One of our favorite things about the show was the creativity used to build whatever in the world James could dream up. And unlike other “reality” TV shows, if the project was a failure, the world got to see it. This hit show was entertaining, and we hated to see it go. Fast forward 15 years and James is back hosting a brand new Monster Garage doing what he’s always done. But from the looks of his latest creation, it seems that James and his team have turned it up a bit.
While we haven’t watched the latest season of Monster Garage, we recently ran across a post from the Roadster Shop that grabbed our attention. James and the team built a Dodge Rampage “Sport Pickup” race car in just five days. This vehicle has a host of go-fast parts, and for a good reason. The crew is trying to blast down the Texas Mile and go 200 MPH with James behind the wheel.
While we were not able to get in touch with James, Casey Rance the owner of Mailorderturner.com was able to give us a few details on this unique vehicle which he dyno tuned. The Rampage body sits atop a Roadster Shop frame with a full cage and all of the safety equipment needed to go fast securely. A Texas Speed 427 is nestled between the fenders with a massive Whipple supercharger poking out of the hood.
On the dyno, the boosted combination made over 700 horsepower to the wheels on X85 fuel with only 8-pounds of boost using a Holley Dominator. Another interesting fact about this truck, it has a manual transmission. That’s right, James is going to be banging gears with a TREMEC T56 Magnum as he attempts to hit 200 MPH in the mile. A set of massive Baer brakes will help get this beast slowed down after it hits the mark with the help of dual parachutes if needed.
We’re excited to see that Jesse James is back in the limelight with Monster Garage and are ecstatic to see what the LS-powered Dodge Rampage can do at the Texas Mike. Be sure to tune in for the Monster Garage season finale on Discovery to see this project come to life.