- Reviewers have found that the Dodge Charger Daytona cannot do a burnout
- The Line Lock characteristic, which disables the entrance electrical motor and locks the wheels, was inexplicably lacking from take a look at vehicles on the launch occasion.
- Dodge does not have something to share about future plans to allow or embrace Line Lock
The Dodge Charger Daytona is out and the primary evaluations are lastly hitting the streets. Critics appear to like the automobile, principally, particularly because it’s one of many first efficiency EVs particularly aimed toward roping in gearheads away from gas-powered, tire-slaying, row-your-own combustion vehicles. That is not a straightforward feat, however as a lot of those that have already made the swap can let you know—the moment torque delivered by an EV may be removed from tame.
However there’s one explicit quirk concerning the Charger Daytona that we won’t fairly overcome. Regardless of Dodge advertising and marketing the Charger as an electrified muscle automobile, it lacks the flexibility to carry out of essentially the most primary hooning options that any red-blooded, high-performance American coupe ought to be capable of do: a burnout.
Photograph by: InsideEVs
Information of the lacking characteristic first got here to us whereas skimming via MotorTrend’s first drive assessment of the Charger Daytona. Throughout their time with the automobile, MotorTrend seen that (for some unfathomable motive) it was inconceivable to get the automobile to do a burnout. No quantity of twiddling with the controls and fuel pedal may yield a brakestand.
Here is what caught our eye from MotorTrend:
In reality, the Charger Daytona received’t do a burnout. It doesn’t matter what we tried, the electrical Charger stubbornly rejected our efforts to announce its arrival to the world through smoke alerts. It’s most likely able to doing one with a line lock characteristic, however inexplicably that’s the one toy Dodge didn’t program in.
Certainly that may’t be proper.
Dodge, the corporate that simply mentioned it was going to save lots of the world from “lame, soulless, weak-looking, self-driving, sleep-pods” by giving the world a battery-powered muscle automobile, would not have made it in order that flagship EV was incapable of spinning its rear tires in a formidable cloud of vaporized rubber… proper?
Possibly there is a good motive for it. Let’s keep in mind right here that the Charger Daytona comes solely in all-wheel drive. Meaning twin 335-horsepower motors on the entrance and rear wheels, making a mixed output of 670 horsepower and 627 pound-feet of on the spot, electrified torque. That is loads of energy for some large quantity 11s on the pavement.
We dug into this quirk a bit extra to search out out precisely what was happening. As talked about, the Charger Daytona is AWD, so with the intention to do a conventional burnout, it might want to chop energy to the entrance wheels—which it ought to be capable of do since an EV does not must mechanically separate the entrance and rear drivetrains on condition that they’re utterly separate from each other.
Dodge calls this characteristic “Line Lock”—a time period that is been round since mid-century within the drag racing scene. Its identify is kind of literal and refers to locking strain within the entrance brake traces of a automobile to maintain pads involved with the rotors and stop the entrance wheels from turning. The motive force can then mash the fuel pedal and warmth up the rear tires earlier than sending the automobile down the drag strip.
The concept is comparable for the Charger Daytona. Turning the characteristic on would disable energy to the entrance motor to forestall the wheels from turning, lock the entrance brakes and let the rear motor unleash its full torque output.Hell, Dodge even brags concerning the means to “add in Line Lock for smoky burnouts” on the web site for the Charger Daytona.
However there’s only one drawback: the Charger Daytona does not have the Line Lock characteristic. In reality, a Stellantis spokesperson confirmed to InsideEVs that Line Lock will not be presently out there on the Charger Daytona and that the model did not have something to share relating to any future plans for the characteristic.
Effectively, people, I hate to interrupt it to you, however that is the world we’re residing in. The Dodge Charger Daytona—the world’s first mass-produced trendy electrical muscle automobile—cannot do a burnout. No less than not but, and whether or not or not it is going to get an replace so as to add Dodge’s Line Lock characteristic sooner or later is anyone’s guess.
Certain, it might do different cool issues. Drift mode will get rowdy and even performs the decoupling of the entrance electrical drive motor. That makes it much more puzzling that Line Lock is not out there for this identical operate. I do know this is not the tip of the world, however it looks as if such a missed alternative to incorporate a primary muscle automobile characteristic on what’s being marketed as the primary trendy electrical muscle automobile. Possibly that’ll change sooner or later, however for now, I’ll go sit within the nook and marvel what we did to deserve this.
