Of all the engines at the 2011 PRI show, none were spoken about more or with more wonderment than this one. This is a motor that Sonny Leonard Racing Engines calls, “The Godfather” and rightfully so. Measuring out at an amazing 1005ci, it can produce more than 2,000hp in naturally aspirated trim and Lord knows how much with forced induction or nitrous oxide.  Whole city blocks could be destroyed if things go sideways with power adders on this thing!

If your initial question is, “How do you build a 1,000ci engine?” the answer is brutally simple, start with a massive block. Made in house at Sonny’s, the block is a billet aluminum piece that probably begins life as a chunk of aluminum the size of a school bus and ends up as a huge piece of gearhead bling with bore centers that measure 5.4″. A Chevy 350 has bore centers that measure out to 4.4″, just to give you an idea on the physical size of the block. 

The giant cylinder heads are Sonny’s “Next Generation” Chevy heads that have been out for several years now. They are a semi-hemi design and have been very popular with the mountain motor pro stock crowd since they hit the streets. The heads on this motor are updated and refined versions of the originals. The intake valve is like 2.9″. That’s bigger than lots of guys’ exhaust system pipe diameter! We do not know the cam specs but there’s probably enough lift to bring tears of joy to our gasoline soaked eyes. 

The crank is a Sonny Bryant billet piece with a stroke of 5.875″. The bore is 5.22″ and the compression ratio is a stiff 16.0:1. Those huge valves are titanium as are the valve springs. Because they are so large, we’re guessing that was the only option. The sheer weight of a stainless valve at those sizes would limit RPM and cause carnage on an epic level. Can you imagine sucking a valve that’s three inches around into the motor? Yikes!

Interestingly, this enging is equipped with EFI. There are four Accufab 2-barrel throttle bodies atop a custom made Sonny’s sheetmetal intake manifold. The injectors looks like they come from Precision and there’s a Big Stuff EFI controller taking care of the thinking end of the operation. 

We could talk all day on this thing because it is just so wild. Even the stock car and go kart guys were spending lots of time staring in wonderment at these engines at the Sonny’s booth. If you have a gearhead cell in your body, you simply have to, it is impossible to look away. 

Oh, the price? Yeah, that would be a cool $115,000 shipped to your door!

Scroll down to see more than 20 photos of this incredible motor!