The Ford flathead V8 is one of the reasons any of us even know what a hot rod is. Sure, guys were messing around with little four banger engines back in the day but it is was the V8 engine that really kicked the hot rodding world into high gear and that spurred on the development of other V8 engines in the Detroit manufacturers skunkworks and all of it lead to the horsepower nuclear arms race known as the muscle car era. Give or take. Anyway, in today;s world the flathead is respected for its history but it seems kind of quaint now, right? It makes the right noises, looks the right part, but it isn’t something that could be used to go “fast” in the modern lexicon unless you are Ron Main/George Poteet with enough investment in theirs to float the economy of a small country…or at least that’s what the majority of people think and thankfully Rick and Joel Schnell aren’t buying it and this video is proof as you’ll see them run their blown, flattie powered dragster deep into the SEVENS at a shade under 175 MPH! Seriously.

This is the angriest sounding flathead we have ever heard and according to the description on the video the engine is running a 60% load of nitro and 24 PSI of boost from the blower on top. We did some digging and found out more about the incredible engine powering this dragster. The block is of the 1949 vintage and for starters the water jackets were filled with aluminum to boost its strength. Moving on, the center exhaust ports were split, the heads are custom billet pieces that Rick made himself, the cam and crank are billet steel, the blower is a 4-71, and the engine dyno’d at 939hp on a 60% load. THAT is one bad ass piece of Ford flathead right there, kids. We could go on for days about the time and dedication it takes to make something like this work and explode all over the place but we’d rather show you the videos on this Saturday and let you revel on it.

PRESS PLAY BELOW TO WATCH THE WORLD’S QUICKEST AND FASTEST QUARTER MILE FLATHEAD GET AFTER IT ON THE STRIP!