The V-16-Powered Lada Is Real and It’s Ridiculous

• Garage 54 installed its V-16 chainsaw engine in a Lada. 
• The 74-horsepower engine was powerful enough to drive the Lada. 
• It took the Lada 26 seconds to hit 37 miles per hour. 

Well, they did it. The Garage 54 crew has installed its V-16 chainsaw engine in a Lada. The team built the engine, comprised of 16 58-cc, two-stroke Hüter BS-62 chainsaws, in a previous video, and the channel’s latest upload shows them putting it through a proper road test after fitting it inside the sedan.

The Garage 54 crew had to extend the Lada’s engine bay. The V-16 engine measured 51.8 inches in length, far longer than the Lada’s stock engine at 18.5 inches. The crew fabricated new fenders to accommodate the engine, extending the brake lines and steering shaft. They didn’t fashion a new hood because who would want to cover up this fantastic build?

After installing the engine, they tested the car inside the garage, and it moved under its own power. They then took it outside for a proper evaluation, which was a success. The V-16, which displaced 928cc and made just 74 horsepower, propelled the elongated Lada to 37 miles per hour in 26 seconds. For some context, the Koenigsegg Jesko Absolut can go from 0 to 250 mph and back in 27.83 seconds.

That’s dangerously slow for today’s roads. Still, the Garage 54 crew once again proves that anything is possible with enough ingenuity, trial and error, and a list of other wacky builds already in the shed.