Angry Tank Engines!

Reviving tank engines seems to be all the rage these days. EngineLabs found a radial-engine aficionado who mounted an 11-liter Continental engine from an M2 tank on a VW. Also, there’s a year-old video (below) of a Ford GAA 1,100ci V8 tank engine spitting fire that popped up on various automotive websites last week. 

Now we find some Swedes who are waking up the neighbors with a Rolls-Royce Meteor tank engine. With the extreme shorty headers, there’s plenty of flames and glowing metal to bring a smile to your face.

According to a British engineering magazine, the Meteor V12 tank engine was a modified version of the Merlin aircraft engines found in the Spitfire and other fighter planes. Even though the Meteor didn’t have the Merlin’s supercharger, it still shared other vital components — such as the crankshaft, crank case, cylinder block and valve gear. The engine ended up in the the Crusader, Cromwell and Centurion tanks. Running on pump gas instead of high-octane aviation fuel, the Meteor still pumped out more than 600 horsepower and up to 1,600 lb-ft torque.

Putting a tank engine in a car is not new but still fun to ponder the possibilities. We all know about Jay Leno’s beastly roadster that sports an engine from an M-47 Patton tank. Over in Australia, there’s a Warman Special with a Rolls Royce tank engine. And there are lots of photos on the web showing a Mustang buildup in progress using the Ford GAA engine, but we’re not sure if the finished car has been revealed. 

Can’t wait to see the first hot-rodder fire up a Honeywell turbine from an M1 Abrams tank and drop it into a car chassis. That would be worth a video.