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Stellantis Has "Disbanded" The Street & Racing Technology (SRT) Division:

Stellantis Has “Disbanded” The Street & Racing Technology (SRT) Division:​

Group Will Now Be Able To Work On All Stellantis Vehicles...​


2021-Dodge-Charger-SRT-Hellcat-Redeye-Widebody-9-scaled.jpg


Has the Street & Racing Technology (SRT) division been disbanded? Over the past week, several websites have been stating that the newly formed Stellantis group has done just that. While Stellantis itself has been quiet about the ordeal, we decided to reach out to their communications team for a real answer to what is going … (read full article...)

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Stellantis Has "Disbanded" The Street & Racing Technology (SRT) Division:

Has the Street & Racing Technology (SRT) division been disbanded? Over the past week, several websites have been stating that the newly formed Stellantis group has done just that. While Stellantis itself has been quiet about the ordeal, we decided to reach out to their communications team for a...
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Corporate mergers are about consolidation and eliminating overlap and duplication. The end result is usually financial savings, but also the result can be a better organization, from the best talent and practices gleaned from the process. If the performance spirit and focus of our beloved brands continues, is better funded and executed, than this is a good thing. There is a lot of racing and high performance history among the Stellantis brands and that should prosper on paper as a single group. What can be a concern is that a performance group that may be too European thinking, asks with concern, can an All-American performance mindset and chemistry thrive? The Germans never got it, the Italians tried but there was some confusion trans Atlantic. As to the French, who knows? If Dodges returns to NASCAR and Dodge Challengers dominate NHRA Factory Stock competition, good. If not, bad. The jury will be out on this for awhile.
 
This story has a familiar ring to it. When Sergio M stepped into Auburn Hills he disbanded the ENVI team. The people involved all were absorbed into the traditional corporate structure.

From 2009:
www.greencarreports.com

Chrysler's ENVI Electric Vehicle Program Cancelled

Over the past year we have brought you countless stories regarding Chrysler's ENVI group. Several times throughout the year the group, which focuses on electric vehicles, has displayed concepts and hinted at production possibilities of various models. Numerous times we reported that the...
www.greencarreports.com www.greencarreports.com

How dare I compare an EV program with SRT. The products are different, but the strategy of the team development is similar. The Fiat 500e compliance car which happened after the disbanding of the ENVI team used an outsourced powertrain from Bosch. However, the extended range EV prototypes also used vendor sourced powertrains. There was also a battery electric minivan project for the USPS, but Uncle Sam didn't think FCA would survive, so the project cancelled when FCA was turned down.

The SRT team did well during the FCA years. The groups low volume projects for the most part have been money makers, unlike the resource hungry compliance car program. Times have changed. SRT nuked the fridge with the Dodge Challenger Demon. The show continues, but it is the same old story. The Ram TRX is a thirsty public relations risk. It might very well be the next poster child of bad timing. Remember the petrol fueled Hummer and Ford Excursion in 2008? Today Ford has a hybrid F-150 and a battery electric version will soon follow. Ram is out there touting the TRX while ignoring the new political and cultural landscape.

It is better to have traditional muscle to no longer be out front. Stellantis needs some different image cars.
 
SRT Division is the best thing that could have happened to Dodge. There real sales has been better than Ram and Jeep. This may have been a big mistake by Stellantis. Maybe they should be looking at Alfa instead.
 
Dodge took the charger from a 2-door midsize muscle car in the 60s and 70's to a 2-door economy hatchback in the 80's and now an amazing 4-door muscle car that we know and love today. But I remember a different car dodge took from humble beginnings and made into a monster, the Neon. Dodge took it's stable grocery getter and turned it into the SRT4 neon and did all kinds of things with that little car and then killed the SRT4 name by putting it on the not-even-close Caliber. My point here is, it's time to let go of the traditional muscle cars and lets move into something new, different and better. A Dodge Neon sedan on the Giulia platform with the Quadrifoglio 505hp 2.9L V6 dubbed Daytona and a 425hp 3.0L from Maserati in the R/T would be an amazing and impressive performance vehicle. With styling cues from the Charger blended with some evolutionary cues from the neon would certainly make for a performance car that looks the part. Not to mention it still pays Homage to the history of Mopar performance while moving the brand forward and globalizing it. Give the car that true Dodge feel on the interior along with a muscular exterior and SRT tuned performance parts and performance packs and upgrades. Bring back the Dodge Stealth as a RWD based AWD 2-door high performance coupe with evolutionary styling from the last-gen Stealth and the viper and make it a 4-seater on the Gran-Turismo platform. Return the Chrysler 300 back to the 300M and 300M special built on the same platform as the Maserati Quattroporte and give it the sleek look that it once had while adding real power and performance and even hybrid technology. Put the Durango on the Levante platform and give it the 425hp 3.0L and the 505hp 2.9L V6 engines and go from there. By spreading the SRT brand into the rest of Stellantis, it allows the brand to add performance everywhere and incorporate the best of every brand into every brand. It's time to pull out of the 60's and 70's and do something newer.
 
I wonder what Dodge's high performance trims will be called, and how it will be designed and engineered.

Maserati has Trofeo, and Alfa has QV. and I'd be wondering if these models are designed and engineered by the same team who design and engineer the regular models or do they have special skunk team.
 
patfromigh said:
This story has a familiar ring to it. When Sergio M stepped into Auburn Hills he disbanded the ENVI team. The people involved all were absorbed into the traditional corporate structure.

From 2009:
www.greencarreports.com

Chrysler's ENVI Electric Vehicle Program Cancelled

Over the past year we have brought you countless stories regarding Chrysler's ENVI group. Several times throughout the year the group, which focuses on electric vehicles, has displayed concepts and hinted at production possibilities of various models. Numerous times we reported that the...
www.greencarreports.com www.greencarreports.com

How dare I compare an EV program with SRT. The products are different, but the strategy of the team development is similar. The Fiat 500e compliance car which happened after the disbanding of the ENVI team used an outsourced powertrain from Bosch. However, the extended range EV prototypes also used vendor sourced powertrains. There was also a battery electric minivan project for the USPS, but Uncle Sam didn't think FCA would survive, so the project cancelled when FCA was turned down.

The SRT team did well during the FCA years. The groups low volume projects for the most part have been money makers, unlike the resource hungry compliance car program. Times have changed. SRT nuked the fridge with the Dodge Challenger Demon. The show continues, but it is the same old story. The Ram TRX is a thirsty public relations risk. It might very well be the next poster child of bad timing. Remember the petrol fueled Hummer and Ford Excursion in 2008? Today Ford has a hybrid F-150 and a battery electric version will soon follow. Ram is out there touting the TRX while ignoring the new political and cultural landscape.

It is better to have traditional muscle to no longer be out front. Stellantis needs some different image cars.
Click to expand...

The ENVI program. What a great portfolio they had in the works then. Including the sexy Chrysler 200C EV...

 
Isn't the current EV program in Jeep and Ram an extension of the ENVI program?
 
redriderbob said:
The ENVI program. What a great portfolio they had in the works then. Including the sexy Chrysler 200C EV...
Click to expand...
I never saw that particular video. When Fiat stepped into the picture in 2009, Chrysler was desperately short of engineering and development staff. ENVI was really a luxury they couldn't afford at the time.

Here is some history from around the time of ENVI. There were some problems with EV development in those years, which weren't really the fault of the ENVI group. The battery vendor was supposed to be A123. If Chrysler stayed tied to A123 this would have hamstrung the company. GM was building the hybrid transmissions for the Dodge Durango, Chrysler Aspen Hemi hybrids and the experimental Ram 1500 PHEV. I forget how many of the Ram plugins were built, I think it was around 150, all of them for a Department of Energy project. The problem was GM was gouging Chrysler for the transmission prices. Production at that time would have been unrealistic, because the retail sales would have been dismal.

The Ram PHEV program was fruitful both for FCA and the DOE. For all the Sergio Marchionne bashing by the media pundits about his disbanding ENVI and later saying "don't buy a Fiat 500e because we lose money on them", a surprising amount of what we now know about networked EV charging has come from that joint FCA-DOE program. Most of the program happened after the disbanding of ENVI, so hindsight justifies Sergio's decisions. Just because FCA wasn't retailing electrified vehicles, doesn't mean the company wasn't staying up to date on the technology. The strategy is to step into plugin sales when the market is ready. The market is heavily influenced by both battery prices and the availability of charging stations. This is why Europe gets this technology first.

Not counting the mild hybrid BSG systems, the current electrified vehicles from Auburn Hills are the Chrysler Pacifica PHEV and the Jeep Wrangler PHEV. Much of the rear drive based hybrids from the Jeep Wrangler going forward will use ZF mechanicals. The e-Flite in the Pacifica PHEV predates ENVI. That particular transmission is based on expired TRW patents. TRW management started researching hybrids following the 1956 Suez Crisis. They were some of the very few Americans who read the tea leaves correctly. Europe, meanwhile, felt the pain at the pump right away. We know the story about TRW because after the introduction of the Pacifica Hybrid, Toyota sued Chrysler for infringing on their hybrid patents. Chrysler showed their hand, and some of the Chrysler patents came out of Highland Park. That was some time ago. ENVI initiated 25 PHEV minivans as part of the DOE project using a GM supplied transaxle. GM proved to be an unreliable partner, so the production version of the Pacifica PHEV uses a transaxle of Chrysler design, based off those old patents.

There were 3 different plugin minivan designs which originated from ENVI. There was a range extended EV using a two cylinder IC range extender. There was also a battery electric cargo van intended for production for the Post Office. Then there were the 25 minivans for the DOE, I believe these used the 4.0 V6 with a GM supplied front drive hybrid transaxle. I think all the vehicles were Chrysler Town & Country models, but I might be wrong about that.

I don't know much about the recently introduced plugin hybrid Jeeps which are front drive based. That is for somebody who knows the details much better than I do.
 
Mopar392 said:
I wonder what Dodge's high performance trims will be called, and how it will be designed and engineered.

Maserati has Trofeo, and Alfa has QV. and I'd be wondering if these models are designed and engineered by the same team who design and engineer the regular models or do they have special skunk team.
Click to expand...
SRT. The BRAND is not going anywhere. They merely axed the engineering division as a separate entity.
 
Time will tell what is going to happen but this looks like a bad omen ! Get yours while you can using employee pricing as I did or regret no doing so.
 
DodgeFL said:
Do you really think things will be the same ?
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No, things will get better. The Challenger and Charger, as presently offered, can not be adapted to either low voltage (48V) of high voltage (Whatever the 4xe is.) electrification. It will require a generational change because of the needed electrical architectural modifications.
 
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