It has been more than six years since the Hennessey Venom F5 was first announced, and the Texas company has confirmed that it will premiere in production guise before the end of the year.
Hennessey intended to unveil the Venom F5 this month, but due to the coronavirus pandemic was forced to delay those plans. Now, in a recent podcast with the head of communications at Bugatti, Tim Bravo, John Hennessey said we will indeed see the Venom F5 before the end of 2020, although he failed to provide a specific date.
During the Drive On podcast, Hennessey added that the company wanted to reveal the Venom F5 at August’s Pebble Beach Concours d’Elegance, but the event was canceled. He also said that work on the first production model is almost complete and it is functional.
With the first Venom F5 complete, Hennessey will start testing in early 2021. It plans to build 24 examples, with half going to customers in North America and the rest to be sold in international markets.
Underpinning the hypercar will be an all-carbon fiber chassis that weighs just 190 lbs (86 kg) with a torsional rigidity of 52,000 newton meters per degree, surpassing the chassis of the Bugatti Chiron. Power will be provided by a 6.6-liter twin-turbocharged V8 with 1,817 hp at 8,000 rpm and 1,193 lb-ft (1,617 Nm) of torque at 5,500 rpm.
John Hennessey has made no secret of his intention to set a new production car top speed record with the Venom F5, exceeding the 311 mph (500 km/h) mark. Following SSC’s controversial attempt, the race to 300 mph is still on. While the Bugatti Chiron Super Sport 300+ hit 304.773 mph (490.484 km/h) last year, it only did so in one direction, meaning the record wasn’t verified by Guinness.
