Formula 400 Super Sport: Powered by 2 Ilmor 725-hp V-10s

Formula announced last week that it has partnered with Ilmor Marine to make available
one of the most powerful gas engines in the 400 Super Sport. The Ilmor 725 MV10-725
is a high-performance, marinized engine that uses the 8.4 L Dodge Viper V-10 aluminum
block. The engine is naturally-aspirated for greater fuel efficiency and longer
engine life. There is no word yet from the folks at Formula as to what the 400’s
top speed might be with the twin 725s, but given that we recorded a WOT speed of
61.6 in a 400 Super Sport powered by twin 525-hp engines, clearly we should be seeing
adrenaline-pumping racing speeds.

The latest Formula 400 Super Sport model is powered by twin, aluminum-block 725-hp V-10 gasoline engines made by Ilmor Marine.

Ilmor Is All About Racing

Ilmor is dedicated solely to high-performance engines. The company was formed in
1984 as a partnership between Mario Ilien and Paul Morgan (thus “Il-mor”). From
the beginning they partnered with Roger Penske to build turbocharged engines for
Penske’s highly-successful Indy Car racing team. 4-time Indy 500 winner
Al Unser was the first driver to use an Ilmor engine in 1986.

An Ilmor 725-hp V-10 engine is lowered into the very first Formula 400 Super Sport, starting a partnership that has some exciting ramifications.

Rick Mears (another 4-time Indy winner) won the 1988 Indy 500 in a Penske PC17 powered
by an Ilmor engine. Throughout the rest of the 1980s and 1990s Ilmor built racing
engines based on blocks from General Motors, Dodge and Mercedes Benz and supplied
them to racing teams in Formula One, NASCAR as well as for Indy cars.

The MV10 725 is the highest performing naturally-aspirated gas engine available for EU certification. The engine has an anti-vapor lock system and is drive-by-wire. The lower unit is an Ilmor Indy Sterndrive.

Ilmor Enters Offshore Racing

It was only a matter of time before Ilmor got around to the highly competitive venue
of offshore powerboat racing. In 2002 it introduced for the first time twin V-8
race engines for the APBA "SuperCat" Series. (Incidentally, the same year Ilmor
entered a partnership with Honda Performance Development to design and develop the
Honda Indy racing engines that started to be used in the 2003 season.)

Ilmor engines power the P1 World Championship-winning boat in both 2007 and in 2008.

In 2004 Ilmor introduced the 550-hp MV10 550 marine engine at the Miami Boat Show.
During the next two years the company developed the MV10 625 and the hand-built
MV7-10 marine engines. The Ilmor MV10 625 engines powered the winner of the 2007
Powerboat P1 Evolution Class World Championship. The MV10 625-hp engines went on
to win the 2008 Powerboat P1 Evolution Class World Championship and the APBA P1
Class World Championship in Key West, FL.

You are looking at 1450-hp ready to be shipped to a lucky Formula customer. Can you imagine the rumble when all 20 cylinders are fired up?

High-Performance Partnership

Because of Formula’s long involvement with offshore racing (the company’s president,
Scott Porter, is a former Offshore World Champion), it is not surprising that Ilmor
and Formula would eventually come together in a high-powered partnership.

The Ilmor 725-hp engine was created by some of the most savvy racing engineers on the planet.

We’re told that only a limited number of the 400 Super Sports with the Ilmor 725-hp
engines can be built each year so getting our hands on one to test might take a while.
Nevertheless, as soon as we do we will pass along what we discover.

Transferring 725-hp reliably to the props takes beefy gears and shafts. That's why Ilmor makes its own lower units, called the Indy Sterndrives (r).

View our test of the
Formula 400 Super Sport powered by 525-hp engines…