Building an AMG Engine

Motor Trend’s Johnny Lieberman gets an opportunity to tour AMG’s engine factory in Affalterbach, Germany and we get the pleasure of tagging along. He works with one of the AMG technicians to build one of the 5.5 liter twin turbo V8’s that powers the entire AMG line with the exception of the C63 AMG (the engineers thought the C63 was too light for the turbo engine’s torque so they stayed with the 6.2 liter naturally aspirated V8). The part that I found particularly interesting was the assembly and testing of the 2,000 psi direct injection fuel system. After everything is installed, they pressure test it for leaks with helium since it’s the smallest practical atom (hydrogen is smaller but more ridiculous to work with). The last thing they want is a bunch of high pressure fuel spraying all over the engine. This was a special opportunity for the Johnny unlike GM’s program where anybody can pay to assemble their own LS7 or LS9 for their Corvette or crate engine purposes. AMG actually decided not to put the engine Lieberman worked on into use. Right now it’s on a display stand where it can’t hurt anybody.


Source: Motor Trend on YouTube