Listen To This Tiny V8 Rev To Over 12,000RPM

V8 engines. We love them because they’re unapologetically big, brash and noisy. Right? Well, not always – certainly not if they’re designed to go in radio-controlled cars.

That’s what we’ve got the chance to see in action here, thanks to YouTube channel JohnnyQ90, which specialises in the fascinating world of teeny-tiny mechanical engineering. The engine in question is a Toyan FS-V800 and yes, it’s a fully functioning V8 – tiny crankshaft, tiny cylinders, tiny exhausts, even a tiny, tiny carburettor. It’s tiny.

28cc of tiny, in fact, which most sources seem to suggest is good for just north of 4bhp if you go for the nitro-fuelled version (yeah, nitro. It’s properly cool). Just like an old American muscle car, it’s a cross-plane crank setup with a 90-degree angle, but unlike an old American muscle car, its diddiness means it redlines at 12,500rpm. Take that, Gordon Murray Automotive T.50.

Perhaps the piece de resistance, though, comes at the beginning of the video, where we get to see not only the engine in action, but also an equally bijou supercharger. Awwwww! Unfortunately, something’s not quite right with the supercharger, though, as it winds up with misaligned rotors and badly scored surfaces inside.

Apparently, the engine is intended for use in things like remote control monster trucks. We get to see it in action in the bare chassis of something, where it first runs on a dyno that was presumably stolen from a mouse’s tuning shop before it goes whizzing around a car park, doing its very best impression of whatever full-sized cars had laid down some naughty rubber on the tarmac.

Jokes aside, this is a seriously impressive bit of engineering. Internal combustion engines are complicated things, and downscaling something to that extent is only going to make it more complicated. Now, wonder if there’s any way of dropping one of these things into a moped?