The classic muscle car formula is to drop a big V8 into a small car, spin the rear tires until they turn into smoke, and call it a day. A Chevy Camaro, or even a Nova, is a great choice for this, but certainly not a Sonic, which has half the cylinders and wrong-wheel drive. Nathan Hoy did it anyway, and the end result is so wrong, it’s right.
We reviewed the Chevy Sonic RS back in 2013. It made a not exactly thrilling 138 horsepower and 148 pound-feet of torque from its turbocharged 1.4-liter inline-4. Hoy fixed that in his 2017 model by replacing the anemic four-banger with GM’s LM7, a 5.3-liter V8 that was GM’s bread-and-butter V8 for trucks in the 2000s. Its 285 hp and 325 lb-ft of torque are more than double what the Sonic originally made. The engine is completely stock except for a front sump oil pan that made the steering rack easy to sort. Other than that, Hoy just cleaned up the engine and shoved it into the Sonic. His Instagram isn’t nate_the_ls_guy for nothing.
You wouldn’t know it from looking at the outside, which looks entirely stock. It even has the original wheels. The loud V8 burble from the cast-iron shorty headers and barely muffled exhaust does give away the secret a bit, but that’s just enough to make you look at the car and go, “Huh?”
A true muscle car
Power goes to the rear wheels (yes, the proper wheels) through a custom 54-inch driveshaft into a Chevy S-10 rear axle. That axle is positioned precisely in the rear of the Sonic by welding it directly to the original suspension’s lateral links. Hoy originally used a Turbo 350 automatic transmission, but has since replaced it with a T-5 five-speed manual transmission, along with other parts to make everything work together. These are all genuine muscle car parts in what may be one of the most unusual applications ever.
The Sonic also contains many other parts to make it work in this weird way. The radiator from a VW Scirocco, plus an always-on electric fan, keeps the V8 cool, even with no thermostat. Beefier front springs from a Chevy Equinox on the Sonic’s stock struts help support the extra weight of the iron-block V8. Amazon supplied other parts like the wiring harness and fuel injector adapters.
“LS swap all the things” has become such an overused cliché that it’s no longer funny. We’ve seen them in everything from a Porsche 912 to a tiny Suzuki kei car. But this one is special, not just because it looks completely original from the outside, but also because it turns a Chevy Sonic, of all things, into a proper muscle car, with a big V8 up front that lights up the back tires anytime you want. What more could you want?
