While the dynamometer was invented as a tool to help car performance professionals determine the horsepower of an automobile, as they become more available and less expensive, the “dyno” has become something of a toy used by car guys to show off their power affluence. Most people are happy just to crest that 300 horsepower line, but for some, unless 500 ponies are put down at the wheels it’s simply not enough. Beyond that, you’re talking about some serious cars, and some serious horsepower.

Have you ever seen an engine literally glow with power? Well now you have. Autoblog came across this video of one of the Hennessey Venom GT’s hitting the dyno, and beyond making big power, this Venom puts on a good, glowing show for the video camera.

Just in case you’ve been living under a rock, we’ll reiterate some of the details regarding the Hennessey Venom GT. Built on a lightweight Lotus chassis, this supercar packs a twin-turbo 6.2 liter LS9-based V8 engine that cranks out over 1,000 horsepower at the crank. On the dyno this particular car, chassis #4, put down 813 horsepower to the wheels in a car that weighs just over a ton.

It sounds crazy, and it is. With that much power on tap, there’s bound to be a lot of excess heat floating around. So the dyno crew shut off the lights to give us a better view of what 813 wheel horsepower does to headers. And with the lights off, the headers glow red hot, not unlike the Dodge Viper ACR-X video we saw. We wouldn’t want to touch that after a dyno run, that’s for sure. So are glowing headers the next big thing in automotive customization? With cars like the Hennessey Venom GT making it look easy and cool, we may have just stumbled on to the next car trend. Or not. But at least it’s a cool video.