Is Pro Street dead?

[Ghoste]

And I think it largely is personally.  I still see it being done to F-body GM products and the occasional Fox bodied Mustang but the Mopar crowd seem to have gotten over this trend.  The Chrysler guys look like they are all doing the Pro Touring bit now.
After it was all said and done, how many of those Pro Street cars do you think ever actually made full bore dragstrip passes?

[HPP]

I don't know that I'd say it is dead, but it certainly is significantly reduced. There are still a sub set of enthusiasts who like the purpose built drag appearance of the pro street genre. My brother still salivates over them, but he can bring himself to tub his Charger to do it. I do still see some of them at the drags, but rarely see any dedicated street versions.

At its height, I'd be willing to bet no more than 10-15% of the built cars ever made a drag pass. I'd bet the same money on the pro-touring guys now as well. There is just a segment of the automotive that wants to have the latest stuff, whether they use it as intended or not. IMO, 50% of the pro-touring crowd is simply 18" wheels with 35 series tires and nothing else. I'd be willing to bet 75% of all touring builds will never see a road course or autocross. The upside of pro touring over pro street is at least the touring approach makes them a more street usable vehicle.

[Indygenerallee]

I never cared for the pro street look myself. 

[GOTWING]

come to ocean city MD. oct. 4-7th and see for yourself ! UMMMM NO 

[Cooter]

Lemme see, I need to spend over $4000.00 to APPEAR like my junk runs 7's 1/4 mile, when yet, a Fox Body Mustang with 8" tires leaves on the rear bumper and runs a full 3 seconds quicker than my "Pro" car....



Yeah, Pro street was/is/always will be a "looks" thing at best. Did i have one? Sure did. Tubbed out 1969 Chevelle with a 454 and 4-speed. Did I make ANY 1/8th mile passes in it? Nope...Because it would spin if a cow pissed on the road. All show and no go...Were those huge tires why it sold? Sure was.

[Indygenerallee]

Built notchback stangs are pretty nasty!!

[XS29LA47V21]

I never cared for the pro street look myself. 

Thats ok, it is an age group profiling anyway.  

Ok I am now profiled (again) I am a product of the 80-90s and still like them, just do not own one. 

[moparstuart]

I never cared for the pro street look myself. 

Thats ok, it is an age group profiling anyway.  

Ok I am now profiled (again) I am a product of the 80-90s and still like them, just do not own one. 

i'm from that time and never liked them  ,  Some pro touring are growing on me   

[Brass]

I think Pro-Street went the way of Street-Freak before it.  Never cared for it much anyway.

[Scaregrabber]

I'd say it was dead about 15 years ago. I used to like picking on those cars with my stock looking musclecars and just kicking them to the curb.

Sheldon

[Lennard]

My buddies Pro street Charger... alive and kickin'!

[Mike DC]

                 
 
The entire Pro Street trend was an imitation of the hugely popular Pro Stock and "flopper" funnycars from the early/mid 1970s.  The trend has faded as the popularity of the inspiration has faded somewhat.  

         

[JB400]

It's called pro touring today.  Same cars bigger rims, more subtle paint schemes.   

[Cooter]

It's called pro touring today.  Same cars bigger rims, more subtle paint schemes.   

HUGE difference between purpose built "Drag" suspensions and those Big wheel'd, Huge braked, Low riding, Air bagged, "Pro-Touring" rides.


Same cars, same big money for something that "Appears" to be "Race" ready though.

[Daytona R/T SE]

I really liked "Pro Street" cars for one drunken, stoned weekend at the Car Craft nationals back in 1982.

Between all of the tubbed cars, burnouts, booze, weed and boob flashing teenage girls it was a great time.

Now, the booze and the weed are gone, Those teenage girls are grandmas, and "Pro street" cars just look silly to me.

[Ghoste]

1982 was a good era wasn't it?

[Charger4404spd]

1982 was a good era wasn't it?

Sure was. High school, hot rods, girls, boobs, weed and cold beer 
I miss those days!

[bill440rt]

'82 was great. I was a kid, just getting into cars.
I liked the Pro Street thing for a while. Never owned one, I was just too young. But, times change. Styles change. Tastes change.
Like anything else, some of them still look cool. Some don't.

[rt green]

is pro street dead? god i hope so

[JB400]

It's called pro touring today.  Same cars bigger rims, more subtle paint schemes.   

HUGE difference between purpose built "Drag" suspensions and those Big wheel'd, Huge braked, Low riding, Air bagged, "Pro-Touring" rides.


Same cars, same big money for something that "Appears" to be "Race" ready though.

I think we had that import invasion in  the 90's and people started getting bored just going in a straight line.  So you pull the wheels off an import, change the shocks and springs, loose the crazy paint, and move the supercharger under the hood, and what do you get?  Now we put the crazy paint on the imports and in the Truckin magazine.

[67440chrg]

I use to realy like them and still do like to see one over a Pro touring. It brings back good old memeries. I wouldnt put mine in that class but I got a award last year for best pro street. I guess it was just diffrent than all the over done GM products at the show.

[Ghoste]

I wouldn't put yours there either.  Whatever I guess huh?

[Cooter]

I usually antiquate "Pro Street" with 15"X14" Rear wheels, and 15"X3/12" Front runners, and HUGE 31X18.5X15" Mickey Thompson's..

[Ghoste]

Gotta back halve the car and put in a four link with a cage and a blower too though.

[Cooter]

Gotta back halve the car and put in a four link with a cage and a blower too though.

No, cause I've seen too many with moved leaf springs, Jungle Jim Roll cages, And A Stock 350 SBC in 'em, with those huge rear tires.

[Dino]

Between all of the tubbed cars, burnouts, booze, weed and boob flashing teenage girls it was a great time.

You can take the tubbed cars and burnouts honestly, I'll keep the rest.  No need for cars when you have all that laying around!

[MAKdaddy]

Resurrecting this thread on my lunch hour due to boredom.

I'm glad to see Pro Street is dead. Too many otherwise valuable cars were lost to back halving so the car could take turns like a Ford 8N farm tractor.

See ya later to 18" MT steam rollers, tacky paint jobs, and women in fluorescent pink pumps, onesie swimsuits, and peroxide-blonde perm's held fast with Aquanet hairspray.

Some stuff belongs in the past for a reason.

Give me sequential multi-port, sticky tires (all near the same size), and sway bars bigger around than my leg any day over Pro-poser!

[Ghoste]

I'll wager that stuff will become passe soon enough too.  No guesses as to what the next popular method of customizing will be though.

[68pplcharger]

I never cared for the pro street look myself.  

Thats ok, it is an age group profiling anyway.  

Ok I am now profiled (again) I am a product of the 80-90s and still like them, just do not own one.  

I'm with you on that one XS29LA47V21... I prefer building a real race car, then make it street legal. The turbo's and blowers today allow tons of horsepower with drivability that wasn't available in the 80's and 90's. For that matter Pro-touring(before it had a name) was always on everyone's mind back then(at least mine) but overdrive was hard to come by that could handle power.  

I always wanted both

[polywideblock]

yes thank god that horrible pro street scene and the crowd they attracted is gone    

now we can have these and the REAL classy crowd they attract instead  



           

give me a bombshell blond with her boobies out leaning against a super charged hemi ANY day ,1982 what a blast  

[Kern Dog]

Pro street cars were like a guy with a 3 inch member taping a kielbasa sausage to his thigh and wearing tight pants. When the time comes to perform, you're always making excuses.

[Old Moparz]

I liked them back in the 80's & still do.     The reason being, is that a lot of the Mopars had ABSOLUTELY NO AFTERMARKET PARTS AVAILABLE so fabricating what you needed was what the prostreet cars fit into.

One of the most memorable cars I can recall is the one that Rick Dobberton built. It was an all out show car from a Pontiac J2000.  

I hated that particular car in general, but what this guy did to the car was insane & a work of art. I did want to tub a car I had back then, but thankfully I was broke & couldn't.    I liked the idea of improving what you could & the protouring seems to be more practical.

[daveco]

Rick Dobberton...
Didn't he try to float a milk tanker across the Pacific or something like that?

Yup, that's the guy: http://www.dobbertinhydrocar.com/Dobbertin%20Surface%20Orbiter.html

[super77se]

I don't think its completely dead , people are still out there building them. the 70's street freak scene was taken over by the pro street scene after they figured out how to narrow a rear end and intall tubs  

[Mike DC]

 
I have never understood how Pro-Steet backhalf jobs on the chassis were the "right" way to install huge tires, and cutting out wider wheelwells was "hackwork."  Back-halving hacks the body up far worse.  I doubt there is any real performance improvement over a wider rear axle.   And Pro-Street backhalf setups look equally goofy to the average person.

The Pro-street trend caused thousands of classic cars to be irreversibly converted to drag-only usage.  In most cases it just wasn't necessary.    
 



Having said all that, IMO it's comical what some of the Pro Touring guys say about Pro Street cars being impractical.  The PT hobby includes plenty of cars with 3" ground clearance, rubber-band tires, $17,000 paintjobs, and drum brakes underneath it all.  There is nothing real-world about any of that.  

I think the old car magazine press & high-end custom world is guilty of overly pushing the PT trend because of location.  They are centered in SoCal where roads are wide & flat & smooth.  For the last 20 years they have been mystified about why their "totally streetable" PT look hasn't totally replaced the PS look.  Many of those PT setups wouldn't last 5 minutes on the roads outside the desert states.    

[el dub]

I like the look of fat tires and wheels tucked under. But just by moving the springs in to the frame rails would do it for me. Not hacking up the back end and using even larger tires and wheels.   

[Lennard]

Pro street cars were like a guy with a 3 inch member taping a kielbasa sausage to his thigh and wearing tight pants. When the time comes to perform, you're always making excuses.

Not always...the street legal '70 in the pic I've posted on the first page does low tens in the quarter mile.

[DixieRestoParts]

I wasn't into Pro Street much after 17 yrs old.  But, if I found one today as a time capsule, I'd probably leave it that way. I could never afford those expensive mods. Today Pro Touring doesn't do much for me either. I can understand improving the handling, but when you put 22" inch wheels and low profile tires on, you lose me.

As I've gotten older, I do like to see cars done up as Day 2 hot rods. I even took the Steel Wheels off my Charger and put slots back on to re-live some of the days of my youth for awhile. At least until I get tired of the slots again. I also added a "engine tuned" colored license plate I bought at Honest Charlie's Speedshop in Chattanooga, TN in 1983. It had sat in my closet for all these years.

[polywideblock]

here's one for the "older " members ,remember when there was just stock or modified and they were all called "street machines ". 

what about the 11 second street animal club   

yeah I know I'm showing my age 

[charger_fan_4ever]

That 68 looks pretty hot to me

a little less tire be even better. We need the pic of the black 70 hemi charger with the trunk rack and fat tires.

[6spd68]

What's worse than a poorly done Pro Street car?  A Gasser!

http://www.kijiji.ca/v-classic-cars/oshawa-durham-region/1968-firebird-gasser/1089451655?enableSearchNavigationFlag=true





I know most of you hate GM cars, but as CAR GUYS; that's gotta hurt on some level...  

[myk]

Is that car even set up properly as a gasser?  Front end looks way too low, rear too high...

[Lennard]

The "real" gassers had only the front in the air on a straight axle to move much weight of the car to the rear to give the rear tires more traction. The Pontiac is not a gasser. I don't know what it is...

[68pplcharger]

The "real" gassers had only the front in the air on a straight axle to move much weight of the car to the rear to give the rear tires more traction. The Pontiac is not a gasser. I don't know what it is...

Poor attempt at a 4 wheel drive minus the front diff... 

[HPP]

They needed all that ground clearance for the extra long exhaust pipe. It kept dragging on the ground, so they kept lifting until it cleared.

[Ghoste]

Looks more like a 4X4.

[Lennard]

Looks more like a 4X4.

Looks, yes...but it has the features of a drag racer. Four link suspension, slicks and a straight front axle.