Street- Freaks !

* Street Freaks *

What is a Street Freak? It's a street driven Drag Strip dropout, de-tuned for Sorta-Legal on-road Cruising. Take a fugitive funny car with a dynamite engine and jacked up suspension, add mufflers (rarely), lights and the biggest street tires (most only had slicks) and drive it on the street !

I grew up in North Jersey in the early 80's , reading every car magazine I could get my hands on . Yes, you could still hold something in your hands and read it ! I had a subscription to Hot Rod at 9 years old and renewed for at least 10 years , until it got over run with ads . I would also purchase Car Craft , & now defunct Popular Hot Rodding & Cars Illustrated at the news stand / magazine store .

This was my only education about Hot Rods or any cars for that matter, as I was the only one in my family who was interested in cars. And as luck would have it , my house was the only one on my street with out a driveway or garage . So convincing my father to buy a project car was out of the question.

The 1980's on my street was still exciting tho, my neighbors had all kinds of hot cars . Because I was just a kid many wouldn't bother talking to me , so I became friends with their little brothers or sisters just to get close to the cars .

Directly across the street from me, my sisters friend had a boy-friend with a 1973 Camaro , This thing had Side Pipes , a chrome bolt in roll bar , L88 hood , Cragar S/S wheels with huge 60's on the back and bright yellow traction bars. And it wore bright candy-apple Red paint.

I got to ride in it once when I was 10, I didn't want to get out , we cruised around for a few hours then it was over.

I don't have any pictures of it , but it looked just like this Vega .

There were a lot of other GM products in my town that were also pretty hot.

Other cars on my street included a 1970 W30 Oldsmobile 442, it was brown with white stripes, course the rear was jacked-up and it was fitted with the biggest Cragar wheels they made . Like this Chevelle here.

This is very close to how the Oldsmobile looked .

Up the street from me there was a bright yellow 69 Nova,it was a weekend race car,but the guy had plates on it and drove it on the street.It had the old-school seven-inch high snorkel scoop,air shocks to fit the big slicks,that were mounted on light-weight Super Trick wheels .I think it just had headers and glass pack mufflers on it, when it would pass my house it would rattle the windows .

The Gasser look was hot then too,after the 1970's those cars were hitting the streets because they were considered outdated by then .

Here are some examples .

Of course you had to get those big tires from somewhere ,companies like Pro-Trac , McCreary and Good/Year made extra large sizes to fit those wide wheels.Mickey Thompson was a big player then and still is today .

The Ansen Sprint was a popular choice of wheel design , as most Funny Cars and Altered's ran them on the Drag Strip, and what ever was on the track made it to the Street Freak crowd .

E-T Mags were also popular with the Street Machine crowd in the 70's.

Even the Compact Ford Pinto can be a little Street Freak but this one is mild compared to others and can be classified as just a Street Machine.

This 1967 Nova is an example of a 21st century Street Freak !

Of course every Street Freak had to have headers !

Doug's headers is still in play today.

This is another example of a modern build of a Street Freak.

The name of this 1977 Mustang II is called Sudden Death , it was built like a Pro-Stock car and driven on the street. This was the start of the Pro-Street movement. It was originally built with a twin turbo 460 by Jack Roush back in the 70's for a street racer , it now resides in Jack's personal collection .

This Nova has the Street Gasser stance giving it Street Freak status !

Some people might call these two cars Pro-Street's, but because of the crazy dual superchargers I would fit them into the Street Freak club , because you just don't see two superchargers very often .