Cruisin in the 80's

[Jim Oaks]

Last night I was watching a documentary about the making of American Graffiti. It reminded me of cruising back in the 1980's. I graduated high school in 1986, and I drove a 1978 Pontiac Grand Prix that was the same color as this one, but mine had the T/A Snowflake wheels and didn't have T-tops.

Another friend had a green Grand Prix with a factory moon roof and chrome wheels, and two other guys I knew had Olds Cutlasses I think there was one other Grand Prix, and a kid that played soccer had a white 1980 Pontiac Trans Am with a white stuffed soccer ball in his back window.

We didn't have social media. There wasn't any websites and forums to hang out on.

Friday night you had the local High School football game, and then you cruised Vine Street down to the McDonalds at the corner of Lakeshore Blvd. We had a drive inn movie theater that's now a Walmart and there was a speed shop across from it called Speed City. Cruise back east on Vine you came to SR91, and taking that south took you to Euclid Ave (US20) where there was a Burger King at SR91 and Euclid Ave. Just a little distance east on Euclid Ave was the Cosmopolitan Night Club, and on Sunday nights they had a teen night (no alcohol). The drinking age for beer was 19 at the time, so when I turned 19, I could go into the club on Saturdays.

While the main roads were 35 MPH and the side streets were 25 MPH, SR91 was 50 MPH. There weren't any businesses or driveways along SR91, so it was a place where you could see if you could get from one traffic light to the next one before your friend does without any traffic pulling out in front of you. I recall one Saturday night a friend and I were checking to see if his Firebird or my Grand Prix could pull away from the green light faster headed south on SR91 and we caught the attention of a cop that was heading north. He turned around to join the fun and when we got to Euclid Ave we turned the corner and pulled into the parking lot of Denny's. I guess he decided not to stop and say hi because he sat at the light for a few seconds and then continued his patrol back north.

Another interesting thing was that when I started driving, car amplifiers hadn't become a thing yet. My buddy with the green Grand Prix got a cool new power booster that had the spectrum display equalizer that put on a cool little light show to the music. I really need to find one of those.

Around my senior year, I purchased an Alphasonik 50-watt amplifier to go with my JVC tape deck and Alpine 4x6 speakers. It was a pretty cool setup at the time.

I met the girl I dated through high school at a high school football game, and then we cruised down to the Mickey-D's and hung out when friends after. I've met a few girls cruisin in the 80's.

Back in the 80's we did engine swaps, some bolt on performance stuff (although I did have a friend that built a small block Chevy with his dad for his Nova), bought chrome wheels and white letter tires, and the rears were always wider than the fronts.

Heck before I had a license, my friend's older brother had a 1970 Chevy Chevelle, and we used to ride around in that with him taking turns mooning people out the window.

As I watched the American Graffiti documentary, I started wondering if the 1980's was that last of that kind of street cruising. It seemed that the generation that followed us were into loud stereos instead of hot rods. We were doing V8 swaps and buying wheels and tires, these younger guys were buying speakers and amplifiers.

Today people are just plain retarded. People can't handle the horsepower of the newer cars and I'm constantly seeing videos of people losing control of them and crashing. As lame as this sounds, I almost think it was more fun when cars didn't have as much power and were easier to control. Not that I don't like fast cars. I do. But I'm pretty happy with my 300HP Jaguar. It's fun without being stupid. But even the 300HP can get squirrelly if you're not careful.

The other thing is that young people today seem to think it's cool to do street takeovers and do donuts in intersections. Back in the 80's we did some dumb stuff, but we still had respect, were fearful of getting caught, and didn't terrorize the public. Today's younger society has no respect. No discipline. They're killing the car culture and some idiots going to end up going to prison for killing a crowd of people. And I personally don't feel sorry for the idiot that stands there watching and gets ran over.

Anyone have any 'back in the day' cruisin stories?

 

[97RangerXLT]

Class of 89 here. we had a several block section in Mattoon IL on two parallel streets that we cruised. there were two old fashioned movie theaters on one of the streets, The ORIGINAL Burger King (look that up on the internet... they got sued by the chain for using the name but they won, and they are the reason there is no chain BK within a 25 mile radius of Mattoon) on the other one within 2 blocks of the theaters. so you could cruise, watch movies and get burgers and ice cream. Friday and Saturday nights were the cruise nights. I loved the old GM G body cars, always wanted a Buick Grand National or Monte Carlo SS. you don't see many of those cars on the road anymore, they tended to rust into powder after about 10 years in Central IL.

AJ

 

[RobbieD]

My buddy with the green Grand Prix got a cool new power booster that had the spectrum display equalizer that put on a cool little light show to the music. I really need to find one of those.

Oh hell yeah! I'd love to have an old graphic equalizer booster, and a CB radio to go with it. Bass 48s on the rear package shelf, and an 8-track with FM in the dash.

Class of 74 here; lived in the boonies. So yeah, at that time CBs were the thing. Being the mid-70s, our cars were the old used '60s muscle cars; Mustangs, Camaros, and Plymouth/Dodges that the rich old guys pay stupid money for these days.

 

[85_Ranger4x4]

Class of 74 here; lived in the boonies. So yeah, at that time CBs were the thing. Being the mid-70s, our cars were the old used '60s muscle cars; Mustangs, Camaros, and Plymouth/Dodges that the rich old guys pay stupid money for these days.

Dad was class of '75, same same.

Dunno if cars were any safer back then. One kid had a Chevelle like dad's, he killed himself hitting a post screwing around with his friends. The guy that bought dad's Roadrunner wrapped it around a tree, I don't think he made it.

Even by todays standards the real muscle cars were respectable for power.. with crap tires, brakes and no power steering on crap roads.

We kinda straddled the line when I was in school. I remember guys swapping stuff around in older 60-70's trucks... but the LS1 Camaro and Cobra Mustangs were out too.

 

[Jim Oaks]

Oh hell yeah! I'd love to have an old graphic equalizer booster, and a CB radio to go with it. Bass 48s on the rear package shelf, and an 8-track with FM in the dash.

Class of 74 here; lived in the boonies. So yeah, at that time CBs were the thing. Being the mid-70s, our cars were the old used '60s muscle cars; Mustangs, Camaros, and Plymouth/Dodges that the rich old guys pay stupid money for these days.

My dad had a CB in the car, and he had business cards with his CB handle and FCC call sign. I remember one time we went to some kind of CB radio camping jamboree thing somewhere.

 

[RobbieD]

Dunno if cars were any safer back then.

Nope. Drum brakes, no crumple zones, crappy lighting, crappy defog/defrost, no seatbelt laws, or just plain old no seat belts.

So the big thing was to build up the motor with speed parts and not give thought to handling or braking. Put on big fat bias-ply tires that would hydro plane at the drop of a hat. The first OPEC gas crisis thinned out a lot of those kinds of cars.

And, in a way, no gas and then higher-priced gas led me to buying my first Ranger in 1985 (while I still owned and kept a Camaro and Firebird, both '68s).

And yes, several of my classmates and friends had lives that were cut way to short.

Even with that said, the 70s and 80s were still great years to be young and stupid. Fun times; sorry but I'd hate to be 20 today.

 

[RobbieD]

My dad had a CB in the car, and he had business cards with his CB handle and FCC call sign. I remember one time we went to some kind of CB radio camping jamboree thing somewhere.

Yep; early in the CB craze you had to get a license to operate it.

But then the damn things got so popular that Uncle Charlie (the FCC) threw in the towel and did away with the licensing.

- KKV7872; 10-10 and standing by.

P.S.- I just don't understand how can I remember my old call letters I haven't used in 50 years, yet forget what in the hell I just went into the kitchen for?

 

[85_Ranger4x4]

So the big thing was to build up the motor with speed parts and not give thought to handling or braking. Put on big fat bias-ply tires that would hydro plane at the drop of a hat.

Dad has talked about that too, used to get big tires that were cheap because:

1. They smoked better than good ones
2. Either way they were not going to last long

Looking back he doesn't think that was probably the best criteria with everything he was doing with the car...

He fought wheel hop terrible in his Chevelle, he took it to a shop in Omaha that dialed it to launch... It would launch beautiful after that... but they totally killed it as a street car. It basically had no rear suspension when they were done.

 

[Robertmangrum.rm]

When I was a in my teens we cruised Rivergate Mall. It was like a car show every Friday and Saturday night. The cops would patrol but as long as you wasn't being dumb, they would just wave and enjoy the cars as well. I had a 86 Cougar XR7 with the 5.0. Of course it had no mufflers haha. Had the old cyclone style wheels like the mustang gts did of that era. Loved how luxurious it was. I did loose several red light to red light races in it. Sounded faster than it was haha. I remember you would have groups of Mustangs, Hondas, and 4x4s all scattered around and everyone getting along. Those were some good times.

My first car I installed a good ole Roadmaster power equalizer. With some of those Pioneer 3 way speakers that set up in the back window and some 6 inch 2ways in the doors. I thought it sounded amazing. Well now I know haha. I built several stereo systems over the years. From just cruisers to actual competition setups. Kinda what led me to what I do today. I have a friend that still competes in those things. I have been out of the game so long, I haven't heard of most the stuff he runs haha. I traded loud stereo stuff out for camping stuff these days. Hardly ever turn it up to half way anymore.

Yes the big tire rear was a thing for us too. Air shocks to lift it so you could run a wider taller tire in the back. If I remember I had 225s on the back and 205s on the front. Funny thing is I only remember because the local used tire shop would sell and put them on for $25 each haha. I may have purchased more than a few sets for the rear. Though the old cougar probably wouldn't hardly break traction when stomped. It did do one heck of a brake stand and make a whole lot of smoke. Sounded pretty good doing it with only cats and resonators.

 

[sgtsandman]

I didn't do much cruising myself but Jerry's Curb Service in Bridgewater always seems to be the place to be, if you were into that kind of thing. People would loop through parking lot over and over again as well as up and down the road that runs along the river, stopping some of the various bars along the way. That was as close as we got to an American Graphitti kind of thing in the county that I know of.

 

[Uncle Gump]

I started cruising on Woodward Ave Royal Oak, MI in my 73 Bronco. 302 2bbl with headers... C4 transmission with a shift kit... 32x11.50 Cepek Fun Country tires on Western wheels. Driver door held closed with home door latch with sheet metal screws. Tunes were through a factory AM radio with an FM Converter with a Spark-o-matic power booster and a couple house speakers i bought from a garage sale. Those were the days!! While that was fun with my buddies with Jeep CJ5's and short box Ford and Chevy trucks... we had way more fun cruising in our (at the time) small town of Auburn Heights. We would cruise from the small Memorial Park in town to the McDonald's a mile away. Halfway to McDonald's was the entrance to the high school where we would throw the Frisbee in the parking lot. But the highlights of our small town were the pits. There were a couple abandoned gravel pits that filled with water and the surrounding area was woods with hills and trails we would take our trucks through. There was a large clearing where we had a bonfires and would drink coolers full of cheap beer (Cinci Cream Ale was the cheapest) and the old Olly Balls of beer that came in the waxed box that you would just dump a bag of ice in. It also included many Little Caesars PIZZA! PIZZA! nights.

I had a few of my "firsts" back in the pits. Many good times and memories of that place.

Here is a blast from my past... myself and my best friend Bubba. In the back of his truck is my first dune buggy. I think we had just finished welding the chassis together. I think it was spring of 1982. That was back when I still had good hair and Mountian Dew came in glass bottles.

I think this one is from our first trip to Northern Michigan to rip the buggies around the big woods.

 

[Shran]

Oh yeah!!! We would cruise the main street through Hot Springs when I was in high school... early 2000's, I graduated in '05. That was the way to find parties before cell phones. Start at Taco John's, then turn around at the old train station & repeat until you found a buddy doing the same thing, or when the cops flashed their lights at you. They were weird about their "no cruising" rules.

I had a '79 Datsun 210, then an '89 Probe, an '80 F100, and finally my '86 F150... still have that truck, I actually pulled it out of the shop and drove it to work today for the first time in like 2 years...what a treat... I should drive it down there and make a couple rounds through the old cruise route just for old times sake.

 

[Snoranger]

Class of ‘95 here.
Big power stereo systems were popular, but we had a world famous drag strip here in town. So horsepower was king.
Almost everyone drove cars from the 80’s. Fox body Mustangs, F-bodys, G-bodies. We did have a Typhoon and a Syclone in the high school parking lot.
The streets were paved with rubber and the local tire shops were making money hand over fist. Super Tuesday at Sunoco saved you 5 cents a gallon on 93 octane.
It was a fun time and place to be a teenager.

 

[Shran]

I can't think of anyone in my high school that had major engine mods. My one buddy did a V8 swap in a Maverick but it was just a 255... he probably gained 3HP at most over the inline 6. There were only a few kids that had "nice" cars, on one hand I can count a Mustang, an RX-7 and an old Camaro but that was about all. Everybody else drove hand-me-down junk cars or ranch trucks. I can't believe the high school parking lots today, last year some kid had a really nice 72 Chevelle and this year there are a lot of newer nice cars and diesel trucks (!!!!) where do kids get the money for a diesel truck?? What parents hand their kids a late model Super Duty??? It's crazy.

Lots of big stereos though. Early 2000's was right at the very end of when you could still see a shotgun in some kid's back window or a pack of smokes on the dash.

 

[Jim Oaks]

where do kids get the money for a diesel truck?? What parents hand their kids a late model Super Duty??? It's crazy.

I used to call this setting your kids up for failure.

I've seen parents buy their kids nice cars to drive to school. Sometimes it's a parent wanting to flaunt that they have money, or think they have money. It's nice to be able to give your kids nice things. Hopefully those kids learn to have an appreciation for those things and what they cost. Growing up with nice things will hopefully make them work hard to have those nice things when they become adults. On the flip side of that, you could create a lifestyle that your kid won't be able to afford when they become an adult causing them to go into debt trying to maintain it.