The Amish Donk fad!!:rofl:

Evolution
 

The Mule,
before it my Buick was a street machine , after it, it became a pro-touring...

i would say Car Craft with Heavy Metal 2, the luxury interior, road race suspension, fuel-injected big block 65 impala SS.. think it was in 92.. atleast that is when i fell for the idea of a muscle car that could out run.. and dice the corners like a porsche...

It was "The Red Witch" for me that Mark built. I saw the cover of the Aug, 1996 "HOT ROD", it had the car on the cover. Inside the mag are some build pics and few other pt cars.

I recently lost the issue of this mag to the "under the sink plumbing leak":(

I'm sure this post will permanently identify me as a geezer but if we are looking back to the Guldstrand and Trans Am years then we have to credit Carroll Shelby and the '65 GT 350 Mustang. That car introduced the idea of a road racer for the street!
Best,
Chuck:thumbsup:

I say Big Red . It had the perfect stance and big wheels first. But if Guldstrand and Herb Adams had real handling parts for camaros at the early 80s maybe they really started "pro-touring" ?

Big Red was a race car...

The Mule is 1041HP TT car that gets driven on the road - to the hot rod show circuit - Power Tour... has A/C...

What starts a "movement" may not be the FIRST of anything - it's what's copied the most...

:hail: Mark/Charley

The Red Witch. Best car ever

marks tri trip that was my favorite of his cars and it was years ago

That Novette of Lil John's was the milestone car that I remember 1st.
I did put together my 1st Pro-Touring Cadillac in 1985, it was a 78 Seville, which was built by GM on a nova chassis. I added sway bars and Gatorback 255/50x16's all around. The vette tires of their time. It had 4 wheel discs on it stock, I upgraded them with some metallic pads. It had a Nitrous fed 350 Olds that embarrased a few bbc Chevelles both on the street and track.
I had a load of fun chasing Porsches and Ferraris up off ramps.
My 2nd Pro-Touring Caddy the Fleedwood Coupe debuted at the Car Craft Nats in St Paul in 1996 where it won Editors Choice.

So... Jeff... you trying to tell us YOU started PT??

Ken Crocie's '64 GTO.
It was also featured in Hot Rod.
I remember he had it on 16s, low, with his own (HO Racing) springs/swaybars under it, and it pulled 1G on the skidpad. This was late '80s or so. Killer car he still had last time I asked.

Guldstrand got me started! :yes:

Al Gore started it. AND the internet.:rofl:

what is pro touring?... if pro touring is taking a musclecar and installing bigger/higher-horsepower engine, better suspension and brakes allong with a fancy paint job and some trick, race-looking interior pieces and perhaps a cage.. then Carol Shelby started it in 1965 with the mustang GT350... Big Red seems to me to be more of a full race car, and it was preceeded by both Car craft´s heavy metal and a bunch of other cars... AND wasnt there a Challenger in the 1972 canonball run with low profile tires and roadrace suspension.. if that isnt pro touring then i dont know what is....

Blue Maxi Camaro
 

Here is my swing at the start of PT.

I think Deuce is close - In my opinion what we refer to as Pro-Touring today would involve taking a popular and/or available car (as opposed to starting with a upper level car – i.e. Corvette, Ferrari, Porsche) and applying State of the Art aftermarket parts to it to increase the performance envelope. The modifications are done to personalize the car for the owner.

If you agree with this definition, the first PT car could be the Blue Maxi Camaro built by Car and Driver magazine in 1969. They took a (even then) popular car, a 1969 Camaro SS/RS. They added a high horse power small block motor to keep the nose from getting too heavy (the then exotic Corvette LT-1). The latest tires - Goodyear Polyglas G60’s and big stiff American 200S wheels, big brakes (JL8 4-wheel discs) and created a car that was “A 4 wheeled Saturn Rocket for your driving pleasure”.

Their goal was to create a Grand Tourer, inspired by Trans Am racers. Not far off from what we are doing today.

http://i45.photobucket.com/albums/f6...eMaxi10002.jpg

http://i45.photobucket.com/albums/f6...5/scan0001.jpg

http://i45.photobucket.com/albums/f6...eMaxi20001.jpg

Tom

sure as hell inspired me. Watching him grin ear to ear driving my car was so awesome. :thumbsup:

http://lh3.ggpht.com/__OT3YJ9o9Ao/Sv...0/IMG_4199.JPG

http://lh4.ggpht.com/__OT3YJ9o9Ao/Sv...0/IMG_4211.JPG

:thumbsup: :bow:

I agree.

What year did Guldstrand open up his own shop?

What was his function at Dana Chevrolet. Did he do motor upgrades, handling upgrades, and/or just work on their racecars??

His shop was first opened in 1968 named Guldstrand engineering in the infamous "Thunder Alley." Thunder Alley was originally an alley off Jefferson Blvd. in Culver City. Don't quote me on it but I think they moved to Burbank in the 90s.

I first discovered their shop getting some racing gloves and shopping for seats for the camaro. The safety and motorsports shop Werks 2 is next door to Guldstrand. I knew he was a legend and I was shocked to look over and see him in the shop, in a lab coat, still wrenching on cars. Awesome, it was right then I decided to have them rework my subframe and keep my car semi-traditional. Having someone like him put his stamp of approval on a car is worth more than any performance mod. I think its great he still loves being in the shop every day and dealing with the customers. He's a real firecracker. Wish I could get him out to a track day for some driving lessons and I'd even let him flog my car. It'd be awesome.

Considering he was the one that pioneered the suspension changes of the first gen camaros for the Penske Trans Am cars, I'd say hes the grandfather of everything we're doing today. Making muscle cars perform like they should!

As far as Dana Chevrolet:

We walked into his shop in 1989 looking for sponsors for our University High School auto shop Street Stock car we ran at Saugus. He sponsored us a full suspension and bushings. This was before energy and you had to use all your old shells. Those were a pain to install. I think he had those made especially for him.

The guy running his parts dept was really cool and helpful. I was trying to setup my Challenger for autocross at the time and he gave me some straight talk and advice. I think he wrote for the magazines at one time and later worked PR for Edlebrock. John Costa? or John something?

I drive by the old shop on Jefferson every week. I see the Speedway Pattern building is for lease.

[QUOTE=rogue;252392]His shop was first opened in 1968 named Guldstrand engineering in the infamous "Thunder Alley." Thunder Alley was originally an alley off Jefferson Blvd. in Culver City. Don't quote me on it but I think they moved to Burbank in the 90s.

I first discovered their shop getting some racing gloves and shopping for seats for the camaro. The safety and motorsports shop Werks 2 is next door to Guldstrand. I knew he was a legend and I was shocked to look over and see him in the shop, in a lab coat, still wrenching on cars. Awesome, it was right then I decided to have them rework my subframe and keep my car semi-traditional. Having someone like him put his stamp of approval on a car is worth more than any performance mod. I think its great he still loves being in the shop every day and dealing with the customers. He's a real firecracker. Wish I could get him out to a track day for some driving lessons and I'd even let him flog my car. It'd be awesome.

Considering he was the one that pioneered the suspension changes of the first gen camaros for the Penske Trans Am cars, I'd say hes the grandfather of everything we're doing today. Making muscle cars perform like they should!



Have you considered inviting him out for the day? I imagine being such a "star" in the industry he has a lot of hreat info and stories. But sometimes people get almost "afraid" to aproach guys like him. Maybe "star struck"?
Not saying you are at all, but i wonder how long it has been since someone simply asked him to go with for the day. If you get him in your car on the track I bet you get some priceless info. Not to mention a once in a lifetime chance that most of us will never have. I say invite him out to a track day. What do you have to loose?:cheers:

that was the car that originally made me want to put a cool suspension under my '69 Camaro but back then I didn't have much money or enough knowledge, and the parts weren't readily available like they are today.

I still managed a updated WS6 steering box, a 'huge' one inch front swaybar:lol: , Koni adjustables, solid tie-rod sleeves and custom wound springs from Gulstrand. problem was that, after paint, I was never able to afford decent rims and tires so the car never did perform to it's potential

I had to bump this thread to give honorable mention to Don Chemello's Nova dubbed "The Flying Brick". :hail:

One first needs to decide what pro-touring is? :beathorse

wasnt that car for sale not to long ago^?

i would say ty woodall's radrides built camaro is the first one i would say .

Don sold it to an engineer at Edelbrock a number of years ago. I am trying to get them to break it out for this year's SoCal Novas BBQ. :yes:

Craig, do you remember Chris Bondy's 67 Convertible from back in the Renton Honest Performance days? Fat tires, looooow (for the time) stance, road-face style cage...this was 20+ years ago. It was the first car like that I remember. I had big'n little Centerlines at the time....
Tim

I DO NOT count the race car Big Red as a Pro Touring car. There were cars before the Mule. But no doubt Mark Stielow and the Mules 100 pages in PHR month after month created the biggest Pro Touring buzz. I might be mistaken, but I think that is the first mainstream high circulation magazine to cover a project NOT owned by the magazine from start to finish like that. I know I subscribed and read each article with excitement.

I had people calling me asking if I had seen this project (the Mule) and asking me to build them one. I was in my first retirement at that time. I had built some G machine stuff but all with bolt ons and nothing to that level. He is still my hero!

Rouge!!!!
 

I'm with you on your first post!

Trans Am cars are race cars....and a race car is not a pro-Touring.
Now if Big Red is registred and driven on the street, it's not only a race car it can be a Pro-Touring even with its race car mods, unlike Sunoco Camaro (and Parnelli's Mustangs, ans so on...) which couldn't be driven on the street....

it's not the fact about having bigger brakes and bigger engine otherwise a 32 Ford hot rodded in 1940 is also a Pro-Touring !!! :rolleyes:

a Pro-Touring car has 17" (or +) wheels with 4 big discs brakes(at least)..it's also a registred car that is driven on the street, on tracks and autocross....so the first guys to had these mods on their cars had created the first PT cars....
Now, how to create a trend? a lone guy in his far away town could have started PT a long way ago but if he never attempted a car show (or track/roadcourse/..) or get published in a magazine, how the hell could he had started something that had been followed by other freaks??
If you want to make some effect on the public, you have to show your car...in magazine, on TV, on internet.
The cars which started PT are the ones which had created a wave in our mind...:woot:

If what you write is true... which it is... then Guldstrand is the obvious piece to this puzzle.

When Guldstrand opened his shop back in the day... the majority of his meat and potatoes came from the street enthusiasts.

However... at the time he had been working at DANA and doing 427 swaps into the early 67's (read: middle to late 66.) His initial claim to fame came back in the early days of the Y-body platform. Daytona, Le Mans, Sebring... and the Corvette. He made quite a contribution to the development of the Y-body and GM kept him in their sights... and then re focused that effort for the F-body and their intent to race in the Trans Am series. At the time of the public launch of the F-body, he was a mechanical engineer working with the Vince Piggins group for the campaign of the Trans Am series cars... which was operated by none other than Roger Penske.

In 1968 when he opened his shop... his love in life was stuffing TA parts into street cars. It was a two way development effort for him. So the facts remain... by the definition you stated, registered... driven on the street etc etc (minus the 17" wheel criteria as they were not even a gleam in anyone's eye back then)... then I am pretty sure that Guldstrand was the one that did it for the GM product brand... and Shelby for Ford.

I am thinking that most here are dating themselves. If you don't look back to the Guldstrand, Shelby, Cox, Cantwell, Donohue, Parnelli and Gurney days of early 1960's road racing... I think you are missing the point all together. These cats still did the race on Sunday / Sell on Monday thing. If they had the 'hot set up'... they were putting yesterdays parts on street cars. That's what started "Pro Touring."

And then... we have been blessed with cats like Stielow and a few others... who have elevated the ideas to stratospheric levels. Its a good time to be alive and own a hot rod...