Are Souped-Up Cars Street-Legal?

Question

I like watching shows where they have people tuning up cars. I especially love the show Unique AutoSports. I was just curious, I've seen cars on that show get really crazy tuning. I saw the guys on the show soup up Jeff Gordon's Race Car, and made it looks wild. They soup up a lot of cars, like Cadillac Escalades, Chevy Corvettes, etc. I was just curious, are we allowed to drive cars like that on the road? Will the cops pull you over and give you a ticket or anything? Because I only see cars like that on TV shows, I hardly see them on the roads. Are we allowed to soup cars like this, or is it illegal?

Answer 1

Obviously it's legal.

You see this on TV because people in REALITY don't exactly have the money to spend on their cars because, it's not an investment because you loose that money you put into it when you re-sell it. But hey, if you've got the cash feel free to as long as you don't run Nitrous Oxide with the nozzel opened while your driving, everything else is legal.

Answer 2

yes its perfectly legal, to an extent.  there are limits on how extreme you make the performance, for example, a camshaft can only have a certain amount of lift before it becomes illegal.  Not sure what the limit is or how they enforce it for that matter but you get the idea.

Answer 3

It depends, if the car becomes tuned to the point where it won't pass the emissions (smog) check and how much HP it has. It also depends what state you're in. For example, here's one I'm sure you even saw. The 2nd Fast and the furious movie. Well, that Grey skyline is NOT capable of passing the emissions standards unless it had some good modding to do so. That's a BIG part of the reason you can't buy that car from Japan and get it sent here (US) anymore.