I acquired this the other day in trade for my bike. "Thanks Greg". No idea what transmission, the axles look bad ass. You can see its a 350 mounted longitudinally.

So far all I have done is re route some lines under the car, clean up the cradle and the motor a bit. I put my 3800 project hood on it and attached my Archie rockers. I took car of a little rust.

The primer that is on it seems to be very hard. I will probably just 400 the good parts and ill have to glaze a few not so good spots. over all everything is very straight.

Im going to replace the deck lid scoop with hopefully a mopar 6pack scoop.

There is a hesitation when I step on it, I think if i rebuild the carb it should clear it up. A few older v8 guys have mentioned me finding a demon carb?


I took this earlier with my phone. ive got the trim on now and it looks pretty good and everything is very solid.


This is an artistic picture of the engine bay. Ill show a regular picture once i paint it all.

I have a gallon of single stage black that will probably go on tomorrow.
I will also have to take the front window out and reattach it. I hope there is a universal type window trim i can use.
Headliner and doors will get new leather like fabric. driver seat will be replaced with a nice one Greg gave with the deal.
the dash will get some plastic and painted black when the window is out.
The list goes on.
Ill keep my camera with me all day tomorrow.

Woah....Hesitation...yea I would be hesitant of doing wheelies at stop lights too....steering becomes an issue with only the rear wheels on the ground...

------------------
84 Duke, Holley TBI, Manual Trans 4.10, CompuCam, White

Hey Chris... great find! Can you tell me anything about that muffler? It appears to be a dual in dual out with each inlet and outlet on opposite sides... or are my eyes just messing with me?

When I step on it, the whole car feels like its going to flip over but that's probably normal with something that big in the back mounted like this BUT it also kind of shifts to the side and that I feel could be cured with some stiffer springs in the back.

You are right about the muffler. Im pretty sure its a dynomax. I will see if i can get you a part number or something later today.

I think people either want to follow the car closely to see what it is, try to race it because it looks sporty, or just be a holes

Last night a guy "I think was messing with me" was tailgating me very bad. So I sped up a bit because i was doing a few mph under the speed limit. He speeds up and starts to do it to me again... Sooo I accelerated just a bit more and while doing so the guy tried passing me?!. Normally Im not like this and would of let the guy pass but I blew his doors off. For a full half second he partly kept up with me in the passing lane. Once that hesitation went away his headlights almost instantly became specks in my rear view mirror. I hope my 3800 swap it this much fun lol. I cant seem to get the injectors to fire though? I didnt even touch that portion of the wireing. Guess ill have to get the multimeter out and go over everything AGAIN. blehh.

Well today is a big day. like I said, ill bring my camera.

[This message has been edited by Chris Hodson (edited 09-24-2010).]

You likely have a Tornado or the equivalent Caddy tranny. They are pretty much bulletproof, but it is worth identifying.

Fun ride. I'm jealous.

Arn

Nice, Thats the way a V8 should set....longways. I like it. Lots of possiblities and quite a bit more bulletproof than sideways. Good find....wanna sell it

That's the only way to get a big block in a fiero without going front engine. Doesn't it put the engine a little higher than a transverse install?

See what brand and model carb you have, typically a low end bog (hesitation) is because you have too large of a carb. If it's a 750 or 850 cfm, then that's probably the problem. A 750 cfm might work with a 350 ok if you rejet it though. Yeah, those Demon carbs are nice.

I found my bog was the accellerator pump circuit. Of course different engine, but, the wrong shooter and wrong size diaphram or cam can do that easily.

On a 350 it is pretty hard to argue against an Edelbrock 600

Arn

buy the book on holley carbs and tune the acc pump. If it is a vac 2nd holley make sure none of the good old boys put a screw in the drivers side linkage to make it in to a "mech" secondary carb. the acc can be tuned with differnt size nozzels, and the acc pump cam. If you can work the carb linkage evon a little bit with out it pumping fuel that is the resson for the bog. A stronger spring in the vac housing for the secondarys will help. With a tall gear for cruisin, a street 350, a auto with a tall 1st gear, a stock converter you had better spend some time on the pump tuning. a smaller carb would be better, a vacum secondary carb ( if you don't have one ) would be better. make sure you have the vacum advants line hooked up to manifold vacum at idle, not the ported spark tit on the carb. Make sure it works.
I used to tune my 3X2 holley set up on my bbc vet.
let me have that car for a year or 2, I'll get it set up right!

Yeah, a weak accelerator pump or wrong size one will cause a bog too. What are we working on? Looks like a Holley from the pic, but it's hard to tell.

[This message has been edited by batboy (edited 09-24-2010).]

Its a holly carb for sure but I have not dug into it just yet. It runs so im not going to ruin a good thing just yet

I picked up a rebuild kit for $23, some plastic tube for the oil pressure sender for about $5. A window wiper motor for the mark 8, wow that car sucks to work on...


Here is a better picture of the engine bay if anyone is interested


This is how I rolled it in the shop this morning.

I had to take the glass out. This just was not working for me,

a little while later...BAM!


There was a bad rust spot a the bottom middle probably from the leak up top. I wire wheeled it out, por15'ed it, metal etched what i didnt catch with the por and then mar glassed it and smoothed it over with some bondo.



eventually i cleaned everything up and put an adhesion promoter over everything. I used a tube and a half of window weld and made sure the thing would never leak again! I went ahead and took out the headliner while the windshield was out.



Im going to just clean it up and use this black head liner fabric that was laying around over it. overall the headliner is not in bad condition.



This morning I attached the other sides rocker scoop. I used some heavy duty rivets with the big daddy rivet gun. The original trim worked to hold it on pretty well but i put in a few rivets with some washers behind it just to make sure.


The car had primer on it before hand and it was pretty hard so im going to try and paint over it. The car sanded out fairly quick, most of the work was just glaze work and it all got hammered out quick.


The worst part of my day was this hood.


It had some cracking and things that just wont fly, this is where i cut out tonight. It will need a few more coats of plastic and a good helping of 2k before its anywhere close to where it needs to be. Ill deal with it in the morning.


The muffler did not have any numbers on top of it, ill probably paint this beast next week sometime and while the paint is kicking out ill go ahead and try rebuilding that carb. Ill probably find an online tutorial that uses stock specs and ill try to take pictures of what im doing for you guys.


OH I forgot... Notice anything different?



That was my test piece. Im about to cut up a good one now
Those autometers are being moved to the top I think.

So that is everything I did today.

Nice work! Gotta love those engines in these cars. Have you got any big plans for the engine bay?

Someone has to say it... A Corvette (even a C3) is not a work bench!

Looks like a fun toy! Someday I want to do a longitudinal...

All my Fieros are being used at the moment so the next best thing to use as a work bench was that vette lol

Whoa - Le Claire is about 1o min away. Would love to see it at the local shows when your finished. And even before TBH...

--Allen

------------------
Is this where I insert something witty?

Those headers are funky. I think you could do well with a redesign on them. They need proper primary pipes for efficiency.

Just a thought.

Arn

With the engine mounted where it is, **HOW are the Axles Getting to where the Rear whells are ??** It appears as if the axles would have to come out of the sides of the oil pan ! looks like the trans is Under the muffler. I'm sure alot of us here would like to know What it is & How it was done.

Not exactly sure what transaxle setup he has, but it's probably an Olds Tornado (front wheel drive).

Thats what I thought initially, but if you look between the header tubes, where the axle "should be", theres nothing there !

I see the Hub flange right there? Looks to just be the angle of the pic. It would have to be the th425 fer sure.

quote Originally posted by Chris Hodson: No idea what transmission, the axles look bad ass.

I'm assuming it's a 3 speed transmission, it's either a TH425 or a TH325. The 425 has an electric kick-down and the pan is square and has 13 bolts. The 325 has a cable kick-down and an L shaped pan with 15 bolts.

Since you already have the glass and the headliner out, I suggest removing the forward roof panel. I have found that Fiero roofs tend to leak at the junction of the forward and aft roof panels. There are two pieces of weather strip at the junction which on some cars do not join, leaving a gap which allows water to collect in the space above the headliner, the runs down the A-pillar and sits at the bottom of the pillar where it corrodes the metal at the bottom of the windshield at the corners. I will try to find some pictures of the damage this can cause. It looks like you certainly have the ability to address this issue, take the time now while the car is still apart.

Im not sure what you are talking about but the metal on the inside front roof section appears to be in great condition. There was just a little rust where it was collecting but ive eliminated any chance for water to get up top. Ive decided not to put in the trim that goes around the window. partly because im cheap but partly because id rather have smooth window weld all the way around. I body worked the edges a but to line up perfectly. If you dont understand ill show you in the pics after i get primer up there.

I noticed the oil pan has been modified to allow clearance for an axle shaft. It looks pretty hardcore.

Im in palatine near Chicago at the moment, im looking for a place to move in close to this area. If anyone needs a room mate or knows anyone that can help me either find a place to live or a job or both near here pleeease let me know!

When I get home ill go see if I can pull some numbers off the trans. Im very excited to get this car painted.

The headlight buckets are pretty much shot, I was wondering if anyone is still making flush mount setups or if there are any measurements or something i could make a set from. Im sure I could make them if worse comes to worse but i would rather buy some and be done with it. Im also open to suggestions for how I should accommodate the distributor and air filter sticking out the top. I was originally thinking a mopar 6pack would cover it nicely. Orrrr I could cut the top skin off the center of the decklid and flip it up then build sides for it, put some screen in and call it good?

Guyyssss... What am I going to do to cover the air filter and the distributor??

This is the mopar 6 pack. Scoop Dimensions: 28" Long, 31" W, 4.5" H


Or I was thinking I could slice a long rectangle and lift it up then glass the sides and put screen on the rear where it is open.

Next im wondering if I should keep the trans am looking hood or find a blank hood and slice a rectangle and push the front in then glass the sides, like a euro look I guess.


? I want opinions!

Pretty sure Batboy and Tony_C already nailed the tranny, but you can also get this setup from a Buick Riviera (the Tornado is it's stablemate). I've got one of these tranny's sitting in storage. Was purchased for a project my dad and I never got around to

Nice ride none-the-less, but I don't think I could ever see myself using the front clip of a vette for a workbench lol..

EDIT: I'm digging the rockers but I'm not sure I like how it flows with the rear bumper cover. I've always been a fan of a nice clean line all the way around a car. Maybe a rear diffuser would tie it in nicely and make it look that much cleaner..? Just a thought..

[This message has been edited by ImperfectTruth (edited 09-28-2010).]

Funny you mention a rear diffuser Its in the works.

quote Originally posted by ImperfectTruth: Pretty sure Batboy and Tony_C already nailed the tranny, but you can also get this setup from a Buick Riviera (the Tornado is it's stablemate). I've got one of these tranny's sitting in storage. Was purchased for a project my dad and I never got around to

Rivieras were not FWD until 1979. When they became FWD, they shared the same platform as the Toronado and Eldorado. They had TH325 and later TH325-4L 4 speed autos, not TH425 which was discontinued after the 1978 model year.

Man I need to come into tech. discussion more! Glad your enjoying it. I've been putting like 100 miles on the bike a day. I love this thing! You've been making some serious progress on the car. Cant wait to see what you turn it into. I didnt have the time for this car with going all out on my sc3800 car. Glad I traded with someone who can make this car its full potential. Keep it up!

I did not get a whole lot done the past few days. Ive been busy with a customers job. Replacing rockers on some newer truck. My work hours are 8am to 8pm - lunch is however long it takes to eat a sandwich lol. I did manage to get the headliner dealt with.



So when I started this I thought I was just going to do a quick industrial style paint job but i should of known better. Ive found out its almost impossible for me to not fix every single pinhole and every single flaw. Today I was considering base coat clear coat but decided against it because I had already got the single stage black. Sooo Its just going to be a very nice single stage paint job. Ive been priming here and there and sanding.. a lot. The roof was tricky around the window but I got it taken care of now.



Everything is pretty much in final primer aside from the hood and the bumper and then decklid.



i ordered a scoop for the decklid. It looks like whats on there right now but a few inched shorter. Im going to have to find a shorter air filter setup. Im open to suggestions. Ive got about 2.5" to play with.
The hood needs to be guide coated and sanded then final primed, ill have to get to that maybe tomorrow morning around 6:30am. YEA i know, thats crazy. I bet you Im probably the only 23 year old who gets up that early.

I cant wait to get some of these cars out. The shop is kind of crowded at the moment. Its only my boss and myself at this place. We get work done but it doesn't seem like fast enough, even working 8-8 lol. Oh well.


The firebird is kind of our long term project. The vette is like a back burner project. So far we have put new quarters on the firebird, well... to much to explain - anywhere you see primer we have worked on it.


I got the other side of the truck in primer before i left the shop tonight so I should be sitting good for tomorrow. New rockers, fixed rust on bottom of doors, repainting bed cover thing, fixing rust on tailgate.


"Ha, like omg! Chris actually does stuff at work!"

yes yes.. among other things.

LIKE HOOD THROWING COMPETITIONS!!!




Nothing but a full body suit can keep the sand out.


Ill post as I go. Enjoy

http://cgi.ebay.com/ebaymot...&hash=item1c1475f25c




I just saw these on ebay. Kind of neat.

Well... i decided to take the bumper off my other Fiero and put it on the 350 swap just because it needed something to complete the look with the archie rockers. i held it up and the exhaust of course did not go where it needed to so I thought I would just make a few cuts and make them point outward. Easy enough but I got into it and it exploded into a ton more work "as usual".



To even fit up the bumper I had to take the exhaust down. From the top it looks like you could just undo the bolts on those flages and it would just lift right out. NOPE. Sooo the next thing I thought was hey... if I undid the bolts on the manifolds then maybe i could get enough room to slide the setup out...NOPE. Maybe if the cradle was out the yes but I have a much more simple alternative..



I got the system out.



I started looking around on it and it was like all the places you could not see from the top had super bad welds. I mean all the welds on it were pretty bad but some places on the bottom looked like it had absolutely nothing there. Makes me believe that the setup was made with the motor in the car. Like the exhaust was build around the motor - you know what I mean. On the exhaust logs...or space or hallway or large open area that the exhaust dumps into, I had to pretty much go over every weld there because there were so many pinholes and leaks. Still a very ingenious idea whoever built it, its just needed to be worked over. By no means am I saying my welds look better over this work lol BUT its better than it was and will last a lot longer. Here is a good example of what was going on.



I was considering other options for the exhaust.



lol, Im joking there. I decided the exhaust setup it has will work ok. I ended up cleaning the rust off and rust proofing it. Im not sure what the temp rating is for on POR15 but ive seen it put through hell and then some temp and abuse wise in the shop next to me and its lasted longer than anything else so why the heck not.

First you got to knock the large pieces of crud and rust off. Leave some rust though. Some people like to take it all off and pretty much shine it up but POR15 is a rust CONVERTER. Whats the use if there is no rust. If there is no rust you might as well just shoot it with a metal etch primer instead. Do that, scuff it well, wax and grease remove it.


Then go ahead and spray your POR15. Just a note, do not put your used product back in the can and the cooler you store this stuff the longer it will last.


I know a few of you guys were interested in regards to the tranny. You can make these numbers out as well as I can


These numbers were on the block


Digging into this beast I noticed a few more things I need to address. Im glad this was greasy!


The shift linkage was pretty loose. It been hard trying to find reverse. You have to pull it back into drive and then push foward until you hit the sweet spot to get it in reverse but I noticed the clip that keeps the shift cable in place was MIA.


The reverse lights do not work. I haven't really investigated it yet but Im wondering if there is even a switch on the tranny for it. Im wondering if ill have to wire in my own switch of some sort?

Things to come soon:
1. Decklid scoop should be in the mail soon
2. New black carpet
3. Nice looking Sunfire seats
4. Brand spankin new Pioneer speakers all around
5. Cavi digi cluster if I can find one - Does it take the same vss signal as a stock Fiero?
6. 17" Grand am wheels painted black
7. HID conversion lamps
8. LED lamps in reflector box's
9. Paint

But not in that order.

[This message has been edited by Chris Hodson (edited 10-04-2010).]