1987 Fiero GT restoration (Page 1/1)
Incindium Films FEB 23, 09:48 PM
To start off Im new to the forums but I've had my Fiero for almost 2 years now. I originally wanted an MR2 (I know I know, how dare I mention the fieros biggest rival in a fiero forum) but I drove the car I have now and thought it was way cooler and felt way better to drive so I bought it. It was all original with 55k miles and came from Denver. It was honestly probably the cleanest cars I've ever bought.

The only issue it had and still has is it appears the 3rd gear synchro is just a little slow. If I try to hit 3rd too quickly it can grind slightly but as long as I don't try to bang 3rd like a 17 year old in an EH civic, it works just fine and hasn't gotten any worse since I've put 10k miles on the car. The first thing to address was changing all the fluids. Not having any service history I have no idea when it was last done and by just taking care of it right away I now have a baseline. The coolant, oil, trans oil, brake fluid, and clutch fluid were all flushed. When doing the clutch I wouldn't get any pressure when trying to bleed it it. Further inspection found the slave cylinder to be absolutely wrecked. It looked like someone had taken a hammer the internals. I guess all the gunk in the old fluid was the only thing holding it together. I replaced the clutch master cylinder as well and flushed the lines because it was bad.


Next was a whole ignition tune up. plugs, wires, cap and rotor. The first 3 plugs were easy. The last 3 at the back took 7 hours. The valve cover on the back was slowly weeping oil onto the spark plugs and the years of road grime mixing with the old essentially encased the original plugs in concrete. On top of that they were corroded really bad so once I chisled the plugs free, no tool would fit on the plug. I had to break the plugs in half and use a wheel nut extractor. The final plug was so bad I almost had to pull the whole head off. Not fun.

The next was suspension and brakes all the way around. I ordered a poly bushing kit for the car but when I tore it all down the factory bushings were somehow still in good shape so I left them. For being a Colorado car, the rust isn't too bad. I still wire wheeled, sealed, and painted all the areas I could get to keep it not too bad. new kyb struts in the rear and new monroe shocks up front. I did an R1 Concepts drilled and slotted rotor kit with ceramic pads. I know they aren't nessecary and i don't beat on the car but they are zinc coated so they won't rust and they look cool dammit! Also I couldn't help myself and had to paint the calipers red.


Ignore my terrible paint work. Its function over looks. After this the shift cables were in dire need of attention. I ordered Rodney Dickman cables, shift rebuild kit, and select arm shaft kit. While the interior was apart to do those things I took the time to re glue and the interior parts I took out as they suffered from the all to common vinyl separation.



[This message has been edited by Incindium Films (edited 02-23-2022).]

Incindium Films FEB 23, 10:18 PM
Final thing for now was to get it painted. I stripped the car down and sanded it really well and took it to everyones favorite, Maaco! Got the 2 stage paint option and used the original paint codes and wow, this local franchise I have does a really good job for the price, the masking lines on the 2 stage are absolutely perfect and the paint they lay down looks exceptional. Yeah there may be a couple specs of dirt and dust that landed in the paint but I always find the painter and flip them 50 bucks to really lay down a ton of clear coat so i have the room to go back and color sand and polish all the imperfections out.



My car came with its wing plastic dipped black and I liked the look of the black better than having it match the car so I had the body shop spray it black the right way and I love the look. All in all everything was looking great. The next thing I do are going to be the seats. Im hoping to find an original seat cover for the driver side in good condition but if not I do like the Mr.Mikes leather kit. Next thing is to throw away the 20 year old after market head unit which for some reason when ever it turns off, the driver foot well light turns on very dimly. The head unit just randomly cycles on and off. I have an original fiero head unit that i want to install, and hope it works. Im not an audio snob so the original head unit and a cassette adapter is just good for me.
Patrick FEB 23, 10:49 PM

Welcome to the forum. Looks like you're doing a nice job with that GT.


quote
Originally posted by Incindium Films:

The only issue it had and still has is it appears the 3rd gear synchro is just a little slow. If I try to hit 3rd too quickly it can grind slightly but as long as I don't try to bang 3rd like a 17 year old in an EH civic, it works just fine and hasn't gotten any worse since I've put 10k miles on the car. The first thing to address was changing all the fluids.



What did you put in the Getrag transmission? The recommended stuff is now Synchromesh Fluid.


quote
Originally posted by Incindium Films:

Next was a whole ignition tune up. plugs, wires, cap and rotor. The first 3 plugs were easy. The last 3 at the back took 7 hours.



That's odd. It's normally the three front spark plugs that cause all the grief. I hope you used anti-seize on their replacements.
FormulaGT FEB 23, 11:31 PM
Looking good! Wondering what the paint job cost?
Incindium Films FEB 23, 11:51 PM

quote
Originally posted by Patrick:


Welcome to the forum. Looks like you're doing a nice job with that GT.

That's odd. It's normally the three front spark plugs that cause all the grief. I hope you used anti-seize on their replacements.




Yes I used synchromesh fluid for the trans. I might be getting the front and back of the engine confused. The plugs on the firewall side were the problem child's. Ive never had a rear/mid engine car before. To muddy the waters even more I have a Saab 900 which has its engine mounted the wrong way for a front drive car and its 180 Degrees backwards. The out put of the crank faces towards the front of the car and the front of the engine with the accessory belts faces the fire wall. Fun
Incindium Films FEB 23, 11:55 PM

quote
Originally posted by FormulaGT:

Looking good! Wondering what the paint job cost?



The paint job was right at 1700. The cheapest I could find in California considering all of our pollution laws. The nice thing is I didn't have to spend anything on body work because the fiero is a life size hot wheels car and made of plastic I love that. Most regular body shops charge upwards of 5k for a paint job. Im not saying my Maaco job is perfect but I've had a lot of cars painted there and if you know how to prep it before hand and understand what their process is like, you get pretty good results.
Patrick FEB 24, 12:34 AM

quote
Originally posted by Incindium Films:

I might be getting the front and back of the engine confused. The plugs on the firewall side were the problem child's. Ive never had a rear/mid engine car before.



If you know which end is the front of the car , you'll know which is the front bank of a transverse mounted engine.

Incindium Films FEB 24, 12:43 AM

quote
Originally posted by Patrick:

If you know which end is the front of the car , you'll know which is the front bank of a transverse mounted engine.



You make a very good point sir. I've also also never had a transverse mounted vehicle.

[This message has been edited by Incindium Films (edited 02-24-2022).]

Incindium Films FEB 24, 03:35 AM
Another thing I forgot to mention was a while back, I had the AC system fixed. Had a brand new compressor installed and the whole system converted to R134a. (it does sort of suck that I just upgraded my whole fleet with working r134 systems and now the EPA is moving to a new type of refrigerant but the the environment is really important. it just kinda sucks that R134a will probably be illegal in a few years). For the first few months after the conversion, the AC blew ice cold. Then it stopped working. Still under warranty I took it back to the same shop and it turned out the retro fit valve had a leak. They replaced it and recharged the system and it worked great for a few more months before breaking again. Now that its out of warranty I'm going to take to local and trusted shop and see what they can do. The shop I originally took it to for AC was the only one willing to do R134 conversions and was the shop I had taken multiple cars to for the same thing with very good results.