Well, I wasn't going to start a build thread yet, because I was just in the teardown phase, but things are progressing fairly quickly, so I'll go ahead and start my thread now.

If you want to catch up to where I am now, please visit my Journal of a Concept website.

Simply put, I'm building my own concept Fiero body, and as such, I aim to keep some of the characteristics that readily identify it as a Fiero.
The characteristics I'm keeping are:
- The hood
- The front fascia. It will be lowered & modified, but it will retain the Fiero look.
- The tail lights. I love the GT tail lights. They will be changed to conform to my rebody, but they will retain the same general layout and look of the original GT tail lights.
- The sunroof. My concept will have a removable hard top, AND it will keep the unusually large Fiero sunroof. In fact, the entire top section of the roof will be trimmed down to just a ¹/₂ inch around the sunroof glass, leaving mostly the sunroof as the roof itself.

For starter pics, I'm going from this:



To this:



I'll quickly run through the last few days with a small pic or two from each, then I'll keep you updated on a daily basis from here on, with larger thumbnails that you won't have to click on.

After removing all the panels, interior, wiring harnesses, etc, etc, everything except the gas tank and drivetrain, I started cutting. I cut down the fiberglass sunroof surround:



Then I estimated where I want my finished roof line (with masking tape), and cut the top completely off:



I then raked the windshield back about 4.6^o, which is a 2" chop. I'm 6'4", and after doing the math on a 3" shop, it didn't look like it was going to be roomy enough for me.
To determine the rake, I just used some simple trigonometry... I basically just formed a right triangle from a point at the top of the windshield, straight down, then straight forward to the base of the windshield, and the stock windshield angle appeared to be about 31^o. My hypotenuse (the line following the windshield) was about 28.5 inches, so I just calculated sine(31) = X/28.5 and solved for X. This gave my straight down drop a distance of about 14.67 inches, so I subtracted 2" form it, and plugged it all back in: sine(X) = 12.67/28.5 then solve for X with arcsine: arcsine(.44456)=X and X ends up being roughly 26.4^o.
Yes, I'm a nerd, and I wanted to know the exact rake of the windshield, or as close to exact as possible so I could better map it out and get an idea instead of just jumping in.... especially since it's my first chop. Plus I love math...

Anyway, on with the pics of the raking:



As you can see, after the rake, I test fitted my fiberglass roof piece to kinda see where things are going to lay out... And to my surprise, it's pretty much dead-on with what I have in my drawings!

This brings us up to lastnight, which was awesome, because my best friend was impressed with my progress, so he bought me an early Christmas present... a welder!!!
It couldn't have come at a more perfect time, because I had to sell mine when I moved from Seattle.
Anyway, of course I played around a bit with the welder, but before that, I went ahead and cut out the metal roof piece that the fiberglass piece mounts to, and again, a test fit showed it fitting together much better than I imagined it would and exactly where I thought it would be.



I guess that quickly catches you up to where I am now, but like I said, if you've got a few minutes, read the journal to fully catch up on how the madness started and to see all of my concept drawings.

Let me know if you find this interesting or not. I don't want to be an annoyance, but I think most of the build threads are really inspirational and informative, so I thought I'd contribute.
Thanks for reading!

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Journal of a concept: http://southeastfieros.com

Well boys & girls, tonight I got to face reality, and she wasn't very kind...
I went to drop the cradle, and I knew I was in trouble when the rear bolts started spinning...





And this is what happens when you think you're parking brake is off and it isn't:



This is a shot standing on the driver side, looking down at the lower frame rail:



So I swallowed my heart, and made the decision...







Looks like I get to carry out my thoughts of a tubular rear clip. I had thought of it before as a way to cut weight in the rear, but now it looks like it has become a necessity.
Please, please, PLEASE, if you know someone buying a Fiero that isn't very familiar with them, have them do a pre-purchase rust inspection. I can't imagine the horror of being "Fiero noob", spending $3k on an awesome looking Fiero, and get it home, only to find out that it looks like this underneath.

I hope that someone soon will post a very detailed rust inspection how-to, because there are tell-tale signs that will give a buyer a good idea of what's under the panels. And if you are doing the how-to, and need me to present some "what to look for" images, I'd be more than happy to.

Ok, I think I'm over my initial two-by-four-to-the-face feeling... I had no idea it would be *that* bad. I don't understand why GM didn't take the time to do something for sealing the inside of the frame rails, and the air pockets between the sheets... Because from my inspection, both my upper and lower frame rusted from the inside out. Anyone that cares to shed some light as to why they think they were never sealed is welcome to.

So from here, I'm going to continue disassembly of the front end, and then get to work on sand blasting it, strength-spot-weld where needed, and get it ready for tubular rear clip. As far as I can tell, the only major rust on the front section is the floor pan, but I still need to pull the front suspension.
I am determined to have this car for my concept. It's a piece of my history (it's #3 out of 10), and has a very special place in my heart and a lot of sentimental value. I'm sure every single one of you thinks I'm crazy for trying to salvage it, but hey, it's not yours!
I'll have more tomorrow...

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Journal of a concept: http://southeastfieros.com <<< >>> Build Thread