Ok, so here is the beginning of a few months (hopefully less) of destroyed knuckles and dirty hands.

I found a rust free '88 coupe here in the Spokane area, '88 coupe with Iron Lung, and a slushbox on it. Came with AC, power windows, locks. No sunroof panel, so I'll swap the one off my parts car. I drove the car around for a few weeks and although it had NO real power to speak of, this is my first '88 so I am in awe of how nicely they ride. This, despite the fact that all the ball-joints are original, and the bushings look like they went up against Chuck Norris' blender.

Without further ado, let's get some pictures rolling!

Cleaning interior out, put on blocks for prep.





Tony Kania came over to help -- He disconnected the engine and transmission lines while I tore down the front suspension. Thanks Tony!




No real rust to speak of, surface stuff here or there, but the bolts all came out without incident except the front brake hose flare bolts. I'll have to cut and re-flare.







Some interior shots, notice how "clean" this car is.. I've never seen one before that didn't at least have rust on the hoor handle mounts.









So, I pre-loosened all the cradle bolts, and disconnected the parking brake cable (MAN, I love how they did it on the '88, under the front cradle crossmember!). Then, Joe (aka Fieroking) showed me his fool-proof method of rigging up to lift a fiero. It basically involves removing rear bumper cover, and bumper mount, and wrapping a strap around frame rails. Not only does this prevent the car from moving around a lot, but it doesn't roll on axis when lifted, and it leaves you enough room to slide dollies under the cradle.


Here's me, suggesting we hit it with a bigger stick. My oldest son Max was so stoked that he got to lift up a whole car. Greg's son Tyler was there helping and learning as he's now 16 and about to begin work on his fiero. That's Joe jockeying the dollies around until they were just right.






Once we got the car resting on the dollies, I got down there to finish removing the cradle bolts. This particular one caused me extreme grief because no matter how we jockeyed the car around, there was still a little weight on it, so I ended up just backing it ALL the way out with a wrench. By the end, I was laying on the ground and my arm was cramping something fierce. I'm an IT admin by trade, not used to all this REAL work...





While I was wedged under there, Joe decided to throw small things down at me and wiggle the duke to scare me. This was my first 2.5, and I thought it was rather ghetto that it only had 2 mounts + a dog bone to hold it up. It was SO sloppy in there..





One last check before lifting the car off, pulled the power, grounds, and the harness through.






Liftoff! Notice my apparent "I am Sparta!" nose covering. I'm pretty sure Greg did that on purpose to keep my camera from melting.





Oops, forgot a hose. Nobody pay attention to that one, it's not important.





Ok, all clear, time to push!! wiggled around to clear the brake line, and the legs of the crane:






Woohoo! All clear! I think I'm doubled over in pain here, but don't remember. By this time, I'd sniffed too much brake fluid, antifreeze, and spent the whole day in the super-hot sun. After this, we set some blocks under where the cradle mounts in the rear. (Don't stare at my ass, and remember kids, say no to crack)





Ugh, cleanup begins. No rust except the battery tray (still not much). At least I can get rid of all that disgusting fiberglass crapola.





Obligatory standing in the engine bay shot: Note, car owner is more than slightly unhinged by now. This, and there is a HUGE thunderstorm rolling in.. Time to put away tools, and cover stuff..




More later! Thank you so much to Joe (Fieroking), Tony Kania, Greg (lilrdfiero), Tyler, and my wife for allowing me another project (although I'm sure it was a brief moment of weakness, and I'll pay for it later).

And the sun set on the first day..

[This message has been edited by aaronkoch (edited 07-22-2009).]

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[This message has been edited by aaronkoch (edited 07-13-2009).]

Nice work Aaron! Did I get you motivated a couple weeks ago?

Mine took 4 months to finish, if you can get yours done by Aug 7th I'll make you a special award for the fastest 3800 engine swap in the northwest!

Let me know if you run into any engine related questions, hopefully I can answer them for you...

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