any ideas on how much torque this trans can sustain ? oh oh im getting ideas again... my problem is that i keep going for another gear when im already in 5th *grins
------------------ 84 Fiero Turbo Vortec 4300 Phantom GT L35 block, Syclone Intake and ECM with Moates adapter 50lb injectors, 3 bar map sens, T04B H3 Turbo
87 GT just waiting for the conversion
www.cardomain.com/id/vortecfiero Murphy's Constant Matter will be damaged in direct proportion to its value Murphy's Law of Thermodynamics Things get worse under pressure. Arthur C. Clarke "Any significantly advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic"
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08:28 PM
The Poopsmith Member
Posts: 1154 From: Portland, OR Registered: Mar 2005
And is there a weight difference between the original five speed and the new six speed. Its can't be that much heavier can it? I will be doing this swap someday and I plan on keeping my 2.8 so this thread is right up my alley. Thanks Archie!
so is the transmision is solid mounted right?, and you are keeping the rubber mounts on the v6? Do you think there will be any strees problem from using this set-up? would it be possible to poly mount the transmission?
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10:39 PM
Archie Member
Posts: 9436 From: Las Vegas, NV Registered: Dec 1999
No, the picture shows a rubber mount but that was for the trial fit. No reason to make a custom mount until it's determined that everything mounts ok in the car.
quote
Originally posted by FieroWannaBe:
would it be possible to poly mount the transmission?
Probally, but I've been solid mounting every car we've built for the last 8 years & it works fine. I just don't mention it here much because 10 "experts" will jump in to tell me I'm doing it wrong.
Archie
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11:37 PM
Apr 6th, 2006
p8ntman442 Member
Posts: 1747 From: portsmouth RI Registered: Sep 2003
solid mounts = quick cheap reliable and transmit much more vibration than rubber. Poly mounts = $$$ time reliable and transmit some more than rubber rubber = ****
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12:08 AM
lou_dias Member
Posts: 5347 From: Warwick, RI Registered: Jun 2000
I'll be sure to post my driving impressions once I get it home. I haven't driven a Fiero in almost 15 months and I have some serious withdrawal symptons here...
Finally a little bit of time to do some updates..........
After trial fitting we removed the engine/trans/cradle assembly from the car. After dis-assembling those items from each other, we installed the Flywheel, new clutch & starter. Then we installed the transmission for the last time.
We finalized the mounts & cleaned & painted the engine cradle....... & put the engine/trans back onto it.........
While this is going on, we're putting in the rear "A" arms & Bump-Steer eliminator kit.
.........................
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10:50 PM
PFF
System Bot
Archie Member
Posts: 9436 From: Las Vegas, NV Registered: Dec 1999
Zooooom in on the rear of that transmission, it looks good. Yep it fits in threre on the 4.9 & 2.8 without even touching the frame rail....
Obviously we also reinstalled the engine assembly while doing this.
At this point we have spent more time installing the Hann Suspension & brake parts than doing the 6 speed conversion.
On the front we found we had a problem gettring both front tires pointing in the same direction. After screwing around for a little while with this, I give Lee a call at Held. Sure enough, we need Tie Rod Extensions but we didn't get any. Lee is going to rush me some. We also had an issue where we felt the left front upper "A" arm was too short by 1/4". Lee told me he'd send one as soon as he could get it made up. We got it just a few days later & it looks like it solved our issues.
We put on the front & rear wheels & tires. Firebird wheels if I remember correctly, 16" in Diameter.
Here are a few pics of the suspension from under the car.
Front crossmember.......
The left & Right front suspensions.....
More on the suspension & looking at the engine/trans from the bottom is coming up.....
Archie
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11:29 PM
Archie Member
Posts: 9436 From: Las Vegas, NV Registered: Dec 1999
There's been alot of comments made about the lack of quality of the Held suspension components int he past. I have also heard that the quality has improved since the new owner (Lee?) took over. It sounds like the customer service is good. Do you have any comments on the overall quality of the components?
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07:48 AM
lou_dias Member
Posts: 5347 From: Warwick, RI Registered: Jun 2000
I'll leave most of the quality questions up to Archie... I just wish he could have shipped ALL the parts that were supposed to be in the kit all at once instead of Archie's people having to figure out what was missing as they went along... Also, the rotors were shipped from his supplier directly to me instead of Archie like everything else went...4 days wasted there waiting for a call tag pickup...
I'll give you the "was it worth the price" answer when I drive it...
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12:12 PM
Fierobsessed Member
Posts: 4782 From: Las Vegas, NV Registered: Dec 2001
The only part I didn't like at all about my HMS suspension on my pace car... the bumpsteer kit. Rediculously heavy, and the toe control rod attaches with a clevis that is a loose fit, and there is one instance of the clevis snapping off, same effect as a blown balljoint. It's the only part I really disliked. I have the sport front suspension however, and that's some pretty nice stuff. I see you got the full crossmember, That looks pretty darn sweet. That's just my $.02 take it for what it's worth.
Yeah, it does look like a really nice package with the new crossmember and all. I was wondering, how much does it change the geometry? Because it seems like, for $2400+, it should be comparable to the 88 suspension to be worth it. Thoughts?
Oh, and keep up the good work, Archie. It's great to finally have more tranny options for our beloved little cars.
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04:22 PM
americasfuture2k Member
Posts: 7131 From: Edmond, Oklahoma Registered: Jan 2006
Now that we have the suspension on & the engine back in, we have to deal with the problems we've got on the suspension.
As I mentioned the front left upper "A" arm seemed to be about 1/4" short. Here is a couple of pics of the new one being installed.
The "A" arms mount to a shaft with 2 big Heim joints. As we are removing the "A" arm you can see that the Heim joint (circled) is adjusted all the way out to try to bring the top ball joint outboard to get the spindle to stand straight up.
Here's a picture of the tie rod extender in place......
On a stock Fiero the steering is 2.5 turns lock to lock. The Held front suspension doesn't have positive stops. However we do have 2.5 turns & the stops look to be the sway bar.
The brake line mounts had to be moved because they would have cut the tire down at full lock.
More to come.....
Archie
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10:06 PM
Archie Member
Posts: 9436 From: Las Vegas, NV Registered: Dec 1999
In this case we had the Held lower "A" arm with the bumpsteer kit on it. Everything else was stock except for the FBird wheels.
Lou doesn't want to use wheel spacers but to get the rear wheels on the car we needed spacers. The following 2 pictures show the tires just barely touching the rear spring perches on the stock struts. These pics were taken with 5/16" spacers AND pulling the top of the spindle out as far as we could.
You can see how far the wheels lean out in these pics........
Lou doesn't want to use spacers so we decided that a set of 8" long coil-overs will give us as much clearance as we'll ever get in the spring perch area.
Will it work??????? What do ya think????????
Tune in tomorrow.
Archie
[This message has been edited by Archie (edited 04-12-2006).]
Well, yeah the Coil-over provided the clearance needed to the inside corner of the tire. So the tire no longer rubs on the spring perch on the rear struts. (I'll edit a picture in here tomorrow)
BUT Then a common problem with Fieros comes in to slow our excitement. (Excitement?!?! yeah, I'll be excited as heck when suspension/wheel/tire combination is finally on the car so I can get back to the whole reason this car is here THE SIX SPEED.)
So what is this common problem?!??!?!?......... It happens everytime you have too much positive offset & wheels that are too small of a Diameter. NOW the inside of the rim (right where the wheel weights clamp on) touches the knuckle where the spindle & the strut bolt together. It's real close if we install the 5/16" wheel spacer, it clears. Without the wheel spacer it touches.
Lou says he doesn't want spacers, so we grind off enough material that it barely clears. However, when I take it to get it aligned, it'll have the spacers on it.
Here is where we ground a little material off......
I forgot to bring home a picture of what this looks like from underneath with the wheel on (I'll edit that in tomorrow). Anytime you try to put a wheel with 40mm or more of positive offset on the rear of a Fiero it's gotta be 17" or more to clear the area shown above.
At this point I'm done with the suspension. I have an appointment, late next week, with the best alignment shop in the Chicago area & He'll spend a couple of hours dialing this thing in but other than that, we've done everything we can for this suspension/wheel/tire package. We still have a couple of things to do to the 6 speed swap & V-6 engine before we're done with it. And I have a friend coming over next Saturday who's going to help us dial in the speedo drive & we should be done with this one.
Here's a few pics of how she looks with those wheels right now.
Coming tomorrow, I'll give you my evaluation of the Held suspension parts we used on this car.
Archie
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12:02 AM
lou_dias Member
Posts: 5347 From: Warwick, RI Registered: Jun 2000
Don't you mean the suspension is killing you. j/k Joe
You ain't kidding! I could of had a Finale kit installed for all the money this suspension is costing me! But I intend to race it this summer at Seekonk Speedway in the Spectator Drags, been doing so since '95...and I intend to win it someday so I had to do this first...
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06:30 AM
Archie Member
Posts: 9436 From: Las Vegas, NV Registered: Dec 1999
Here is a couple of pictures that show that the Coil-overs have allowed a lot more clearance in the area where the spring perch was rubbing.
These pictures also show where the knuckle is REAL CLOSE to the wheel right in the area where the wheel weight is. This is a 16" wheel, a 17" wheel would have 1/2" more room.
The wheel spacers are not on in these pics. but I'll have them on when I take it in for the alignment next week. If the alignment guy needs to lean the tire in more at the top then the spacer will be needed to keep it from rubbing.
Tonite was supposed to be the nite where I give you my impressions of the Held parts but more stuff came up that we gotta talk about.
One of the things I always hated about the Formula One brake kit is that little hand brake caliper in the rear. For those that don't know, the company you now know as Held was originally started by a guy named Darrel Armstrong & it was called Formula One. Well Darrel is the guy that came up with the idea to use that Mickey Mouse little hand brake caliper on this system. I've never seen one of them that actually was hooked up & that worked. Well today we took those little things off & put them in the trunk. As it turns out they rub on the inside of that 16" wheel. Here's a couple of pics.
So, they're outta here, I'm tired of dealing with it.
So how about the good news!!!!!!!!!! Anyone interested??????
Archie
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10:58 PM
MotorTV Member
Posts: 260 From: chicago,il,usa Registered: Nov 2001
As part of the 6 speed swap we had to make a small little fitting to adapt the Fiero clutch line to the G6 Hyd. T.O.B. On the last 2 6 speed swaps Chuck has custom made the fittings for me. Now I have 209 of them. We used a machine shop that Chuck's brother used to own & they made me a Lifetimes supply of these fittings.
So after addressing rubbing wheels & dumb little hand brake calipers & replacing a plugged cat. convertor, we were able to drive Lou's car for the 1st time today just before 5 pm. Because everyone wanted to go home we only drove it a little but 6 speed #3 has been driven.
Here is a picture of it leaving on it's maiden voyage.
I'm taking the weekend off, but stay tuned because the #4 6 speed, Chop Top, IMSA widebody, all Chrome TPI, Fastburn, ZZ430 Clone is coming right along.......
AND it's followed real closely by the #5 6 speed, Chop Top #22, all Chrome TPI, Fastburn, 350 HO crate engined car know as the Tazmanian Devil.......
I'm taking the weekend off, but stay tuned because the #4 6 speed, Chop Top, IMSA widebody, all Chrome TPI, Fastburn, ZZ430 Clone is coming right along.......
Archie
looks Good Archie
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01:25 AM
blackrams Member
Posts: 32111 From: Covington, TN, USA Registered: Feb 2003
Archie, You and your shop crew do some amazing and creative work. I hope to get back up there for another visit sometime. My quesstion is, is the G6 stock motor and 6 speed a viable swap. I've not heard of anyone using the 3.9 motor. I know this would not necessarily be a true performance swap but, I'm just thinking out loud.
------------------ Ron Freedom isn't Free, it's always earned. My imagination is the only limiting factor to my Fiero. Well, there is that money issue.
