| '64 Pontiac Banshee, a Fiero inside, a blown VVT NorthStar, all the good stuff, a complex tribute to the brand, Pontiac. | | - Fiero Chassis + Alloy Skin + Northstar + Flat Crank n Cams + Turbos + AWD +++ Merry Christmas ! edit- 1:55am est Dec 25 21 Corvettereport/1970-xp-882-...-corvette-prototype/ So, you say you wished upon a star for the '69 Corvette, a rebodied Fiero appearing in your garage this morning, all polished aluminum. ( That reminds me... ) edit- 2:40am est Dec 25 21 Jim Cowden's Aluminum GT40 What makes the heart beat, if it fails to do so, see your physician immediately for an injection of motor oil, an antidote for a bland life without crankshafts. Merry Christmas ! Ya Animal !
[This message has been edited by Valkrie9 (edited 12-27-2021).]
This is the style a custom Fiero would look swell in, a fresh suit, a new cut, updated interior and power, lots of power. I even like the colour, silver flake with a copper pearl and clearcoat. Yeah. | - Replication, a tribute to the artists, a fine compliment if done with the highest regard to quality, fit and finish. Drawn and sculpted by the eyes and hands of Bill Mitchell, that dreamer, designer, bravo !
Of all the beautifully curved Corvette prototypes done since I admired them in the early sixties, this is the one most likely to be built, based on a Fiero chassis. The stamped and welded beginnings of a tub to carry the custom front and rear sheetmetal, monocoque crush zones, suspension and engine/transaxle crossmembers. In fact, if some enterprising do it all kind of builder was properly motivated, He might find a small niche market to sell a few, as many as ten. lol ! Reynolds Corvette Concept Car. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=urXLqaW5CuQ
The truth is if you go back the Corvette prototypes were built as from, rear, transverse, longitudinal, reverse rotation, rotory, V6, twin V6, composite build and more.
I have drawings from the 70’s of the Corvette with a space frame and one with a rotory and one a transverse 454.
The transaxle was always the weak link.
The truth be told the idea of the Fiero was originally from the tech center as a V6 Corvette. Chevy turned it down. Hulki in search of a way to lower the cowl on the P car used the idea rejected by Chevy for the Fiero to get the low nose he wanted. This was documented in the Book Inside the Corvette.
GM never throws away ideas they are often retained and picked up by other divisions.
The 63 Buick Riviera was originally a Cadillac. Incept that was rejected. It became the Silver Artrow concept for Buick and then the Riviera.
Same for the 1990 Fiero GT styling. It was canceled but reused to style the 4th Gen F body. Even the dash was reused.
The Aerovette was a concept that evolved over time during the late 60s and thru the early 70s. It had a transverse mid-engine and Bill-fold doors. I have actually wondered why, with all of the Fiero kitcars, has nobody ever done one for the Aerovette...? This is what the C8 should have looked like (Instead of it's Toyonda styling(Yech!)
[This message has been edited by cvxjet (edited 12-25-2021).]
- Begin your panel beating experience here ! Give it a try for a week of labor, rolling and swinging a rubber mallet, to make sheet metal art. Yes, an aluminum hulled Fiero a thing of beauty, years to build. Wray Schelin's ProShaper Workshop https://www.youtube.com/c/proshaper/videos Lessons - Courses in Metal. wow !
[This message has been edited by Valkrie9 (edited 12-26-2021).]
Damn, too bad this is a Fiero forum, not a Corvette forum.
I just wanted members to see that Chevy Corvette first COPIED the Pontiac Fiero for their mid-engine car (transverse).
The photo you are looking at was from the 2003 Detroit Autorama that my car was in. When the public was not in the building. I was talking to the people from GM display and they knew that I worked for GM Experimental Engineering. They opened the deck lid to show me the mid-engine car (not for the public to see). If you look at the guy next to me his face is mad. My brother took the photo not understanding that was against the rules of GM and I still worked there for Cadillac and could be fired if that photo got out to the public. I have never shown this photo to the public before.
My intentions were not to turn it into a Corvette post. (Let’s leave Ferrari out of this also.)
That deck lid was never open during the show.
[This message has been edited by Fino (edited 12-25-2021).]
The car you were photographed with was the CERV III.
For those who don't know, it was a concept/research vehicle. I made a model of it back in the late 80s. It was (Basically) the beginning of "Life after box design" at GM. This (Styling)design led to the Pontiac Banshee concept car which was the lead-in to the 1993 4th gen Firebird (With CURVES).....
The chassis of the CERV III had that transverse V8 engine plus All-wheel drive and 4-wheel steering..
As far as the Vette vs the Fiero; I never saw where the Fiero would rob Vette sales if it was kept at the lower performance teer; You have HIGH performance cars (Vette, Ferrari, Lambo) and you have the lower-level sports cars (300ZX, RX7, GTV)....
The difference in performance is obvious; High perf; 0-60 = 4-5 seconds, 1/4 = 12-13 seconds....the sports cars ; 0-60 = 7-8 seconds, 1/4 = 15-16 seconds....
(Yes, I know there were versions of lower-teer cars that approached upper teer performance (300ZX Turbo, RX-7 Turbo)
The car you were photographed with was the CERV III.
For those who don't know, it was a concept/research vehicle. I made a model of it back in the late 80s. It was (Basically) the beginning of "Life after box design" at GM. This (Styling)design led to the Pontiac Banshee concept car which was the lead-in to the 1993 4th gen Firebird (With CURVES).....
The chassis of the CERV III had that transverse V8 engine plus All-wheel drive and 4-wheel steering..
As far as the Vette vs the Fiero; I never saw where the Fiero would rob Vette sales if it was kept at the lower performance teer; You have HIGH performance cars (Vette, Ferrari, Lambo) and you have the lower-level sports cars (300ZX, RX7, GTV)....
The difference in performance is obvious; High perf; 0-60 = 4-5 seconds, 1/4 = 12-13 seconds....the sports cars ; 0-60 = 7-8 seconds, 1/4 = 15-16 seconds....
(Yes, I know there were versions of lower-teer cars that approached upper teer performance (300ZX Turbo, RX-7 Turbo)
Sorry for the post. You are right I am stupid for thinking that I would have anything of value to add to the Fiero community. It shows in my car.
This is why I don't go to any Fiero shows like I use to do.
Fino please do not take any of this personal.. These post were adding to the discussion.
The Cerv III was not the First mid engine Corvette and the early models were longitudinal and even som transverse were done before the Cerv III.
There is a ton of history here and if you let the discussion go more would be learned.
This is also why the Fiero died. While there were a ton of mistakes made one over looked is they put the Fiero in a Plant that could build 250,000 cars a year. That is not economical and it gave Chevy the excuse it needed to kill the Fiero when it did fear for Corvette Sales.
This was confirmed by John Schinella at a Fiero meet in Michigan. He said the GM 80 F body replacement was set for the Fiero plant and that when it was killed it gave Chevy all they needed to kill the Fiero. Yes they were scare of the loss of sales to a more powerful Fiero.
Mid engine Corvette work started in the early 60’s. One version was a rear engine V8 the was reverse rotation. Even all aluminum it would pull the wheels.
I would encourage you to check out the early history as it is very interesting. To be honest it may have been best they waited till now as so many of the early versions would never have survived the mid seventies sales slump. Today it is much easier to build a mid engine and keep the price below the more expensive exotics. Yet still match them in performance.
Fino- in no way was I dissing on you for posting the pic; It is great history...Please put it back up.
So many Fieroists have installed Vette engines, brakes, etc.....My personal favorite Vettes are the C6 Z06 and the Aerovette concept car.
Cliff created the "Other Cars" section for vhicles such as this. It's not a Fiero, it's an "other car". It can't get any more simple than that. Fino can post this over there and we'll all go over there and have a huge discussion about the car. I'm not sure why there's a problem with this. Try this on any other car forum and the mods will move the thread within 24 hours.
[This message has been edited by IMSA GT (edited 12-26-2021).]
Originally posted by olejoedad: Good post, fino. I wish I had copied the picture before you took it down. Yeah, this place has trolls, just like Middle Earth.....😟
Lucky me, I already saved those pictures. I figured it would be removed one way or other and thought it was interesting pictures to have.
Imsa, to me this relates to Fieros; He was pointing out that the first mid-engine Vette had it's engine mounted transversely- just like the Fiero. And I think that we need to not be overly strict with the definitions of different parts of the forum.
I have posted in "Other Cars" about my Mustang and my jet boat...but if I had done something on one of them that could be related to a Fiero, then I would see no problem in posting it here or in Tech.
Just to add a bit of info; The car that was pictured was called the CERV III; CERV stands for Chevrolet Engineering Research Vehicle.....And the CERV III was also called the Corvette Indy.
[This message has been edited by cvxjet (edited 12-26-2021).]
Like it or not the history of the Corvette and Fiero are intertwined for various reasons.
The Mid Engine Vette ideas help inspire the Fiero going Mid engine as GM could have just made it FWF like the Capri and no one would have been happy.
The Corvette Indy was a different car than the Cerv III. The Indy was more show car and had a Ilmor Indycar engine in it. The same engine the Cart teams were using.
There was a Silver push show car and a Red show car that ran.
The Cerv III was Chevys attempt to see if they could make the Indy more production like. It was the blue car and had a 650 hp TT V8 Future LT5.
The Cerv III was built by Lotus and just was never a program GM would approve. It would have been way too expensive as built.
But the engine from this car went on to the car that was approved. The ZR1.
Now imagine Chevy pushing to get a big buck mid engine approved in the 80’s and then Pontiac showing up with the 1990 GT for a fraction of the price. Now you can see where the inter division rivalry was going and it hurt both divisions.
In the early 90’s GM killed the C5 program but it was hidden much like the Fiero and it survives today because rules were broken.
It is a very interesting history and when balanced with the Fiero history the parts of the puzzle begin to fit. This era was a very volatile time at GM with a lot of crazy ideas and poor management controlling the divisions to work together not against each other.
Here are the two cars. I believe both are still around. I had seen both at Detroit in the past. Advanced cars but just not something that would have lasted. It would have been too expensive and may have hurt the Corvette more than help.
The red car is the Indy. The blue car is the Cerv 3. Similar but not the same car.
[This message has been edited by hyperv6 (edited 12-26-2021).]
The car you were photographed with was the CERV III.
For those who don't know, it was a concept/research vehicle. I made a model of it back in the late 80s. It was (Basically) the beginning of "Life after box design" at GM. This (Styling)design led to the Pontiac Banshee concept car which was the lead-in to the 1993 4th gen Firebird (With CURVES).....
The chassis of the CERV III had that transverse V8 engine plus All-wheel drive and 4-wheel steering..
As far as the Vette vs the Fiero; I never saw where the Fiero would rob Vette sales if it was kept at the lower performance teer; You have HIGH performance cars (Vette, Ferrari, Lambo) and you have the lower-level sports cars (300ZX, RX7, GTV)....
The difference in performance is obvious; High perf; 0-60 = 4-5 seconds, 1/4 = 12-13 seconds....the sports cars ; 0-60 = 7-8 seconds, 1/4 = 15-16 seconds....
(Yes, I know there were versions of lower-teer cars that approached upper teer performance (300ZX Turbo, RX-7 Turbo)
GM in this era was when GM wanted every car to be FWD. The transverse set up was mostly done because GM engineers feared they may at some point only have a transaxle to work with. They also were working to go trans axle if the engine stayed up front which is what happened..
Fino don’t take any of this personal we are all just trying to have a discussion. If we keep exchanging info we all will learn new things.
There is a lot of cool unpublished or little known info here and it needs to be shared or it will be lost.
What is crazy is the talk was Pontiac was working with Lotus on the suspension on the Fiero. All the while Lotus was building these Corvettes.
While Pontiac has Porsche engineering was tuning the GM designed suspension.
Like I said crazy era.
[This message has been edited by hyperv6 (edited 12-26-2021).]
Originally posted by hyperv6: Here are the two cars. I believe both are still around. I had seen both at Detroit in the past. Advanced cars but just not something that would have lasted. It would have been too expensive and may have hurt the Corvette more than help. The red car is the Indy. The blue car is the Cerv 3. Similar but not the same car.
Like the glass house of the CERV-III, because... Isdera Commendatore, seen, heard and admired. Building a Fiero based supercar, costing as much as a European designed art object from a studio, the Pontiac chassis quite stiff and strong, crash resistant. Never have seen a re-glassed Fiero, other than the CRX proposal, more fastback. Something original, an adaptation of various components, sections, to result in a pleasing shape, recognized as a sporty car. Fiero with a French look, a European engine, made of light metal, carbon fibre. .
Obviously inspiring the Pontiac Fiero's designers, also including generic corporate parts, logically, in defiance of automotive journalist's desires for bespoke manufacturing overheads. ' Look ! They used the same switches and window winders ! The same shift knob, too. ' ' Oh how droll.. '
I've only seen one rear glass hatchback Fiero, here it is, a Corvette engine transversely.
Cliff created the "Other Cars" section for vhicles such as this. It's not a Fiero, it's an "other car". It can't get any more simple than that. Fino can post this over there and we'll all go over there and have a huge discussion about the car. I'm not sure why there's a problem with this. Try this on any other car forum and the mods will move the thread within 24 hours.
Some day you will understand that running other people down, does not make you better.
reminds me of the GM Holden Hurricane 1969 mid engine. Such a cool color. [URL=https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Holden_Hurricane#:~:text=The%20Holden%20Hurricane%20is%20a%20two-seat%20concept%20car,trends%2C%20propulsion%20systems%20and%20other%20long%20range%20developments%22.]https://en.wikipedia.org/wi...e%20developments%22.[/UR L]
[This message has been edited by Australian (edited 01-04-2022).]
I have never seen that Holden- That is really cool looking! (And I also never noticed the different sides of those Fiero mock-ups)
I remember that Ford was very successful with their Taurus...Then they decided They'd go with 100% CURVES!!!! on the third-gen.....and sales TANKED! And I also remember the late 70s GM cars with their STRAIGHT lines everywhere.
A good design is always a mixture of straights and curves.....Kind of like a good race track!
Yeah, We all admired the Hurricane when it appeared on every magazine's cover way back. Dutifully drawn on notebook back pages, some very nice, depending on the eye brain hand skills. Weird, I can't remember the drive-train, I'll have to look it up. DeansGarage It was the ' 1969_Holden_Hurricane_Concept_6 ' photo that made such a great impression. 1963 Pontiac Tempest 4 spd trans-axle.
[This message has been edited by Valkrie9 (edited 01-16-2022).]
The Fiero as a Corvette, in flash colors, needs a V10, supercharged naturally, to make it quick and fast. Corvette brakes too, an emergency braking ballistic parachute, airbags, bagged suspension, blah blah blah + + +. A roll bar above the humps, for sanity. Yep. Have a curved windshield made at great expense ~2K. A grand sight on the street, exhilarating on the track.
