Ahh yes, quite possibly the most loved and hated car of the 80's, the Fiero. I've owned my Red 1985 SE 2M6 (2 seat, Mid Engine, 6 cylinder) for about 10 years, over the course of the years, the car has had the stock 2.8 and automatic trans, and 2 different 2006 Pontiac G6 3.5l V6's(RPO LX9). and an F23 5 speed manual out of a 2001 Pontiac sunfire. this car has been my long running engineering training platform that never runs... lol, I hope to change that by years end though.
a Picture of the car in a more or less as purchased state:
after owning the car for about 4 months, daily driving, it developed a misfire, that very quickly made the car undriveable. I refuse to admit this misfire developed do to my repeated abuse of a 140000 mile engine and transmission(jumped timing?). lol... so, I decided to install a new engine, and a five speed manual. hindsight being 20/20, I should have installed the stock fiero 4 speed manual I had instead of the 5 speed, but what's the fun in something bolting together like it was made to? I did some research, and found that later models of the stock 2.8 existed, and could be swapped in, so I found myself ordering a $250 engine and bolting the stock Fiero passenger side engine mount on, then "fabricating" the other mounts out of some 3/16 plate I had. originally, I was going to install the stock engine in the car, which would works out to over 50% more power, with a much broader torque curve, but, whats the fun in that? so I bought a bunch of expensive parts, including a custom upper intake manifold, and a turbo. I never really got the car running until about 3 years later. I drove the car intermittently, but had cooling system problems that lead to the car overheating, and running like crap, along with a tune that was way off.
no matter what I seemed to do, the car wouldn't run right, I decided it had something to do with the engine management (very poor troubleshooting techniques used... ) so I then installed a MS3x, a 1988 Fiero rear subframe, and C5 corvette brakes on all four corners using some custom adapters I designed.
I got to the point of testing the MS3, but never fired the engine with it. around this time, work required me to move across the country twice, so the car sat for over a year at my dads house. after about 2 years of the car sitting, I finally got it back in my possession, this past January.
which brings us almost up to the here and now. I removed the "built" engine, and have since begun building a new one, to correct numerous small details that you only learn from doing it not right. when the engine was built, the windage tray didn't fit, I was ok with this for some reason. the car was very hard to work on due to the numerous "good ideas" a younger me had, things like the turbo oil drain being way oversized, and in the middle of the oil pan, the poor routing of the turbo hotside, the shift linkage for the trans, ect. I decided that I am now older, and therefore wiser, so I must be able to do it all better, and I hope I'm right this time.
upon removal of the built engine, I noticed my "custom" upper intake wasn't sealing around one of the ports at all, which leads me to believe that almost all of this issues I was having were stemming from this one flaw, something I wish I had noticed years ago. but I wasn't as detail oriented, or as well trained. I decided not to re-use the existing short block, with the exception of the camshaft. I picked up a new engine, had it tanked, decked, and honed, and went to town. some of the stuff I did is kinda cringeworthy, but I "did the wrong thing the right way" like cutting valve reliefs in the pistons myself with sandpaper and a drill...
while my work was sloppy, I put the effort into making it pretty good, I ended up with 6 almost identical reliefs which should provide plenty of clearance into the stock pistons. I also traded up my MS3x for an MS3 Pro Ultimate, and am planning to convert the car to DBW throttle control. I also modified the oil pan for a better oil return layout, entering the pan behind the starter instead of the middle of the pan.
I started by flaring the aluminum tube
Made a hole
Applied heat evenly across the whole pan inside and out there must have been some interference with the thermal camera, the whole thing was about the same temp, but from some angles, it didn't look it at all.
I guess the anodizing doesn't like getting hot...
it's got about 1/16"-1/8" clearance to the starter motor, which I think should be more than adequate.
the engine now sits on the stand, I'm waiting on parts to complete the new upper intake/plenum, and a few valvetrain parts to do final assembly. I have a ton of plans for this heap, and would love for it to be the fastest 5 speed Fiero powered by a GM 60 degree V6, something that shouldn't be too terribly hard, I'll post continued updates as they happen, but unfortunately, I will be out of contact with work soon for a spell, so if you're sitting on the edge of your seat, delays will probably happen.
Cheers-
Eric
a Picture of the car in a more or less as purchased state:
after owning the car for about 4 months, daily driving, it developed a misfire, that very quickly made the car undriveable. I refuse to admit this misfire developed do to my repeated abuse of a 140000 mile engine and transmission(jumped timing?). lol... so, I decided to install a new engine, and a five speed manual. hindsight being 20/20, I should have installed the stock fiero 4 speed manual I had instead of the 5 speed, but what's the fun in something bolting together like it was made to? I did some research, and found that later models of the stock 2.8 existed, and could be swapped in, so I found myself ordering a $250 engine and bolting the stock Fiero passenger side engine mount on, then "fabricating" the other mounts out of some 3/16 plate I had. originally, I was going to install the stock engine in the car, which would works out to over 50% more power, with a much broader torque curve, but, whats the fun in that? so I bought a bunch of expensive parts, including a custom upper intake manifold, and a turbo. I never really got the car running until about 3 years later. I drove the car intermittently, but had cooling system problems that lead to the car overheating, and running like crap, along with a tune that was way off.
no matter what I seemed to do, the car wouldn't run right, I decided it had something to do with the engine management (very poor troubleshooting techniques used... ) so I then installed a MS3x, a 1988 Fiero rear subframe, and C5 corvette brakes on all four corners using some custom adapters I designed.
I got to the point of testing the MS3, but never fired the engine with it. around this time, work required me to move across the country twice, so the car sat for over a year at my dads house. after about 2 years of the car sitting, I finally got it back in my possession, this past January.
which brings us almost up to the here and now. I removed the "built" engine, and have since begun building a new one, to correct numerous small details that you only learn from doing it not right. when the engine was built, the windage tray didn't fit, I was ok with this for some reason. the car was very hard to work on due to the numerous "good ideas" a younger me had, things like the turbo oil drain being way oversized, and in the middle of the oil pan, the poor routing of the turbo hotside, the shift linkage for the trans, ect. I decided that I am now older, and therefore wiser, so I must be able to do it all better, and I hope I'm right this time.
upon removal of the built engine, I noticed my "custom" upper intake wasn't sealing around one of the ports at all, which leads me to believe that almost all of this issues I was having were stemming from this one flaw, something I wish I had noticed years ago. but I wasn't as detail oriented, or as well trained. I decided not to re-use the existing short block, with the exception of the camshaft. I picked up a new engine, had it tanked, decked, and honed, and went to town. some of the stuff I did is kinda cringeworthy, but I "did the wrong thing the right way" like cutting valve reliefs in the pistons myself with sandpaper and a drill...
while my work was sloppy, I put the effort into making it pretty good, I ended up with 6 almost identical reliefs which should provide plenty of clearance into the stock pistons. I also traded up my MS3x for an MS3 Pro Ultimate, and am planning to convert the car to DBW throttle control. I also modified the oil pan for a better oil return layout, entering the pan behind the starter instead of the middle of the pan.
I started by flaring the aluminum tube
Made a hole
Applied heat evenly across the whole pan inside and out there must have been some interference with the thermal camera, the whole thing was about the same temp, but from some angles, it didn't look it at all.
I guess the anodizing doesn't like getting hot...
it's got about 1/16"-1/8" clearance to the starter motor, which I think should be more than adequate.
the engine now sits on the stand, I'm waiting on parts to complete the new upper intake/plenum, and a few valvetrain parts to do final assembly. I have a ton of plans for this heap, and would love for it to be the fastest 5 speed Fiero powered by a GM 60 degree V6, something that shouldn't be too terribly hard, I'll post continued updates as they happen, but unfortunately, I will be out of contact with work soon for a spell, so if you're sitting on the edge of your seat, delays will probably happen.
Cheers-
Eric
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