Colinb17's Little Red Rocket Build: 1988 Fiero

the hump isn't actually tapered. it's perfectly squared off. it just slopes towards the rear. I get what you're saying though.

 

Must be the photo not showing angles well then. Looks good though

 

Giant skewps are hard to package up for international shipping this is the picture I got from the guy I bought them from.

 

Interesting.

 

I love that he put Fragile on there in three languages

 

I'm curious to see what was originally in the box on the bottom. Logo on the tape looks like Lincoln Electric, but the box itself doesn't look welding related.

It's funny, this guy must be the most American resident of the neatherlands. He's got a perfect replica of the night rider car, and is currently restoring what looks like an old Chevy pickup.

 

Where might one find info on this setup?

 

Right here I designed and built it from scratch about 5 years ago. What would you like to know?

 

Think it would work on a off road tear drop style trailer? Stable on the highway?

 

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it can certainly work on a trailer like that. much like a 4-link on a truck though, it's only as good as the setup. geometry, spring rates, and shocks will all play into that.

when I first built the suspension, I had an enclosure on the trailer, that was likely close to the size and weight of a teardrop. between the enclosure and all of the stuff I could back into it, it got quite heavy. I no longer have the enclosure on it, and primarily use the trailer to haul kayaks, but I do take the kayak rack off occasionally to haul big or heavy loads.

when I have it fully loaded with kayaks, paddle boards, and windsurfers, or have heavy items on it, I run all 4 coils. when I'm pulling it empty or with lighter loads, I remove the two inner coils.

I've towed this trailer a good 5000 on-road miles, and who knows how many off road, and never had a stability issue. if I did, a swaybar would be an easy fix.

here's a couple of other views of the suspension, and a shot of the old enclosure.





enclosure and trailer flex.

 

Thanks for the info. I may pick your brain some more when the time comes to decide on the final suspension.

I remember the trailer now but didn't realize you had that setup on it. You built that when you lived in Florida didn't you?

 

good memory, that's correct. did the enclosure because I was constantly hauling stuff 1000 miles between Virginia and Florida, did the 4-link when I realized that the stock leaf springs were no match for the new weight, and handles like junk off road. no longer need the enclosure, so here's the new rack on it.

shoot me a PM anytime with questions

 

It was a pain in the ass, but I closed out the lug nut saga this weekend.

to recap, after the new wheels showed up, I quickly realized that the bore in the wheel for the nut was really small, and factory lug nuts, would not fit. they were the right style nut for the wheel, but their outer diameter was too large. after a good amount of searching I found some steel nuts with a floating aluminum washer. they just barely fit. turns out that the fit was so close, that when you torqued them down, the aluminum washer expanded just enough to wedge itself against the walls of the lug nut hole. so when you take the lugs out, there was a lot of resistance, and then pop, the nut would come loose, and the washer would remain in the wheel. you could tighten it back down and pop the nut back into the washer just fine, but I didn't like the idea of being stuck with washers lodged in the wheels.

I was able to pop the nut back into the washer and then hammer the entire assembly out from the back side on a few occasions, but many of the washers had to be cut out. that was the pain in the ass part.

here's a photo of one that I was able to get out in one piece. you can see scuffs on the red washer, where it wedge inside the wheel.



for the many times that the washer did not come out with the nut, I had to resort to some milling bits in the die grinder. doing "precision" work with a die grinder is super time consuming. these bits will blow through aluminum like it's butter, so you have to take off a little at a time, and when you get closer to breaking through the washer, you have to switch over to the smaller, angled, and more precise bits.



after they were all taken care of, I installed the narrow, one-piece, aluminum lugs. not a huge fan of open ended lugs, but my options are limited with these wheels. surely something I will keep in mind when I get the next set of wheels.



at 60mm long, I feared that they'd stick out way too far for my linking. while they are a tad longer than I'd prefer, I don't really mind them.

 

Time to get some extended studs!

 

honestly, the factory studs are pretty long. stock lug nuts were open ended for that reason, they just had concave plastic caps on them to cover the protruding stud.

 

GodSpeed, Grimm Speed?

 

JDMspeed. despite the name, I imagine they are made in china. will check the box though. maybe i'll be surprised with a made in japan stamp......but probably not.

glass is half full though, if I ever strip one, I can just go ham on the impact until the threads liquefy, and the nut slides right off. quick chase with a die, and we're good to go again.

 

so, many of you probably know that the Fiero had a reputation for catching on fire. as always, the media at the time made it seem like a far bigger issue than it was, however, there is a real risk of fire in these cars if you don't do some key maintenance.

there are two ways a Fiero can catch on fire, and both are easily avoidable with a 5 minute claeaning.

if you ever see a Fiero on fire and the fire is in the rear, it's a V6, and the owner was a slob who let a ton of leaves accumulate on top of the header closest to the firewall. obviously I don't have this issue, since I have the L4 engine.

the other way to light up a fiero applies to all models, there is no cabin air filter, like what we are used to on newer cars. any debris that is sucked into the AC system accumulates at the base of the heater core. the heater core is not hot enough to ignite the leafy debris, but the blower motor resistors sure are. the fan speed has three levels, and off. when one of the three levels is selected, current goes through the selected resistor, and as a byproduct, the resistor gets hot. in some cases, very very hot. of course, this set of resistors sits right at the base of the heater core, and has a nice habit of catching the accumulated debris on fire. the solution is the pull the resistor out every once in a while, and stick a shop vac hose in there to get out all of the junk. fire risk gone.

here you can see the three resistor coils, one for each fan speed. makes the infamous Tacoma blower motor resistor look like something from the future....
love seeing stuff like this however, because it is basic physics at it's best. This is perfect example of Ohm's Law in it's simplest form; the kind of thing you'd see in a text book. V=IR. input voltage is constant. resistance is determined by the diameter and length of the coil selected. output current is the result, which varies the speed of the blower motor.

the Pontiac engineers obviously knew this component was going to get hot, which is why the base is made out of fiberglass vs the standard ABS plastic used in most plugs.

 

So is the updated one a digital board.