Real Fiero Tech

Part design sometimes needs a few iterations to settle on something good.

Same thing goes for the production process.

I agree with making the oil band wider; it didn't need to be ultra-precise and the collet setup was good for it. I guess the lifter body wasn't too hard to cut? ************************************************************************************************ Hmmm, interesting point about the oil pres...

Weld In NPT Flange Fittings From Tanks, Inc. prod_zm_2226.jpg https://www.tanksinc.com/index.cfm/page/ptype=product/product_id=787/category_id=167/mode=prod/prd787.htm I think that the large flange diameter is good for strength when welded to a thin-walled tank. I just used the 1/2" NPT version...

After rereading your post with the G graph, you mentioned left hand turns above 3500 and esp over 6k rpm you have oil pressure issues. You're turning gs the car was never designed to do, nor the oil pan designed for If that's the case, I doubt the windage trray is gonna help anything. In left hand ...

I have to redo my Fiero's turbo oil return setup, so I'm wondering if the drain would work better if it is hidden behind a main bearing cap, or if it can be facing a crankshaft throw (and the associated wind), or if welding a small cap over the drain fitting would be a good idea...

Is it feasible to make flats in aftermarket lifters to use a stock-style anti-rotation plate rather than link bars?

I suppose that lifters are fairly hard, but could this be doable on a surface grinder setup?

Does the engine have the VIN on it?

If the thief tries to part it out, he may be dumb enough to sell the engine with your VIN on it.

As a cheap/simple method of testing hardness, I have used hardness testing files. Hardness testing files come in kits of different hardnesses, e.g. 35, 40, 45, 50, 55, 60 HRC. A file will cut a metal softer than itself, but not a metal harder than itself. It's not precise, but it gives a rough indic...

I think that this concept of sizing tires according to weight distribution is unrelated to the position of the engine in the car.

I took my car (with the spherical bearing shells) for a quick spin yesterday, and the ride quality was fine (by my standard anyway; I suppose that this is subjective). One might think that metal-on-metal would be rough, but there is still the main spring and shock working. I intentionally drove over...

Mevotech SMS2278 / Moog 2278 fits on the car.

The front ride height is somewhat high (1.5" higher than I'd like), but longer is better than shorter. Longer can be trimmed as required. I'll be trimming these springs.

A car from my era!
Spotted today at the hardware store... I was not expecting it to be so clean.

My intent is that the firewall plate be inserted between the pedal box and the firewall in order to stiffen the firewall so that it does not absorb brake pedal load. I am targeting 1/8" material, but we'll see what can fit. Is that area flat? I don't have it in mind right now. If you can glue ...

I have a lead in chamfer in the bearing bore specified at 45 degrees, but only out to the ID of the bore "outside" of the bearing bore. Technically, if you want to spec the chamfer large enough to ensure that there always will be a chamfer (very small chamfers may not appear in the final ...

Can you elaborate a bit more on the firewall reinforcement plate? Is this more of an adapter for your custom parts, or does it also have a reinforcing (strength? stiffness?) function? I feel like a part of the Fiero's poor (soft) brake feel comes from the firewall flexing as the driver pushes on the...

I don’t really like the corner counterspace next to the fridge; looks like it is obstructed and hard to use. Can you put the pantry in that corner? Maybe not possible with the vent area… You’re not drawing in OnShape like you often do? Are you making your Paint drawings exactly to scale, for instanc...

Some thoughts: Plenum concept would ensure equal pressure to each duct, but each duct has a different length, number of turns, etc, so it doesn't mean that the resulting flow would be the same. And depending on the rooms, they may not all need the same cfms, so I wouldn't get too worked up over this...

I was checking out Onshape, and it looks like it has some sort of FEA built into it. However, that looks to be a $$$ paid option. For comparing the strength of different engine mount designs (which can be hard to analyse by intuition with their funky shape), I think that doing sort of basic static F...

The 3D scan data is good for reverse-engineering, but you shouldn't try to directly generate CAD geometry with it. You're better off using it as a visual reference, and then re-drawing native CAD geometry, so that the native CAD file approximately follows the shape of the visual reference. Perhaps m...

Can the BMW unit just work with a vehicle model, or does it also need empirical trial-and-error tuning?