Real Fiero Tech

[sidenote] Safety glasses can be had for <$5. Cutoff disks explode. [/sidenote]

Jinxmutt wrote:[sidenote] Safety glasses can be had for <$5. Cutoff disks explode. [/sidenote]

I've had this happen personally. Had a nice chunk stick into my arm. Be careful!

And I know what you mean about the salt (although probably less in PA). I have to keep washing my Galant at least once a week to keep all the shit off of it...

I have several pairs of safety glasses and wear them regularly for anything from woodworking to grinding to even being under the car and changing oil. I wear contacts so when something flys or falls into my eyes it really sucks. But that was my buddy grinding not me and he just picked up the grinder and had at it. He knows where safety glasses are in my garage just decided to not wear them. I'll let him know you all think he's a retard.

And yeah the worst part about salt here is it generally doesn't get above freezing for months at a time so washing the car is pretty much out of the question when it's that cold. However, just last week we finally finished installing the garage heater so now I could run to the car wash, park the car in the garage for a few hours, and crank up the heater till it dries completely.

fieromadman wrote:And yeah the worst part about salt here is it generally doesn't get above freezing for months at a time so washing the car is pretty much out of the question when it's that cold. However, just last week we finally finished installing the garage heater so now I could run to the car wash, park the car in the garage for a few hours, and crank up the heater till it dries completely.

Sounds like a decent little operation you got going over there... Whatever you can do to beat nature.

Ok a couple decent updates on the car.

I ordered much needed bigger injectors. They are evo 8 9 10 560's. They act more like 580's in dsm's though because they open up faster than stock eclipse injectors. These injectors will flow more than enough to support anything a maxxed out 14b like mine with throw at them. They should also flow enough to support anything a 16g will throw at them. Since at some point I would like to upgrade the turbo to a big 16g I think these will suit me well and the price was right.

Also, the car has DSM link on it but the previous owner never tuned with dsmlink, instead he tuned with a MAF translator. That is a very crude way of tuning and not exactly one that will grant you good gas mileage (I was getting anywhere from 12-20) because it constantly adds fuel instead of just when you need it. So I decided to turn all the maft settings to zero and start tuning with dsmlink. Really I haven't even gotten on it all the way since I did this because I haven't had a wideband in the car but datalogs so far look ok. I got a wideband from a friend that is setup for moving from one car to the other because mine in the Fiero is pretty much not comming out without alot of work that I dont plan on putting into it. I just had a wideband bung installed on the car last night so when the injectors get here I'll be ready to roll as far as tuning goes.

Well I got the wideband on it and did some datalogging with it when the stock injectors were still in it. I was rich across the board, so I dont think that I had to worry about getting new injectors yet. So even though I have larger ones already i dont think they'll be going on untill the front mount and larger turbo are on. That should be getting done pretty soon. I was racing a buddy of mine in his turbo civic this past weekend (I won by 3-4 cars but he was only pushing like 4 psi) so much that my manifold and turbo were glowing red. That wasn't cool, neither was the fact that my dipstick that tends to pop out under boost was spewing oil all over the manifold when I was racing him. Well you can see where this is going, basically the oil lit on fire and damn near brought the whole car down if i wouldnt have been quick to act. Needless to say, don't run 20 psi through a 14b for extended periods of time, and definately don't do that with oil blowing all over the place.

So I learned a few things, one, I need to get a new dipstick with a good grommet ASAP. Two I need a new better flowing manifold and bigger turbo ASAP because 3-4 cars on a d16 civic with only 4 psi compared to my 20 psi is pathetic. A 16g and tubular manifold and fmic would complement my injectors well too. So I'm thinking that it would be a great idea to go ahead and do that asap... and get a new dipstick.

I found some pretty good 16g/tubular manifold/fmic package deals on ebay. They are ebay stuff granted, but at least the turbo is cheap. I'll see what people on dsm forums are saying about these.

Or you could build headers, mount a GT35R with a T4 hotside, and run 25psi. It'll love it. The R series like pressure.

fieromadman wrote:I was racing a buddy of mine in his turbo civic this past weekend (I won by 3-4 cars but he was only pushing like 4 psi) so much that my manifold and turbo were glowing red. That wasn't cool, neither was the fact that my dipstick that tends to pop out under boost was spewing oil all over the manifold when I was racing him.

Hehe... good ole 4G63's... Get some miles on them and they have so much blow-by they blow the dipstick out of the tube. You know that the typical DSM fix for that is just to crush the tube with vice grips so that it grabs the dipstick, right?

Yeah, efficient turbo systems make much better use of boost. Don't forget, though that you've got a lot more weight and drivetrain loss than he does.

While I don't doubt that I have alot of blow-by (and I know I do, otherwise why would the crankcase pressurize) there is probably only about 50,000 miles on this engine. Granted I bet it wasn't treated the best during its lifetime but i doubt the rings are THAT bad. So what I'm trying to say is that I dont think that it is that bad. My dipstick is just that bad. They don't have anything that will hold them in besides the grommet on the top and my grommet literally broke off and fell in half while I was checking my oil after the last oil change. It never used to do that while the grommet was on there. For now I'm using electrical tape around the top of the dipstick to hold it in, and obviously it's not working that well... lol.

But yes, I know his car easily weighs in at 500 pounds lighter than mine and the AWD drivetrain loss sucks. I've been wanting to upgrade this turbo, intercooler, and inefficient manifold for a while. Just using that as an excuse. Till then I think I'll get a new dipstick.

Just been doing some boring things lately with this car. The Fiero has more attention by far than this one lately.

I had a bad oil pressure sending unit. I replaced that when I did my last oil change. The back section of the exhaust became unclamped when I was accelerating hard a while back. I said fuck the clamp and tacked the thing on there after that. I got some new summer tires put on it a couple weeks back. These were greatly needed, and I got a good deal on them. The major thing that I did recently was a complete detail job on the outside of the car. It really needed it too. I clayed the whole thing, buffed the whole thing, and waxxed the whole thing. It turned out REALLY nice. The paint looks original almost. The body has always been really clean on the car, but WOW now. The front bumper just could use a repaint. Here's some pics...













Thats it for now.

This car got sold. I decided that the money that I was going to put into it for repairs and such woudnt be worth it. Instead i sold that outright for more than I paid for it even though i had a considerable ammount of money into it and got a new 2010 Scion tC. It's got a warranty, decent looks, reliabilty, better MPG's, and a non completely boring ammount of horsepower.

I'll post updates and pictures of the tC later in the week.