newbie questions about racing a Fiero

Hi All,

I am in the market for a new Hornet race car. Thats an entry level class at our 1/4 mile paved oval in Agassiz. It allows for a N/A 4 cylinder of up to 150 hp. Right now I share an Asuna Sunfire with a friend, but we want our own cars for next season. I want a rear wheel drive this time, and I am finding my options are pretty limited, but the 4 cyl Fiero seems to fit the bill. My problem of course is that on paper it looks very uncompetetive, being heavy and underpowered. Our current car weighs about 2200 pounds with the interior stripped out and a pretty good cage, and it is 140 hp stock, although we probably have slightly more than that due to a couple little tweaks. We get absolutely blown out of the water by the Hondas. Mostly due to the fact that it pushes so bad on the corners.(and our lack of driving skill) At any rate, i don't want to be beaten even worse, so any lack of power needs to be made up by improved cornering.

So here are my questions.

• how much power can that pushrod engine make with some basic porting and a cam change? Maybe if I had it apart, a little off the head?
• how much might it weigh if the interior, lights etc was stripped out?
• how fast is it in second gear? (most of the cars run in second only. 17 seconds a lap means no time for shifting.) We had to swap a different tranny into the Asuna and change the computer to get the speed out of second. We need to hit about 110 km on the straights and have really good torque coming out of the turns at probably 80 or 90.
• how adjustable is the suspension for rear toe and front and rear camber?
• Where is the fuel tank located?

Thanks in advance for the help.....

Thank you for the quick reply. That actually sounds fairly promising. I thought they were a lot heavier. I have read anywhere up to 3000 pounds. The fuel tank location is great as it means I wouldn't have to use a fuel cel. The second gear thing bears some thought though, as no one ever seems to do well in third gear. Its usually just too tall, and I am not sure a Fiero would be any different. How about a tranny from a different pontiac model with taller gears? Or a different rear end perhaps. As long as I can lurch it onto the track, all I really need is really good torque between about 80 and 110km/h. Every 9 seconds for 100 laps........

bearmtnmartin wrote: I thought they were a lot heavier. I have read anywhere up to 3000 pounds.

My '84 (notchie, 4-banger, manual) weighs 2400 lbs.

My '86 GT (fastback, V6, auto) weighs 2650 lbs.

bearmtnmartin wrote: How about a tranny from a different pontiac model with taller gears? Or a different rear end perhaps.

Keep in mind there is no separate "rear end". You have everything in the one transaxel. Having said that, yes, there is a selection of Fiero transaxels with different gear ratios.

I wouldn't worry about using a Muncie over a Isuzu tranny for the durability factor. Use whatever tranny gives you the gear ratios you're after. People use the Isuzu successfully with V8 swaps in their Fieros.

A little 4-banger duke isn't going to be blowing up transaxels on an oval race track.

Cheese wrote: Capt Fiero wrote:        2nd gear I don't think will get you near 110, you would need 3rd gear for that.  However with the close ratio's in the trans I don't see that being an issue.   The duke has no issue with torque at low rpms coming out of a corner. Suspension is very adjustable, most alignment shops find there to be too much adjustment and can never get the damn thing right.  That's not completely true, the front camber on stock 84-87 cars has only a single adjustment which is made by rotating the ball joint 180 degrees, fortunately you can buy ball joints like this one which will give you more adjustment. In my 5-speed (Isuzu) duke, the top speed in second gear is about 80km/h. This isn't so much of a problem in autox since the speeds are lower, I think the fastest I've gone in my car during autox was just below that. If I remember correctly, the peak torque for the duke is around 3k rpm, and coming out of 2nd (shifting at 5k rpm) into 3rd you should be somewhere near there. Some of the 84's had a performance 4-speed transmission which I believe gave them a faster 0-60 time by a second or two (compared to the 5-speed in my car). There's actually a scan of an old magazine in the archives (here) with some performance info on the 84 duke with the 4-speed performance trans. Not sure what to add for power. The stock 92hp likely won't enough and most people seem to think the duke can't handle anywhere near 150hp. I've left my engine stock on purpose since the car is also my daily driver so I wanted it to be reliable. Plus when I replaced my engine with a rebuilt one I had no idea I would be autoxing. Oh yeah, in case you're confused, the "Iron Duke" is the name for the 4cyl in the Fiero.

You all out to lunch...lol...JOKING

Our suspension has NO real ability to adjust especially for racing (track/road), autocross or drag sure, but with most R-Comp tires, our configuration (and I have almost all the upgrades) get eaten up...trust me, I have the worn tread to prove it and the testiments from the shops who have done my alignments in frustration as they cannot get the settings for the application needs I have.

Cheers

Thanks for all the input. I may go this route. My other options are an older Celica or a Pinto. There really isn't much else out there for a rear wheel drive econobox any more. Part of the equation is that it is very cheap racing. We are not allowed (don't get caught!) any modifications, and we have to run a 65 series tire. No headers, no chips, no cold air intakes, etc. We are allowed a cherry bomb muffler, which adds more noise than horsepower. Its a lot of fun and I highly reccomend it to anyone who wants some cheap excitement.

For the record, I paid 300 dollars for my Asuna, and we have a total of about 2000 dollars invested for car, a seasons worth of race entries, racing gear, and upgrades to date. We spent a little more than planned because we had to do a tranny and ECU swap to get the gearing right. But I have also won 250 dollars to date, and not all of that went to beer But that car needs nothing now, and next year should be very cheap unless we pile it into the wall.

Capt Fiero wrote: Hey Brian with the moog adjustable's up front and the camber kit in the back you should be able to get enough camber in the tires to actully eat the inside of the tire right up.  If you can't you either don't have the right ball joints or the shops are being lazy and are not changing the caster. (which requires removing the upper control arm bolts)

Ok, you had to question...OMG

As you know, I have both above, here is my last stats, and these are better than what In had from Dales and I was under the car with Jason helping trying to negative camber...below is the Toyo R888 spec, notice the camber

Setup Guidelines

•  Operating Temperature: 71°c to 104°c (160°F to 220°F) I was lucky on a 30+c day on the track, after each round I tested with David's digital temp gauge and did not peak past 155 F
• Tire Pressure:

• Camber: -2.5° to -5.0° (the Proxes R888 generally  requires less negative camber than the Proxes RA1)
• Caster: As much positive as possible
• Shaving: 4/32” is recommended for competition  (grooves remain until 2/32”)
• Rim width: a tire size that falls within the range of midpoint to maximum rim widths is recommended

At Burquitlam Auto (Which has provided me the BEST alignment to date):

FRONT (all degree):

Caster: left 5.5 / right 4.6

Camber: left -0.2 / right -0.2 (Killing the tires, minimum -2.5 required, I am WAY off). Max out of 5 alignments in 3-4 years has been -0.75, so maybe time to look at other options and invest money here, or budget for tread...

Toe: left .010 / right 0.15 / total 0.25

REAR (all degree):

Camber: left -1.2 / right -1.5

Toe: left 0.05 / right 0.05 / total 0.10

If I had the chance in my youth, I would have started to Kart, pretty affordable start, then build to the Hornet.

I have friends who are in many types of racing, all cost something, but getting back all that fun is what it's all about...I luv having those stats after a autox day and out of 60 or so, I'll be in the top 15 with my FIERO...that feels good

Keep us posted, post some pics

bearmtnmartin wrote: We just looked at a Civic and decided against it because i wanted a rear wheel drive. It sold for 600 dollars to a kid who is now running rings around me.

Brian's been doing very well in autocross this year with his Fiero, and at the last event he was 10th out of 40 drivers. Quite an accomplishment considering some of the high price horsepower he was competing against. However, in 9th place just ahead of Brian was... a 1989 Honda Civic.  That ugly thing went like stink!