Meeting Wrap Up Letters

REMEMBER SPECIAL START TIME. Be there at 5pm if you want to help get things organized. 5:30 is the official start to the Christmas Party.   If you are participating in the Christmas Party, you will need to be at the meeting at 5:30 PM. The club will be buying several appy platters and assorted munchies.   We will do the gift exchange at 6:30.  Meeting will start at 7pm.    Everyone is welcome to come early if they wish.   We are only doing the early because we want extra time for people that want to exchange gifts and hang out.

Items to talk about at the meeting.  I hear John Carlo is having a blast in his new 3800SC choptop widebody car.  I know many of you are pretty eager to see the car.   Clynt is installing a Turbo onto his V8 Caddy powered Fiero.  I am working on Paul Wans Fiero still.   I’ll have some funny stories about that car.  Myself and Patrick helped Phil take a complete 86GT down to nearly the bare frame in one afternoon.  There are a few pics on the forum.

                   If someone has a list of Christmas Lights displays could you please bring it to the meeting?  This is usually a really fun night, chasing each other around the side streets checking out lights.  We also get checked out by the people as they are amazed to see all the Fiero’s cruising around.  

                  I will try to have an update regarding the Fiero trailer hitches from Pat Patterson.   

             Winter driving in a Fiero.  Its better than you think.  Mid engine helps with traction of the drive tires, and if you are prepared for a bit of under steer, that you can usually correct with a quick blip of the throttle to kick the back end around, it can really be fun.  Only time I have ever been stuck was when I tried to drive my lowered 85GT in 2ft of fresh powder that I managed to get high centered on. 

 New Forum Section, we added a place for people to post BAD VENDORS.  If you took your Fiero to a shop or mechanic and got screwed or they attempted to screw you, please post of the shop name, date it happened and if you know who you talked to please add it.   I will be adding and explaining my alignment issues at the meeting.   I went to Kal Tire in Port Kells and suffice it to say, if I was not a mechanic and knew nothing about cars, they would have soaked me for at least $500 for an alignment on my car.  I paid them $120 and took my car any left. 

Now for a good shop.  Target Muffler and Brake 6070 200^th street.  Really great guys, kinda shop that makes you feel like you are at home with your buddies when you walk in.   There was Zero attitude from them, I told them what I needed the guy behind the counter said sure, no problem, took the hose I needed built, gave it back to me, I asked how much and he just said, ah 20 bucks ok with you.  I paid him cash and was out the door in 15mins.   I had gone to another shop in port Kells and stood at the counter for nearly 15mins just waiting to talk to someone.  So I was really happy with Target.  They also said they will remove cat converts and install a steel pipe for less than $50 or do a simple converter install of you want a new one for about $30.

     Due to no one really stepping up for alternatives for the food and toy drive we are going to stick with the original plan of donating to the Santa Fox Food Drive.  If you have canned food in your cupboard  that you bought by mistake, and are not going to eat, or just have a bunch of extras that you want to donate, we are getting geared up for our December food drive.  So food/toys whatever you got that you want to donate, please bring it to the club meeting and we will get it setup.  We should have a box or something to put stuff into.  I know that with the slowing economy everyone is starting to pinch there nickels, but there are a lot of people out there that need a helping hand.    Your donation can be Food that is non perishable, new unwrapped toys, or simply a few bucks in cash.   When I say nothing perishable, I am talking like Sack of Potatoes, bread.

The gift exchange is a maximum cost of $20 per gift and it must be Automotive related.    I find the best way to get something good, is to grab the Canadian Tire Flier and the Princess Auto sales Flier, with stuff in the CDN Tire Flier being up to ½ off, you can usually find something really cool in the under $20 range.   I think last year at this time they had Dremel kits on sale, regular price of $49 on sale for 19.99.    Another good place to check out is the XS Cargo stores.    We buy a great deal of club raffle draw items at those places. 

I am also looking for volunteers to help out with the planning of the Christmas lights drive.

Hey everybody, do you know what time it is, its FIERO TIME!!!!!!!!!!!

Yep, Yep, Yeppers.

So grab the garden hose, get cleaned up, and then go wash your car.  J

              We may have some special guests at this meeting.  A fellow car club has contacted me and is interested in getting together with us for a cruise.  I have asked them to send a representative to this month’s Fiero club meeting.  

      Fall is coming, Fall is coming, Fall is coming.  It’s the end of the Summer, run, hurry, save your days.      There is not much time left, you need to bring your Fiero out and have a few more blasts of summer fun with your car.  This meeting will be one of those chances.  So grab your day timer and put Saturday, September 13^th 2008 as a BIG HIGHLIGHTED DAY.  You are more than welcome to bring the wife and kids along.  It might get a little crowded in the Fiero, but hey we have done worse.   If its legal to put Horses/Animals in a trailer and tow it behind your car, I wonder how much trouble you would get into for putting people in a trailer behind a car? LOL.

      Ok Back to Topic.   We need to discuss Winter Events. 

Halloween, do we want to do anything.  Is anyone throwing a Halloween party we can crash.

Thanksgiving, I know most people spend it with their families, however there are a few people out there that don’t have immediate family to spend it with, so why not get together with other Fiero owners.  

Christmas, OMG did I really say it, yes I did, there is only roughly 100 shopping days left.   Time to start dropping hints to the loved ones, www.fierostore.com  and www.rodneydickman.com  and www.fierosails.com  

                                                     What do we want to do for our club Christmas Party this year.  We started a tradition about 4 years ago of doing a gift exchange and so far everyone has loved it.   We use the balance of the end of the year club dues to pay for a bunch of finger food at the Christmas party each year.      Do we want to have it at Ricky’s like we did last year, or do we want to do it separately at another location?

Winter Tech, alright, every year we talk about this, and every year we still end up with people having problems.  Change your Antifreeze, at the very least, check its quality with a meter.   Check your tires, tires that might be good enough for spring, summer and fall, might leave you in a ditch come the first snowfall.   Alignment, get it checked.  If your car pulls even in the slightest bit on the dry, you have an alignment issue.  That will put your car in a constant skid as soon as you get onto ICE.    You need to get the TOE checked to make sure both wheels are running true.   So far we have not lost any Fieros due to icy roads, as frankly these cars can be GREAT in the winter.  You just have to make sure your car is setup right for it. 

We will go into greater detail at the meeting.

P.S. if you have not paid your 2008 yet. (its almost 2009) Do ya think you could please take care of that.  Its only $24 bucks.  That’s a whopping $2 per month.  Less than the price of a good coffee.    You dues go toward club domain fee’s, club stickers, club, supplies, BBQ costs, Picnic Costs.    We are in need of another order of Business cards for the club, which we will be ordering soon as well.  If anyone owns a card printing shop and can get us a better quote please drop me an email to capt@captfiero.com  

Meetings start at 7pm in the Banquet Room

 People usually start arriving around 6:30 for chit chat.  We usually end the meeting around 10pm.

Always the 2nd Saturday of the month. 

Surrey Evergreen Mall, corner of Fraser Hwy and 152nd Street.
8958-152nd Street
Surrey, British Columbia
V3R 4E7
Phone: (604) 581-3212
Fax: (604) 581-9284
 

Dinner Menu

This is also an open invitation to all you Yankee Americans to come and see the World Renowned See to Sky Hwy and Visit Whistler Village.    (if you want more details just Google and I am sure you will find lots.

Club meeting date and time is the same.  Aug 9^th Rickey’s Restaurant 7pm corner of Fraser Hwy and 152^nd Street in Surrey. We will be discussing the details of the Whistler Run.

Aug 16^th 2008 Whistler Run, Sea to Sky Hwy 2 weeks away.  

We will meet at the Big McDonald's parking lot located one block North of Trans Canada on Willingdon in Burnaby. 

Bring your GMRS Radios we will run on channel 20. 

Stops will be Port-O-Cove (sp) and the old Mining town up there someplace.

Maybe make a stop to Visit out Fiero Friends in Squamish.

I have no idea what time we will get to Whistler, but the plan will be to get up there hang out, have a bit to eat in Whistler Village.

Then had back down maybe make another stop at Port O Cove for some evening pics and goofing around for the ladies.

Leave the Cove and head back to Vancouver.   If the group wants to can take a drive through Vancouver and play around, maybe Robsin Street, Davie Street.  Even do a night run through Stanley Park.  I think there is a TJI Fridays some place downtown that would be great to eat at, or maybe go into Metrotown a group and find a nice place to eat there.

This will be a full day run with lots of fun and cruising.  Bring your Video Cameras, Radar Detectors and GMRS Radios.   

A note ahead of time, speed limits will be set at “spirited” driving.  If you are not comfortable with that please bring it up and arrangements will be made to wait for you at stops.  

               Please Also check the club website as we are starting a thread on this topic.

Updates to come soon.

Well here goes.

Pics are here http://captfiero.com/021007

The meeting had 14 cars and lots of people.

  We had a new Member Mark Preddy (hope I spelled that right) with an 85GT that he purchased with a bad motor and is rebuilding the 2.8.   He is just 15 so this will be his first car.  I hope everyone can be quick on the draw with answers to Fiero questions for a new comer.

Terry Beale as promised was at the meeting and discussed in depth the direction the PPPCC is heading.  There are sweeping changes in the midst with there club and he wanted to assure us that we will be welcomed with open arms to any of there meetings or events.  The main topic of discussion with Terry and the club was the All Pontiac Show.   The show entrance fee will be in the $10-$20 range again this year.   It will be held at Softball City in White Rock, they are going to try and get much better signage this year so more people will see where the show is being held.    We got into a discussion about classes and Fiero’s.  Currently some of the other classes have 15+ years of one make and model of a car putting all the GT’s Formulas and assorted body styles in one group.   With us having only 4 years of one make and model car it is hard to justify the cost of 2 classes with 6 awards for 20 cars.  It’s not out of the question mind you.   We could opt for having 2 classes of Fiero’s and only have a 1^st and 2^nd prize for that class.   Now the question is to draw the line, what would the classes be?  Notchback / Fastback.  That would put Factory Stock Original cars like Ken So’s up against cars like Smurfs modified Notchback and Clynts custom V8.   Ok well that would not really be fair.  So how about Modified / Stock.  2 issues arise when you look at it that way.  What is Stock, where do you draw the line on a 20 year old car?  Would a non stock stereo void you, would aftermarket wheels void you?  Who is going to be the one to say how much can be changed and can’t be changed.   Would it be fair for the public opinion to judge which is more appealing a stock 4cly coupe vs. stock Fastback.   The people that vote on these cars are Jon and Jane Doe from the public.    I know that a Fiero owner will be able to tell what parts are suppose to be there and what parts aren’t. 

So I am looking to the club to let me know what you think the break down should be to honestly be fair.   

Pre Registration for the show was another issue. Coming from a sear financial standpoint. It is really hard to expect then to give us 2 classes with multiple awards when they don’t know how many cars will be showing up.  Last year there was only 5 people pre-register, yes we had something like 20+ cars in the show.  But they had no idea how many cars would really show up.  Heck I did not know how many people were for sure going to show up.  Lisa asked Terry if they were going to use the same pre reg forms this year as last year and he said they were.  So it was proposed that we get them printed up soon and start taking them at the next meeting.  John Craker also brought up the idea of registration via PayPal to make it really easy.  Terry really liked the idea in concept but administration of web stuff being rather awkward with there club he is not sure if it would be feasible. 

That was pretty much it for the All Pontiac Show discussion.    We moved on to talking about the Langley Good Times Cruise in.  Blair is really pushing to get club attendance up for that show.  Terry said what they did last year was there group met up before the show and all drove to the show at the same time.  That way they were in line together and could be placed together as a group.   The Langley Good Times cruise in is a great show each year it brings attention not to just any single car, but the entire hobby of building cars.  People come with an open mind about cars and when they see a Fiero the response is usually good.  The stigma that our cars had even 10 years ago of being a plastic disposable car has pretty much worn off.  The new generation of car guys have an appreciation for our little sports cars.  Most of the younger guys are not even old enough to remember the bad problems these cars had when new and only of the cool little 2 seater sports car from Pontiac.   Even Terry who is the current Pres of the Pontiac club was thinking Hmm; one of these cars might be a fun run-about car.   

Web Stuff.  

Graeme Bull of   http://www.solid-thinking.com has taken it upon himself to build us one heck of a website.  Note I don’t say Webpage, as what he has built is far more than that.  We have our own Forum, Mailing List, place to post pics of our cars that users can update, change and delete as they see fit.  Because of his ability to host the site himself and maintain it with content that changes automatically it is far more reliable and updatable than when I was hosting and Darcy had built for us.   We due owe Darcy a big thank you for all his efforts and keeping us up and running with a site for the last 6-8 months.  However it is time to move on to bigger and better things.   So pop over to  www.westcoastfieros.com and browse around the new home.  Check out the forums with Members Rides.  Register and post up pics of your car.  

Also note that when sending mail to the club email list.  The address is No Longer  mailinglist@fiero.solid-thinking.com or  chat@fiero.solid-thinking.com 

The new address are  mailinglist@westcoastfieros.com  (normal stuff) and  chat@westcoastfieros.com  (chatty stuff)  

 Regarding the Chilliwack and Victoria web sites.  Graeme and I are working on a solution for both of those pages.  So if you are a member in either of those areas.  The pages should be up shortly with all your local contact info.

Ok Members in attendance of the last meeting.

Clynt 87 Auto V8

Nigel 86GT

John and Amanda 86GT

Mike Arnold 86 2M4

Graeme Bull 88GT

Blair 85 2M4

John Carlo 86GT

Jonathon Boss 87 V8 GT

Austin Lee 86GT

Marcel V. 86SE

Stuart Jorgensen 87SE

John Cascarejo 85GT

Mark Preddy 85GT

David Bergquist 85GT V8

Lisa Reimann 86SE V8 and 85SE V6 (yes she had both cars at the meeting)

Have a Great Day