Good day to all!
My name is Rafael and I attended the meeting on Sept. 14th and met some of the members, Charlie, Charlie's brother, Tim and a few other members. Everyone was very nice and willing to share their knowledge about the cars.
I became a Fiero owner just about one month ago and I love the car. It is a 1988 White/Gray, 54K miles, automatic, tilt, power windows, no sunroof, no power door locks or mirrors.
The car was originally purchased new in 1988 by a 65 year old gentleman that owned the car till he passed and then the car was stored for years till the son got it and moved to Florida and kept it of several years and then sold it to the guy I got it from.
My wife and I moved to SW Florida in March from North Georgia and we came down with 3 vehicles a 2003 Ford Ranger and two Miatas both 2002 one automatic and one 6 speed. Well, it only took me several trips to the store to realize that I didn't needed a 6 spd. car in flat land Florida and also curveless so I lost interest in the car and parked and drove the truck to get stuff and my wife's automatic Miata.
Family of 2 with less than 3 cars is not a happy family, so I started to think. My goal was not to go back to the Euro brands since I pretty much owned every brand including a Ferrari witch by far was the funnest car to drive, look and be looked at. Well, the search was on for a Fiero.
I started to research and read everything I came across and quickly realize that the 88 was the one to go after for obvious reasons, last year, suspension and several other things.
Searched, e-bay, auto trader, every craig's list in 1,000 miles and Fiero clubs websites among other and I was hooked and on the hunt. Budget was set and started spending endless hours searching. I came across several "dogs" being presented as pristine, several pristine cars but crazy sellers asking for double than the car was sold for it new and of course just a few real unmolested jewels with reasonable prices and "bada-bing-bada-bom" I found the car.
Listed on E-bay on auction form, the car had the equipment that I wanted, no sunroof or t-tops, auto and white was perfect for Florida. To make the long story short I have spend 3 weeks going over the car, cleaning and cleaning, addressing some minor issues and making plans for upgrades such as distributor rebuilt, lowering springs, headlight replacement, etc.So, I travel to Atlanta often and I'm going to try to be there in time for the meetings on Saturday and hopefully once I get comfortable with the car I will drive it up there.Looking forward to meet more members and to learn more about these cars.I hope you all had a great run yesterday and I can't wait to see the pictures.Thank you for reading my posting and God bless us all!!
Rafael