The new life of the formula fastback

[Fierofool]

Almost all aftermarket Fiero heater cores are made by the same company and branded for the seller.  All of them are 1/4 to 3/8 inch short and the system retainer don't hold them well.  It also leaves an opening that reduces the function of the mixer door by letting outside air in at all times.

I have a couple of original extra Harrisons that have been rebuilt and I'm running a rebuilt Harrison in my 86.  The 87 has one of those misfit ReadyAire or Specter (sp?) short cores.  There is a superb rebuilder up in Conyers, close to the Ga. 20 and I-20 intersection.  They've been in business since I was a kid.  The original shop in Tucker is where my Dad took our farm equipment and personal vehicle radiators and heater cores to be repaired.   Fiero heater cores are about $45 for a repair.  And you have copper instead of aluminum.  And it fits properly.  I have a rebuildable unit if you want to go that route.  I may be able to get it rebuilt here in Lawrenceville and their truck deliver it to Conyers. 

Sims Radiator
1178 Royal Dr SW, Conyers, GA 30094

[NoMad]

It was quite the task to get it in this morning and like you both said it wasn't a great fit. Lots more work than it should have been and now I have a new cracked portion of the dash due to removing the speaker cover.....

I will probably use your rebuilders and pull this one back out as soon as possible. It makes moving the heat slider a real pain which makes me think there is some interference inside.

While ai was in there I went ahead and pulled the donut spare and the Jack from the front along with the tools and retainers. With the new brakes I couldn't use it anyway so no sense in just carrying dead weight.

Also replaced the small incadecent bulbs in my marker lights for the last of my LED 194s I bought. Huge difference doesn't describe it.

[Fierofool]

I use a heavy paper clip with a small bend on the end or a dental pick.  If I have to use a flat blade screwdriver, I place my finger or small wrench on the dash to use as a leverage point.  Learned the hard way. 

Nothing you did should have affected the climate control slider.  Did you clean out any debris while you were in the front compartment? 

You may want to keep the jack in there.  If you have a flat, it will allow you to remove the wheel and have it repaired.  The jack is pretty specific to the Fiero.  A shop or tow service would only have a floor jack and couldn't get it underneath the car far enough to lift in the proper locations. 

[GTRS Fiero]

I agree on the heat slider.  It is worse, now?

I use a putty knife to lift the speaker grille.

[NoMad]

As per my usual I cleaned the heck out of it all while it was open. Lots of dirty junk on the plastic but gladly no debris to be found. Guess I did an okay job on the earlier clean up.

Ya, the slider is now stiff and hard to move. That wasn't the case before.

As for the jack, I am pretty handy with a plug kit and anything worse I have towing and roadside so I might as well use it for once. 

[Fierofool]

Did you remove the fan motor and ballast resistor from the front compartment?  That's where you will find all the garbage.  Very little gets inside where the heater core is located.  It's all jammed up against the other side of the AC condenser.  See my thread in Tech Tips and Tech questions,  Preventing Fires.  What you will see came from a car that has been driven for several years with this stuff inside.  Had the heater motor not failed, I probably wouldn't have known it was there until it caught fire.

[NoMad]

I actually cleaned that area out day one.

[scottb]

Your mileage my vary, but I would put the spare tire back in. Taking weight off of the the front makes my car drive squirrely. I could tell a difference in the way it drives after throwing in 2 spare gallon jugs of water.

[GTRS Fiero]

As per my usual I cleaned the heck out of it all while it was open. Lots of dirty junk on the plastic but gladly no debris to be found. Guess I did an okay job on the earlier clean up.

Ya, the slider is now stiff and hard to move. That wasn't the case before.

As for the jack, I am pretty handy with a plug kit and anything worse I have towing and roadside so I might as well use it for once. 

Look under the right speaker.  There is a clamp there for adjusting the door.  You may have an issue there.

[NoMad]

Your mileage my vary, but I would put the spare tire back in. Taking weight off of the the front makes my car drive squirrely. I could tell a difference in the way it drives after throwing in 2 spare gallon jugs of water.

Soon the battery will be there to add some weight up front.

[NoMad]

Tried the simple test of swapping the tach filter but no change. Guess more indepth testing will be my Sunday morning plan.

Digging through my FSM I see that a lot of my dummy lights are inop and while they likely are not that big a deal I now want to go through and fix them..... More for the list.

[NoMad]

Had some time today before practice so I got dug in real deep. Pulled the instrument cluster and all related housings so I could try to get the trip meter and the tachometer working.

Charley had handed off a pile of gauge cluster parts a few weeks ago and I went through what was there in hopes of making a working cluster.

While I was in I went ahead and cleaned up all the contacts, all had heavy corrosion, and did the temperature gauge fix by flipping the two wires as shown on the tech tips page. Also installed a grounded electronic flasher so I could get my LED turn signals installed. While the gauges were out I went ahead and selected the best of the two plastic face plates and then used a headlight clean and seal kit we had laying around to make it look the best I could without a replacement or a full sand and refinish job.

The plug for the temp gauge and sender was totally disgusting and I had to use picks and QD Electronic cleaner to even be able to pull the wires and swap them.

Got it all back together to find some hit and miss results.

Funtional tach ✅
Funtional Trip meter ✅
Functional Temp gauge without pegging ✅
Funtional Speedo ❎
Functional Odometer ❎
Functional Overheat dummy light ❎

But I did get to see the big difference the LED turn and tail lights made.

When I get back from practice I will try to make a functional speedo/odo/trip combo from the units.

A few more off the list.

[GTRS Fiero]

Did you do the test to check the bulb?

[Fierofool]

When you get back into the gauge cluster, if your temp gauge doesn't sit on the bottom of the thermometer symbol when no power is applied, pull the needle off and position it there.  I've used Elmer's Carpenter's glue to hold it on with great success.  It should sit on 100 with power applied and a cold engine.

[NoMad]

Well it sure seems I can't have a working Speedo and odometer if I want a working trip meter. I swapped a known good stepper motor onto my original working Speedo. Still no trip meter function and I managed to set the needle wrong so I didn't even get an accurate speedo back. Swapped in the last Speedo Charley gave me and I am now right back where I started. Speedo and odo work but no trip.

It would appear something is failing in the boards rather than the stepper motors. Might be worth finding the input values for testing the functions off the car for accuracy of Speedo so I can replace the failed board components and build working units again and calibrate them.  Project for another day I suppose.

I also asked for coverage for the 9th so I can make the meeting and hopefully bring Cat along as well.