Yeah baby!
Things have looked up a bit since sitting out on that lonely San Diego drag strip, eh?
I came close to offering a ride in my dad's transporter. He'd probably be cool with it, but I promised the missus that our next vacation would be to the tropics, not a cross-country slog.
I wonder if there's enough time to swap that V-6 for a SBC?
Well all I can say at this point is.....kick some East Coast ass for us, OK? 
No time for engine swaps, unfortunately. Given more resources, I've got about a half dozen options to pick up 50-100 horsepower without going over budget. I could also lose about 150 pounds given more time. Shoulda, coulda, woulda! The way I see things, it's a lot better to show with untapped potential than it is to watch from a distance and tell people what I "could" build. 
Bryce
Nashco wrote: No time for engine swaps, unfortunately. Given more resources, I've got about a half dozen options to pick up 50-100 horsepower without going over budget. I could also lose about 150 pounds given more time. Shoulda, coulda, woulda! The way I see things, it's a lot better to show with untapped potential than it is to watch from a distance and tell people what I "could" build.
Thtat's why every Challenger should be on a 3 year plan for a given car. Some are talented enough to do it in one, but IMHO, 3 is a good length to optimize.
Eric
Nashco - PM sent
Debbie
alfadriver wrote: Thtat's why every Challenger should be on a 3 year plan for a given car. Some are talented enough to do it in one, but IMHO, 3 is a good length to optimize. Eric
You mean 3 week plan right? Yeah, thought so. That's the plan I'm on! yippee!
I did some more wire-reduction on the (stock) interior harness last night and came up with a game plan for my new EV switch layout and wire routing. Tonight I'm hoping to finish stripping the stock wiring, reinstall the EV wiring, and finish the EV cooling system with the new tubes I made. Looks like another late night in the garage!
alfadriver wrote: Thtat's why every Challenger should be on a 3 year plan for a given car. Some are talented enough to do it in one, but IMHO, 3 is a good length to optimize. Eric
3 YEAR plan? I don't have nearly the attention span necessary to reuse this same car for three years. Perhaps I'm running an accelerated development plan doing two $2009 events in less than three months? 
Bryce
Nashco wrote: 3 YEAR plan? I don't have nearly the attention span necessary to reuse this same car for three years. Perhaps I'm running an accelerated development plan doing two $2009 events in less than three months?
I'm on a three (I hope) year plan. But years 1 through 2.5 involve redoing the garage...
While I know most of you are joking pretty heavily, let me assure you that Challenges 2 and 3 are much more relaxing that 1 for a given car. I remember the crash we did to finish our car before the 2002 Challenge- 6 hours post work every day, between 3 people, and 6-7 more on weekends. The car turned out great.
Challenge 2 was a lot easier- take out motor, dress engine compartment, clean and dress car, re- assemble. drive it and sort it a lot.
Challenge 3- same as 2, but less of it. drive it more, and sort it more.
Thanks to that schedule, we finished top 10 three times, and got FTD at the autocross the third time after grenading our trans at the drag strip.
I got the opinion that GRM appreciated the return cars as much as the first timers. Especially the odd balls like Alfas. Trust me when I say this, Bryce, Per is going to do his best to make sure you bring that back (besides my car, I'll use Angry's 2nd 'vair as another example of sorting making them happy).
When you get back to the NW, sit on the car for a few months before doing anything. It lets the angst get forgotten and the potential resurfaces.
Eric
Nelson Fiat Part 2 is another good example, as is the yellow Hong CRX, the Gutty CRX, the Mini-Me Silver Bullet, and probably a bunch more that I don't remember right now...
Merkurs do not return well.
alfadriver wrote:Nashco wrote: No time for engine swaps, unfortunately. Given more resources, I've got about a half dozen options to pick up 50-100 horsepower without going over budget. I could also lose about 150 pounds given more time. Shoulda, coulda, woulda! The way I see things, it's a lot better to show with untapped potential than it is to watch from a distance and tell people what I "could" build.Thtat's why every Challenger should be on a 3 year plan for a given car. Some are talented enough to do it in one, but IMHO, 3 is a good length to optimize. Eric
Spot on. very spot on. Wish I could be there to see it Bryce, but congrats on all you've achieved.
3 YEAR plan? I don't have nearly the attention span necessary to reuse this same car for three years. Perhaps I'm running an accelerated development plan doing two $2009 events in less than three months?
Seriously, look at his stable of cars, he's totally ADD... ;)
'69 Bug | '05 Saabaru | '95 Impreza | '67 122S | '07 Sky Redline | $2009 West/East Coast - AWD Fiero Hybrid
John Brown wrote: Merkurs do not return well.
Just to prod you in the side, (getting off topic of this WAY COOL CAR) you should check out the JUST FINISHED results for the SCCA Solo national, class DSP....
(and note that OUR car was slower than the Spider that competed in this competition- they went head to head a couple of times. Ok, so prod with a cattle prod)
E-
Eric, lets face it... Me blaming the car is on par with The space program blaming a Twinkie for the space shuttle not launching.
John Brown wrote: Eric, lets face it... Me blaming the car is on par with The space program blaming a Twinkie for the space shuttle not launching.
Good point. But the Merkur IS a car you are familiar with, can get reasonably easily, know what parts are worthless for a challenge, and probably can figure out how to copy.
I think it would be cool to bring back some of the original challenge kind of cars to see if they can be competetive again. With the right work.
If I could find 4-5 other people to do most of the work 
I've got the ideas for a pretty simple Spider. Haven't you always wanted an Alfa? 
Bryce- I'm really happy that you are going- and I very much look forward to reading the article about the build, and the technology in the car. If you ask me, the Best Engineered award has been decided upon already. But that would require asking me....
E-
Well, I feel like I'm past due for an update. Most of the work I've been doing lately won't really be noticed once it's done, but as I've said before in this build, that's the point. I want things to look like that's just how they were supposed to be from the factory even if it means a lot more effort. One of the more time consuming "invisible" projects has been decontenting the wiring. Most of this has been for the stock Fiero harness, since I've got rid of TONS of stuff on the car that means I get to delete tons of wiring. The car has just enough electrical stuff left to function as a street car, but that's it. Sure, the weight loss is nice, but this is mostly to reduce visible clutter that used to be invisible...stuff like the harness that used to hide out behind the dash that is now displaced by batteries. Here's one of many piles of wiring I've created:
You guys that have stripped down a modern wire harness know how much of a hassle this is. Here's a shot of some of the EV wiring that is being added to the front end of the car:
Since I'm modifying the harness to fit, there are a lot of splices where I've eliminated inline connectors or stretched wires. I think Jessica and I have probably done something like 80 splices on the car, fortunately we're getting the process down pretty well. Those of you with keen eyes will also catch some work in progress in the backgroun. The sheet metal is part of the battery box, which is required to meet NHRA requirements for the batteries in the interior...the sheet metal is super cheap stuff sourced for home HVAC ductwork. The aluminum tubes on top of the motor are new replacements for the hodge-podge rubber hoses I had before and are not only more robust but also significantly cheaper...the tubing only cost me a couple bucks as it was previously a clothes hanging rod from a Linens and Things that was going out of business.
Here's the latest bundle of wiring under the dash:
It looks like a disaster, but this is actually a huge improvement from the bundle I was dealing with a few weeks ago. For reference, the EV wiring is in the blue zip ties under the pedals, that huge bundle under the steering column is original GM stuff. Slowly, these harnesses are getting picked through, modified, and rerouted until they start to cleanly fit into the available spaces.
I was going through our pictures from the drive down to San Diego and got a kick out of this one:
This embodies everything that I love and hate about driving in SoCal. I love the beautiful beaches, great roads along the coast, and the usually great weather. Traffic, on the other hand, is enough to make you go nuts. That's Rick driving in front of me in the G37, Chris was driving behind me in his Miata.
More progress updates next week. I'm running out of time before this thing gets put on a transporter so I have to stop taking things apart to "fix" them. I swear, I've had just about everything on this car apart and back together about ten times.
Bryce
ww wrote: Seriously, look at his stable of cars, he's totally ADD... ;)
Yup, I tend to go through cars like water. I have a weakness for interesting projects and like all types of vehicles, so the fleet is constantly fluctuating.
Bryce
I also suffer from this affliction, current count is 14 cars
Bryce,
We still good for Sunday afternoon detailing? I've got the polisher all packed up. 
P71 wrote: Bryce, We still good for Sunday afternoon detailing? I've got the polisher all packed up.
I don't think I'm going to be able to swing it, unfortunately. I'm out of town (again) and I can only work on it during the weeknights. The car ships out next Friday, so it looks like I'll just be doing it the ol' fashioned way...with a bunch of elbow grease in a hotel parking lot in Gainesville. Thanks for the offer, I just can't make the timing work out.
Bryce
Bryce,
I read about your car on AutoBlog a while ago and had no idea it was you. I should have known when I saw it was a Fiero though! Looks like one heck of a project! It's truly an accomplishment to have the car running.
Good luck in FL! I did the $2005 Challenge and had a blast.
Phil (Not sure if you remember me, but we went to college together ;P)
Thanks Phil! (Yes, I remember you)
I haven't made time to post pictures lately because I've been swamped. Progress has been a bit slower than I had hoped it would be over the last week or so due to lots of reasons. Oh well, I keep my nose to the grindstone and do the best I can...the car has to be at the transporter on Friday so I'm really running up against the deadline, as usual. Several big projects are about 90% done and I'm hoping to finish those up tonight. It doesn't look like I'll have time to post pictures and more detailed updates until Friday or Saturday, after the car is dropped off. Very little of the work we're doing now was "required" but we're trying to improve the car as much as possible before the big show, can't disappoint our fans!
Jessica has been a huge help again this week doing tons of detailing. She's getting pretty good with a rattle can! The Fiero had lots of black trim pieces that were a bit worse for wear, but a can of half price "trim paint" (that we got at a hardware store that was closing it's doors) and several hours of her attention to detail has all of the trim looking fantastic. This is yet another thing that most people won't notice when seeing the car for the first time, but having it all look fresh instead of having chipped/peeling/faded paint is a dramatic difference. Another example where time is a big investment, but for only a few bucks the car looks MUCH better.
The interior has been getting thoroughly detailed too. Based on some comments we got in San Diego, we've decided to put most of the stock interior back in the car. This means regluing the (typically saggy GM) headliner and trimming some stuff around the battery boxes. We're probably going to leave the carpet out. It doesn't look too bad with it out (and floor mats in) and the carpet on this car is VERY heavy, probably 30 pounds. Surprising for such a small car, but it's really nice stuff with a thick backing material, probably to help with noise insulation. Jessica is also doing most of the interior work, I guess one of the (very) few perks to her unemployment is that when I'm REALLY pinched for time she can step up and help out.
The wiring is coming along nicely. I tested things out on Monday night after I'd cut and spliced a bunch of wires for the EV system and things still worked normally...thank goodness! I have a few more details to re-wire like lights, wipers, etc. under the front hood, then I'll finally be done with under-hood wiring. Since everybody seems to think there's so many wires for the EV system when they've seen it, I'm going to great lengths to change that opinion. The EV system actually has fewer wires than the gas powertrain, so it makes my life a bit easier in trying to hide the wires.
I'm still struggling on what to do with tires. The car is currently wearing some mismatched all-seasons. I have some used up RT615s from a LeMons car that would be free to the challenge budget, but they're arguably not much better than all-seasons with tread and I'll probably have to pay to get them mounted (and of course my budget is getting tight). A coworker has a tire machine, but I'm not sure if I'll be able to get his help before Friday for free mounting. I'm thinking I should ask Jessica to dress up in her cutest outfit and send her to the local yokel tire shop to see what the bottom dollar is for mounting, she's got free tire patches there in the past so it's worth a shot.
Everybody says to put the best tires on that you can afford in the budget...I wish I could track down some of those free/near-free autocross tires that I am always hearing about with challengers!
Bryce
keep up the great pace! I can't wait to see how this thing does
Nashco wrote: I wish I could track down some of those free/near-free autocross tires that I am always hearing about with challengers!
What size rims?
DILYSI Dave wrote:Nashco wrote: I wish I could track down some of those free/near-free autocross tires that I am always hearing about with challengers!What size rims?
The car currently has 15x6 fronts and 15x7 rears (stock stuff for the '88 Fiero).
Bryce
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