I am more of a Camaro guy, but I am glad there are people like you who feel that way about the Firebird. If there were a way for Pontiac to hear the voice of people like you, then at least the Firebird would maybe have its foot in GM's door. How come there was never a petition about this on the internet? Methinks that if the Camaro does really well, that Pontiac could reenlist the Firebird, seeing that the GTO is too expensive to be considered a competitor to the Mustang, or even a bargain muscle car.

As I said, if someone were to point me in the right direction, I would let GM know how I feel.

 

RussStang: Yeah it seems that true Firebird lovers are few and far between. I'll be honest, if the Camaro performs as well as it should and is styled as such that I like it, I'll obviously consider it. But trust me, this whole lack of Firebird and the fact that it's "dead" leaves a real bad taste in my mouth.

Unfortunately, there really isn't a "direction" or "place" to point you to. I tried setting up a petition like that to save the Camaro, but it never really took off. I guess the only thing we Firebird lovers can do is email or write to GM and Pontiac to let them know that Firebird is in our minds. RP said it himself, if enough of the same emails that are received contain the same material, it gets documented as such and draws attention. That might be our only hope as of this moment.

Kevin

 

I think alot of the reason that a petition for the Firebird might not take off as well as for the Camaro lies in the fact that many of the fbody performance sites only really advertise for the Camaro. Firebird guys are always welcome, but look at the website we are posting this on. I don't know how much the average Firebird owner goes and looks at something like camaroz28.com. I think if there were a way to get it known across many of the boards on the net that there was indeed a petition going on, then there would be more support for it. To me, part of the problem is that its just not getting the exposure, and getting out of the shadow of the Camaro seems to be a problem. Are there even any good Firebird specific websites on the net?

 

Maybe the best approrach would be to try bring back the more popular Camaro first (even though I love my Firebird), and hope that GM gets the hint, considering how similar the two are.

I'd like to see both of them back, because as far as I'm concerned they're both great cars... but trying to bring the Camaro back seems easier, no?

 

Top Trans Am horsepower & torque, 1971-1980 (all figures in SAE-NET:

1971: 455HO 310/410 (All new displacement)

1972: 455HO 300/415 (Though horsepower went down, torque went up)

1973: 455SD 290/370 (New low compression heads due to Federal regulations removing lead from gasoline. Also 1st year 2nd gen TAs had 2 engines)

1974: 455SD 250/380 (Torque went up while horspower dropped. Still aggressive but shorter duration cam & last year of true dual exhaust)

1975: 455HO 200/330 (The 455 was actually dropped for 1975 when the press was shown the new '75 Pontiacs. Pontiac retreated and installed 455s used in it's large cars by the time the cars went into production. The HO name was actually meaningless)

1976: 455HO 200/ 330 (Last year of the 455. Car & Driver April 1976 reported a 7.0 0-60 time & the quarter in 15.6@91 mph, beating the L82 Corvette 0-60 and loosing the quarter mile by just 0.3 seconds. FWTW: in the same article, C&D tested a Dodge Dart. The TA topped out at 118 mph. The Dart 360 topped out at 122.)

1977: T/A 6.6 200/325 (Same horsepower, smaller 400ci engine, only 5 less lbs/ft of torque over a higher but longer RPM range)

1978: T/A 6.6 220/320 (20 more horses via twin resonator exhaust, larger snorkel, & revised timing. To avoid oil starvation during extreme handling manuvers... these cars aim was to outhandle the Corvette... Pontiac added a windage tray to the oil pan. Not bad for a $75 engine option.)

1979: T/A 6.6 220/320 (carryover from 1978. Car & driver article reported a 6.5 second 0-60 time with this engine... quicker than Z28s from at least '71 to '93 )

1980: Turbo 4.9 210/345 (Horsepower dipped, but torque saw a massive increase over the T/A 6.6 engine. Sticking it behind an automatic transmission & a 3.08 axle instead of the T/A 6.6's 3.73 made the car a whole lot slower, though)

Overall, Tran's Am's power went up and down over the 70s. The final turbo T/As actually put out more horses & torque than the 455HOs and more torque than the T/A 6.6.

By the time the 1989 Turbo T/A was out, Buick was no longer using the engine since the Regal was dead a couple of years already, and GM had this great engine sitting around (all engines were GM by the early 80s). GMC's Typhoon & Cyclone inherited the engine next.

 

I'm pretty sure that the engine used in Typhoons and Syclones was a turboed 4.3 not the Buick 3.8 from the Regal.

 

Actually, the Typhoon and Syclone used a Chevy 4.3 Turbo and not the Buick 3.8.

The T/A 6.6 came with 3.23 gears.

 

Correct, but it's engineering upgrade jump off point & many of the parts came from the turbo 3.8.


Trivia time:
Guess which other Pontiac vehicle was seen as a recipient for the turbo V6 that appeared in the 1989 Turbo Trans Am if it hadn't been discontinued?

Hint: it's name began with "F".

 

They were working on a pretty healthy all aluminum, 60*,2.9L, V6 Turbo version of the Fiero.

Too bad it wasn't approved...it would have been a rocket!

 

At the 20th anniversary fiero show in Detroit GM brought a turbo fiero prototype out to display-I dont know which engine was in it(I didnt go to the event). The 2.9 turbo was mentioned for fiero production in 1985, but thanks to the Corvette team it didnt happen. There is a story on the net about that engine and how Robert Stempel (then chevy gen mgr) helped to bring about its demise.

If the 3.8 turbo made it to fiero production with the alum chassis, its performance would rival the c6 today. I saw it posted on Pennocks that a prototype with the 3.8t and a regular steel chassis ended up getting crashed.

 

I remember seeing a spy pic of the engineering mule....in the early or mid '80s. It had a very agressive wheel/tire combo.

The horsepower ...I believe...was just north of 200. Not much today...but heady stuff back then...especially in a sub 3000lbs car.

The aluminum 2.9 T was quite abit along in it's developement. I distinctly remember the Corvette team pressuring Pontiac to kill it.
It would have been as fast or faster than Vette at half the price.

 

The 2.9t was rated at 290hp, the fiero would have wieghed at least 500 pounds less than the 220-230 hp vette of the day. Also it was built on a more advanced chassis than the vette then (no spaceframe Corvette until 1997!). If I can find the link to the article about 2.9t I will post it here.

 

Thanks for refreshing my memory! 290 it was. It would have been awesome.

I have the pic and small blurb somewhere in my magazine archives. It would probably take me a loooong to to dig it up though.

 

I don't understand why you would want all wheel drive on a Firebird... actually I can... but I just don't think it fits. The only recent "true sports car" that has had AWD is the Mitsubishi 3000GT VR-4. I don't refer to cars like the Subaru Impreza or Lancer Evo as sports cars, they don't follow the rules when it comes to sports cars IMO.

Looks like a Honda + 300 HP =‚sports car? nooooo, that equals rally car.

aside from the 3000GT, there aren't any recent true sports cars that I know of with AWD. Porsche and Lamborghini are a little above sports cars, at least in our $40,000-$50,000 maximum price range, so I'm not counting them either. There's probably other cars, mostly German, and well, I'm not even going to consider counting them (I'm biased against German cars, even Porsche a little bit).

So my vote is most definitely no, keep it RWD.

Firebirds have been so similar to Camaros throughout the years that I don't think they need to be more different to a higher degree. They just need to be less conservative than the Camaro and I think they'll be fine.

 

The engine was actually a twin turbo-imagine the cost to insure the car. I finally found a working link to the article: http://harvesthands.trifocus.net/~fws/magazines

I also found it mentioned elsewhere that the 89 fiero could have received the 3.1 turbo that went into the 89 grand prix.


Anyone at GM notice how well the Nissan Z is selling? The fastback gt with more hp would give it a run for its money today (in both performance and STYLE). Someone driving a Z tried following me recently to get a better look at my car.

Bob Lutz has the troops at GM all fired up-but he seems to have forgotten about an affordable version of "gotta have". No-its not solstice. The sad thing is that they still want to keep the decks clear for Corvette. So much for Pontiac being the performance division again. A 2 seat eco-tech 4 cylinder doesnt cut it.