suddenly loose steering and dead brakes (Page 3/4) 1985 Fiero GT MAY 07, 06:03 AM quote Originally posted by cartercarbaficionado: alright after a violent spirited test drive I can say the brakes are working properly after I unplugged the booster and let it sit open for awhile. car has its hot heat back which means the gauge is lying to me again about being halfway between 40 and the middle but it's holding there and has all its power back for the first time in months and is letting it spin tires through corners and such. not sure what I did and the front end is much much better but definitely is getting rebuilt fully very very soon with the best parts money can buy for it Your gauge is reading properly, it's not linear, as the first half is like 40-105, then the second half is 105-125 I think, so halfway between 40 and the middle is about 90* Celsius, which is right where gm cars like to operate. cartercarbaficionado MAY 07, 06:26 AM quote Originally posted by 1985 Fiero GT: Your gauge is reading properly, it's not linear, as the first half is like 40-105, then the second half is 105-125 I think, so halfway between 40 and the middle is about 90* Celsius, which is right where gm cars like to operate. oh....so it being at the middle was bad. good to know and guess I'll be making an se air duct 1985 Fiero GT MAY 07, 06:54 AM quote Originally posted by cartercarbaficionado: oh....so it being at the middle was bad. good to know and guess I'll be making an se air duct Anything from 1/4 to just a little past the middle is ok, deepening on outside temp, how fast you're going, etc. roughly 90-110 is "normal" I think cartercarbaficionado MAY 07, 06:59 AM quote Originally posted by 1985 Fiero GT: Anything from 1/4 to just a little past the middle is ok, deepening on outside temp, how fast you're going, etc. roughly 90-110 is "normal" I think fair enough, it was normally half to 3/4, of the gauge so it wasn't too good, I'm gonna be fixing the starter so I'll probably examine the cooling pipes just to check that they aren't crushed 82-T/A [At Work] MAY 07, 07:28 AM quote Originally posted by cartercarbaficionado: my starter just locked up and smoked out :/. I litterally can't get a break Yeah, I get a lot of flack for this... but these cars are mostly all original now. Unless it's a low mileage car... there's going to be "always something." Sometimes, the best thing to do at that point is tear through the car, section by section, until you've refreshed the entire car. That's what I'm doing with my daughter's car. It gets expensive, and obviously you don't have to replace everything like I am... but otherwise it becomes a whack-a-mole game of vehicle roulette to fix problems. cartercarbaficionado MAY 07, 07:47 AM quote Originally posted by 82-T/A [At Work]: Yeah, I get a lot of flack for this... but these cars are mostly all original now. Unless it's a low mileage car... there's going to be "always something." Sometimes, the best thing to do at that point is tear through the car, section by section, until you've refreshed the entire car. That's what I'm doing with my daughter's car. It gets expensive, and obviously you don't have to replace everything like I am... but otherwise it becomes a whack-a-mole game of vehicle roulette to fix problems. I'm used to gms of this era breaking but thus is getting a little ridiculous for a motor with 50k miles on it. though I'm starting to doubt that statement from the seller because I put I think 10-40 or maybe even 15w-50 to keep it out of the red at idle anyways off my tangent it really is just one thing after another with this and I'm sure it'll stop one day but like the rad just sprung a leak 5 minutes ago. how or why I don't know but I do know that really sucks but I'll be changing the starter and using the 84s radiator for a bit since I know it doesn't leak at least ironically the 84 is in much better shape despite the rust it has and the fact it had a blown up motor but hey only 30k miles since it had original tires, brakes and everything anyways I'm gonna get to swapping that rad in and fixing the starter 82-T/A [At Work] MAY 07, 08:49 AM quote Originally posted by cartercarbaficionado: I'm used to gms of this era breaking but thus is getting a little ridiculous for a motor with 50k miles on it. though I'm starting to doubt that statement from the seller because I put I think 10-40 or maybe even 15w-50 to keep it out of the red at idle anyways off my tangent it really is just one thing after another with this and I'm sure it'll stop one day but like the rad just sprung a leak 5 minutes ago. how or why I don't know but I do know that really sucks but I'll be changing the starter and using the 84s radiator for a bit since I know it doesn't leak at least ironically the 84 is in much better shape despite the rust it has and the fact it had a blown up motor but hey only 30k miles since it had original tires, brakes and everything anyways I'm gonna get to swapping that rad in and fixing the starter It sucks... but the thing you want to consider is that this car is already 35-40 years old, depending on year. At that age, even if it was stored in an air-conditioned museum, there's all kinds of stuff that's going to go bad. I mean, I'm not telling you anything you don't already know... but contacts start to corrode, corrosion between dissimilar metals, even when just sitting... the coolant is going to be rusting the inside of the block if any of it has tap water in there. That doesn't even begin to mention all the rubber and plastics that are starting to break down... particularly in the components where's heat/cold cycling. To put it into perspective... I had a 1973 Oldsmobile Cutlass Supreme that I got w/ 83k miles on it. ... I loved that car, it was awesome. But even though it was original... the seals in the transmission were failing due to age, and the transmission pump just wasn't working as it should. It would slip on full throttle unless it was already rolling. All the seals in the carburetor were going bad too... from old gas and such. Of course, these cars are so simple... rebuild the carb, adjust the secondaries... you're good to go. There's a coil and a vacuum advance distributor. The Fiero has like 6-8 vacuum lines, all of which can cause issues, and tons of plastic sensors. And it's all from a time when GM was slightly less than reliable. Part of me thinks the best thing to do is to take a 7730 ECM or a MicroSquirt, rebuild the mechanical components and replace the accessories with modern versions... and use the latest sensors and engine management in order to minimize all the extraneous stuff like EGR, cold start injector, oil pressure sending unit / fuel pump stuff (like Old Joe said). There's just a better way. My 2006 Pontiac Solstice had a very clean engine bay. There were only like 3 vacuum lines, and they were large ones. One was for PCV, one was for the Brake Booster, and I forget what the other one was for. In that picture, it only looks cluttered because EVERYTHING is up there... but so much less cluttered than a mid-80s GM engine bay. :/ Most of the stuff on our engines aren't even needed anymore for proper operation... or emissions (really)... if you implement a better engine management system. 82-T/A [At Work] MAY 07, 09:01 AM quote Originally posted by cartercarbaficionado: I'm used to gms of this era breaking but thus is getting a little ridiculous for a motor with 50k miles on it. though I'm starting to doubt that statement from the seller because I put I think 10-40 or maybe even 15w-50 to keep it out of the red at idle Also... I wanted to add to this... your oil pressure sending unit might be bad. When my Fiero had ~90k miles on it many many many years ago... the oil pressure gauge was occasionally going into the red as I was sitting at idle, but good on the highway. This really freaked me out. I posted on here way back when... and someone told me to change out the sending unit. I did, and low and behold... the oil pressure started reading normal. I'm not suggesting you go out and buy a new oil pressure sending unit... but just be aware they do go bad, and it could be that. cartercarbaficionado MAY 07, 07:28 PM quote Originally posted by 82-T/A [At Work]: Also... I wanted to add to this... your oil pressure sending unit might be bad. When my Fiero had ~90k miles on it many many many years ago... the oil pressure gauge was occasionally going into the red as I was sitting at idle, but good on the highway. This really freaked me out. I posted on here way back when... and someone told me to change out the sending unit. I did, and low and behold... the oil pressure started reading normal. I'm not suggesting you go out and buy a new oil pressure sending unit... but just be aware they do go bad, and it could be that. you might be right since at 2k rpm it's sitting near 40 psi and never going any higher or lower after that. though my battery gauge is acting up and I'm like pretty sure it's wrong since at 19 volts every bulb in the car would burn out extremely quickly and it's jumpy. now if only I felt like fixing the fuel gauge so half tank didn't mean half or empty, I did rebuild my starter and it was completely full of copper dust and seems to have started working again but I'll likely just bump start it whenever I can and just assume it's gonna go out again until I can afford a 3800 starter also I'm used to low mileage cars breaking from age but like this motor was just gone through but I'm not sure how much I trust how it was put in since I found some loose motor mount bolts cartercarbaficionado MAY 07, 08:22 PM starter still doesn't work even after a new solenoid and a rebuild, it spins for a bench test but I'm pretty sure it doesn't have the power to spin the engine over since my voltage drops to 8 when it tries with nothing happening