So I'll be starting my dash swap hopefully within the next week. My plan is to take an extra Fiero dash, mount it inside of the Grand Prix dash, and then attach the whole thing into the car. I got my spare dash courtesy of Mel Johnson, thanks again, and am finishing up making a workbench/shop area in my garage. Does anybody have any any objections to my logic of using a spare fiero dash as a giant mounting bracket? Oh, and the here's the kicker, my Fiero is my daily driver, so I have to keep the car in driving shape throughout the extent of this swap. Speak now or forever hold your peace (or stay silent long enough to get some laughs at my expense as I slowly put myself in over my head)

[This message has been edited by Freeman (edited 09-18-2008).]

All I'll say is I hope you arent a big guy. Cause thats probably gonna cut out quite a bit of room, its gonna stick out farrrrr..

I'm 6' 4"... the Fiero Dash should hopefully be tucked completely inside the Grand Prix dash, I'll make sure to mock everything up before I start

pictures, i demand them

quote Originally posted by Freeman: Oh, and the here's the kicker, my Fiero is my daily driver, so I have to keep the car in driving shape throughout the extent of this swap.

You are making a BIG mistake. Read a few of the threads on this swap or even ask Jon Scott if he'd try this on a daily driver .....

I'll be posting pics as soon as I start, the garage is mostly clean so I can start soon. Pics will hopefully be coming on Monday. I plan on still using the Fiero instrument cluster, so not a whole lot of things that are needed for everyday driving are going to be missing. I still have that youthful feeling of 'I can do anything', so it should be worth the try at least. I am only working part-time right now, so the more labor-intensive projects I can plan to work in to my 4 day weekends. I do appreciate the warning, I'll make sure to take small steps as to not completely bury myself in a project I cant pull off... I hope

Jon-

Here's the only thread I could find...
https://www.fiero.nl/forum/A...040710-2-046539.html

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86 GT 5-speed, 88 Coupe Auto
Webmaster, NIFE
www.fierofocus.com

if your swaping in the Grand Prix dash get one with the HUD...it's a great option

Freeman, good for you on that mark. I don't think its a big mistake at all. Granted I find your method of mounting different but I'm going to be doing this in 2 months or less, but it'll be the firebird dash swap, and I'll be keeping mine going d/d too. I dont see why it cant be done.

Pull the dash, and whatever else in one night, and plug back in the gauge cluster so you've still got all your electronics. Just no frills!

Matthew

jweisman-
Do you know how to hook up the HUD to an 86? I heard that it is pretty easy on an 88, but haven't really looked into it, I have the HUD available if I decide to go that route

I wouldn't attempt a project like this on a daily driver. Even "simple" projects have tendency to not go as expected. Especially on older cars.

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My Build Thread

quote Originally posted by Freeman: jweisman- Do you know how to hook up the HUD to an 86? I heard that it is pretty easy on an 88, but haven't really looked into it, I have the HUD available if I decide to go that route

I don't know how... there are some forum members that know

OK, so here are my starting materials, This is also my first attempt at embedding images. Lets hope this works...

Donor Dash / Soon-to-be Mounting bracket... (courtesy of Mel)




Grand Prix Dash...




Center Console I may or may not use...



Glove Box and Steering Wheel Kick Panel...



Damage to Dash From airbag deploy (need to repair)...




Hopefully I can get started on this soon. I have to work overtime this week, so progress will be fit in sparingly

Ok, so not much progress, started to take the dash apart, making sure to keep the car drivable...






Hopefully I'll get a lot done in the next couple days.

So I've still been slow with progress, took out the armrest and rest of the center console today. Debating the need to hook the hvac and stereo back up, but the car is still drivable.






I'll be playing with photoshop later on tonight, I have some ideas I've been kicking around in my head. Hopefully in the next couple days I'll be able to do more work and less standing around and scratching my head

I personally think you are going to run into big problems with the space available behind the dash - I know there is no way that I could get 1/2 a Fiero dash in behind the Firebird one, much less a full one. You are probably going to have to cut up the dash so much to make it fit in behind that you would be better off without it. But hey, your welcome to try.

Another issue I can see is with the heater duct work - getting the vents to feed the Fiero dash (not and issue) - but then trying to feed the new one in next to zero space.

I found with the Firebird dash that I really didn't have to make up any brackets to mount it. It screwed into the car just fine - just had to modify the steering column bracket.

good luck with making it driveable while doing a dash swap. your in for more than you think trying to do it that way

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1987 Fiero GT built by my brother, merlot566jka, 3500 LX9 from 06 Malibu, WOT-TECH.com 1280 grind stage 3 cam, LS6 valve springs, 1227730 ECM conversion, Darrel Morse solid aluminum cradle mounts, Truleo headers modified to fit the 3500, 36# inectors, 70mm 4.3 throttle body adapted to 3500 intake, ported heads, upper and lower intakes, lightly polished, tcemotorsports.com crank trigger wheel, CenterForce dual friction clutch, Flowtech Afterburner muffler, 2.5" piping, cat deleted, EGR deleted, SinisterPerformance tuning, C6 Corvette exhaust tips. projected to be 35 MPG with a guesstimate of 250 hp at the motor

I appreciate the concern guys, I'm making sure to move at a sails pace to keep myself from getting in to deep over my head.

Mickey_Mooose-
I do plan on cutting up the extra fiero dash quite a bit. The ductwork lines up pretty well, but I myself still have concerns about making it all fit. The Grand Prix dash has a surprising amount of room in it, and I can tuck the entire dask inside. Hopefully after I figure what I'm going to cut off, and what I'm going to leave on, I'll be left with something resembling more of a skeleton-like mounting bracket rather than an actual Fiero dash. I can't post pics from work, but when I get home I can post pics of the Fiero dash "hiding" inside the Grand Prix dash.

americasfuture2k-
I'm aware that this whole plan has a great amount of potential of blowing up in my face, I'm making sure not to cut up or damage any of my original dash components, that way if this flops I can always revert back to my stock Fiero dash

Thanks for the input guys, I know that this is a big gamble

So it's time for an update...

My initial measurements must have been off, since the Grand Prix dash is about 1.5" too wide. This kinda sucks, but I have decided on my solution.

Here is my solution



I will cut the passenger half of the Grand Prix Dash off. Done.

OK, so that is the easy way out, but it makes the most sense to me at this point, and here are my reasons...

1. There was damage to the dash from the airbag being deployed that would have needed to be repaired anyway
2. I never had the passenger air bag cover, so I would have to make one anyway
3. Now that I have all that extra room on the passenger side, I get to teach myself how to fiberglass

The project is growing.

Note: My car is still in griving condition

Ok, so here are the events that led up to my cutting in half of the Grand Prix Dash...

First, I finished pulling out the stock dash that I had in the car...




I then set the Grand Prix dash about where it should be, only to find that it stuck out too far...





I thought I could fix the problem by cutting a decent sized strip off the back...



After putting the dash back in, I found that it was going to be too wide, so this is where it strted to get interesting.

So here is what I've done now...

Drew a line where I was going to cut...


Then cut the thing in half


I then began the process of mounting the half Grand Prix dash to the donor fiero dash

This part with some basic nuts and bolts...


And this part with some toggle bolts...




I ended up using some pieces that I cut off the donor fiero dash to fill the gaps where I was putting the toggle bolts. The plastic with foam attached worked great for filling the angled gaps, this can be seen in the above pics.

I then mounted the Fiero dash using all the existing stock mounting points


I then mounted the guage cluster, reconnected the wiring, put the shifter back in, reconnected the HVAC controls, and the car is drivable again.



I still need to modify all the ductwork, and make mounting points for the switches, radio, HVAC, and aux guages. For now though, the defroster works and the car drives, so I'll still be able to make it to work tomorrow.

holy moly!
it looks great
how much do you drive it if its a dd. do you have another car to get to work if you need to wait on a part ?
lookin good. many people have problems with dash swaps so they dont want to do them.man you must be really committed
keep us posted.

Here is a photo of a Grand Prix dash in a Fiero that might help you.

im keeping an eye on this and i like what i see so far, if you decide against using the center console i want it, im just a hop skip and a jump away, after you get this completed i might have to see it at a fiero meeting, i will have my crappy looking 3800 at some of them im sure

btw i like the coon hunter 5000, that should be your new name, but it might be considered a bit racist :P

[This message has been edited by vamper (edited 10-08-2008).]

Don't think I would've cut the dash like that. I think as was stated above, you need to ditch the Fiero dash completely. I know I couldn't fit the Fiero dash behind my 3000GT dash either. And your ductwork should prove interesting.

I am trrying to understand what you are trying to do......reinvent the wheel by giving yourself a lot of work did you measure the dash before you decided to mount it,may be that is your problem and joining them together will not look good because of the 80's and 90's styling are waaay opposite.

Do yourself a favour and install a firebird dash that has been done several times with positive results instead of what you are doing ..........just being real.

I appreciate the feedback. The 'CoonHunter5000" was written on the donor dash when I got it. This is only an early step in the interior build which should hopefully spread through the rest of the car. Sorry, but I'm already on working on the center console. I intend on piecing the other half of the Grand Prix dash in the passenger side, if not just using it to make a mold and make a custom passenger area that fits my liking (already looking at lcd's online). The entire Fiero dash will be hidden, so the CoonHunter5000 will eventually be buried. The custom ductwork it going to be tricky, but I already have been playing with my secret weapon to tackle that challenge. I'm more concerned about working on mounting the stereo and switches than the duct work, believe it or not. That however may be a gross underestimate on my part though.

And gunslinger, I appreciate your concern. The idea of trying to combine 80's and 90's style never crossed my mind. I agree with you that that would look horrible.

Following Sourmug's Decklid Vent Build has given me the confidence to try my hand at using fiberglass, so after I finish up with the drivers side that is currently up, it maky end up being made from scratch from there.

And the best news, I still have yet to alter anything on my car, so I still have my bailout if need be, though I think i'm going to just keep pushing on from here

Editted for grammar (I are bad at english)

[This message has been edited by Freeman (edited 10-09-2008).]

quote Originally posted by Freeman: After putting the dash back in, I found that it was going to be too wide, so this is where it strted to get interesting.

...this is odd, since this swap has been done without cutting it in half (maybe this is due to you installing it over the FIero dash?) - https://www.fiero.nl/forum/Forum2/HTML/095420.html