Junkyard Find: 1986 Pontiac Fiero SE
The Pontiac Fiero was a frequent junkyard sighting up until about a decade ago, but now they’re quite rare. So far in this series, we have seen this excessively yellow ’86, this ’88 Formula, and now today’s Iron Duke-powered ’86.
The SE was the second-to-top Fiero trim level for ’86, and it came with aluminum wheels and a black “aero package.”
Unfortunately, the SE didn’t come standard with the 140-horsepower 2.8-liter V6. Instead, the gnashy, rattly, shaky 2.5-liter pushrod Iron Duke four-cylinder offered 92 horses.
You were in the danger zone when you revved the Duke to 4,500 rpm. Meanwhile, the ’86 Toyota MR2 came with a 112-horsepower 1.6-liter engine, weighed 2,282 pounds (versus the Fiero’s 2,499 pounds), and sold for $11,298 (versus the Fiero’s $10,595). On top of that, the ’86 Honda CRX Si listed for $8,279 (though you’d probably end up paying a lot more than that), weighed a mere 1,954 pounds and packed 91 high-revving horses in its 1.5-liter engine.
Did any affordable sporty cars of the 1980s escape the decade without an application of this horrible purple window film?
The Fiero keeps its fuel tank in this tall central chassis spine, and the coolant lines live in channels on the other sides of the seats. This put the Fiero driver deep in a trough.
I was in college in Southern California around this time, and I don’t recall seeing a single Fiero in the campus parking lots. Plenty of shiny new Volkswagen GTIs, Fox Mustangs, and Honda CRXs, of course, but no Fieros. Maybe things were different in the Midwest.
Strangely, no mention of the Iron Duke in this ad.
[Image: © 2016 Murilee Martin/The Truth About Cars]
Murilee Martin is the pen name of Phil Greden, a writer who has lived in Minnesota, California, Georgia and (now) Colorado. He has toiled at copywriting, technical writing, junkmail writing, fiction writing and now automotive writing. He has owned many terrible vehicles and some good ones. He spends a great deal of time in self-service junkyards. These days, he writes for publications including Autoweek, Autoblog, Hagerty, The Truth About Cars and Capital One.
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Let's all try to get along. Everyone has a point... AIDS was not trivial...but if 50 million have died of malaria since DDT was banned, and we can't quantify the benefit (and we probably can't), THAT is worse. Reagan made people feel good again, yes. He also PRESIDED OVER an era in which debt on many levels increased to levels that (till then) had been unprecedented--public and private. This paved the way for where we are. Yet, he Reagan had common sense. He actually talked to the Soviets, and did NOT provoke them. HE did not cause the massive deficits that ran up the debt--but he was not entirely innocent. The Democratic Congress ran up entitlements. Reagan wanted to cut taxes and increase defense (which contributed to the end of the Cold War), and to get enough Dem support, he let the Dems spend on THEIR priorities. Key words...SPEND! As for Carter, I remember the malaise era...1979, peak malaise! US hostages in Iran, the aborted rescue debacle, the spike in gas prices that year. Later, in the 80s, I learned that "Jimmuh" was the choice of the 'establishment'--so I liked him even less. Mr. Human Rights lifted the lame US arms embargo on Turkey, which had illegally attacked Cyprus, and in which 7 Americans simply...vanished. Carter = LOSER!!! And yet, now, looking back, Carter also had a few good points. The biggest was, to try to reduce energy use in particular, and live within our means in general. That didn't play well with the voters then. But now we seem overextended...to me at least. As for the Fiero--like many good "new" GM ideas, it wasn't ready for prime time at lauch (Corvair--rear sway bar, Vega, bad engine & rust, X-car...) but at the end of it's life, the Fiero V6 5-spd was a terrific car by the standards of 1988! And while Carter's malaise era winners were....full-size GM cars and Ford's Fox Fairmonts, Reagan presided over the renaissance of good cars people could afford---starting with the 82 Ford's Fox Mustang GT, the PA-made 83 Rabbit GTI, and (sadly for GM) many imports (Honda Civics, the Toyota Supra and MR2), the 82 Accord, the 86 Taurus.....
Speaking of the purple window tint, I had an old timer tell me it was the high levels of ammonia in window cleaner that did the black to purple change, maybe he was wrong but I've never used any window cleaner since on tinted windows. R.i.p lil mid engine buddy