A little background info first, to get an idea of what I can and cannot do.


At 16 years old, I successfully acquired the family’s 2.8L Firebird and fell in love with the 3rd gens. It wasn’t a powerhouse, but the engine was freshly rebuilt, giving it great response. My close friend just crashed his older Honda Prelude and is looking for a car, I see a 3rd gen Camaro ( 83 z28 ) for sale and advise him to go for it. He snags it ( 305 2 barrels ) and starts modding it out ( ultimately to a 383 ) and my best bud scores a mint 91 Firebird Formula with WS6 package ( 305 TPI ). Lets just say my 2.8 fell behind very quickly to these 2 cars, the formula struck at my heart, being a very big fan of the firebird ( People even nicknamed me Firebird in highschool, and my bud still calls me like that haha ).

Eventually, after a few years in my hands, the 2.8 bird gave out, mostly due to rusted floorpans ( lack of oil treatments for winter by my mother, the original owner ) and it crushed my heart to see her go to the scrapyard.
Years passed and I am reunited with a car that caught my eyes years ago. My old friend’s 91 formula has been sitting unused for a few years in a field ( due to lack of funding, he bought a house at a fairly young age and transitioned to JDM Toyota – Celica GT-Four ) and after about 3-4 years without talking to my bud, we meet at the dragstrip and start chatting up. I ask what became of the Formula, hoping he didn’t scrap her and he tells me it’s still where he left her. I tell him I’m interested in buying it. 2 Days later, myself and my neighbour ( restored a 85 monte carlo SS – lots of GM experience ) go check up the Formula to see if the body and frame are rusted. To our surprise, the body and frame are in excellent condition.

The car
Transmisson is missing ( he rebuilt his 700r4 with about 2 grand worth of performance upgrade and lent it to the 383 camaro, so I’m not getting it )
Engine had trouble in the last few months of usage, limp home mode maybe or something else, it had zero power ( Neighbour says we can fix this – great, was planning to ditch the TPI and go carbed 350, but if we can resurrect the 5.0 TPI I’m going to keep it ) I haven’t touched the 305 TPI in a while, I don’t even remember what it used to do specifically, but I know it wasn’t as powerful as it was.
Brakes are probably dead. I mean seriously, 3 years without moving, I’m expecting jammed brakes.
Suspension is probably shot. I don’t know much about suspension, but I’m putting that on the list of stuff to do.
Trunk lid motor doesn’t work anymore, I’m guessing this is fairly common, mine didn’t work too well either haha.
Exhaust is absolutely dead, rusted all over. Luckily the guy I’m buying it from and another friend of mine started a performance parts company a few years ago, they kept it alive when we lost touch, they recently did a custom stainless steel 3” exhaust on a Precidia and charged about 800$ for the whole thing ( low restriction cat, resonator and muffler etc ) so they’ll be doing the exhaust.
I’m not keeping the tires, he spent about 900$ on great tires a few years back and promised them to my neighbour, he’ll be tossing me random 16” rubbers for the time being. I wasn’t expecting them to be included, considering the price he’s asking for the car.

The situation
I’m 25 years old, currently in 2nd year of college ( Quebec system, 2 years of college before university ) I went through some very bad periods so far in my life, but ever since I went back to school things have been looking up and I want to keep going, setting goals for myself.

The plan
I learned a bit about cars back when we worked on the 383 camaro, but I was always to the side, not really involved in the actual building since it wasn’t my car. I want to learn what I wanted to learn. I have some great mechanics around me ( neighbour, the 383 guy now races a 7 sec skyline – 1/8th mile and the formula owner works at a Toyota dealership ) I don’t want to turn this into a dragstrip monster, but I want to make it mine. I want to learn how to port and polish the important parts, make the engine clean looking ( just polishing and painting ) some small projects. If I can liberate some horsepower out of the 305, that’d be great. I’d like it to be fun to drive. I have located a TH400 transmission for about 450$, but that’s about all I’ve found so far. I’m the kind of guy that prefers waiting a bit longer but getting the better product ( Saved for about 2 months to get my backpack for school cause I wanted a CamelBak BFM lol ) I’d kinda like to restore the interior ( pulling the back seats and carpet, cleaning it up ) and do it all the right way. I might leave the rear seats out, never liked them anyway.

The big problem
As with all students, I’m broke as hell, living with my father and we don’t have a garage to work in. My neighbour won’t mind letting me work in his garage once he cleans it up a bit ( I offered to help obviously ) but the problem is going to be winter. I live in Quebec and we get a LOT of snow and it can get VERY cold ( I’ve seen -51 Celcius, my firebird fired right up ) We have a fairly big yard so I can leave it there, but I want to help minimise the chance of corrosion getting in the car. This is going to be a long term project since I can only afford so much every now and then and am fairly busy with school. The good thing is, I have a very understanding gf and she loves the car. I also have absolutely zero tools, so I’ll have to do most of the work at my neighbour’s place.



The good side
He’s asking me 500$ CND for it and won’t sell to anyone else. I can take my time with the rebuild, because the car hasn’t had a plate in a while, so it will need an inspection to get back on the road. The car is a bit dirty, but it had a brand new paintjob ( cost him over 3 grand ) and was oiled just before being put away. Another good thing is I have been looking for a project like this for about 10 years now and my father is willing to turn this into a ( long awaited ) father and son project. He never does anything besides work and always told me if I found a good shell we’d work on it. The last few I found were complete, but had frame / floorpans rust all over them. I think it would be an amazing bonding experience ( even if 10 years late, it’s never TOO late )

So I have a couple of questions, because as with most posts here, people need something.


How to ensure it can safely sit in my driveway / yard without getting rusted ? I was thinking a tarp underneath and putting it on jackstands, but I’m afraid the stands might sink in the grass or it might make the car sag ? I have a tempo shelter in my shed, but I’ve been told it keeps moisture and will do more harm than good.
How difficult is the project ahead of me ? With very little experience and no clue how a TPI works, is this doable. The answer on this is not as important as my first question, but general thoughts and comments will be helpful.
What mods can I do to her ? I know there is a search function, but when you don’t really know what to look for, it’s kinda hard to search haha.
As a side note, please be exhaustive in your replies, remember I haven’t touched a wrench in about 10 years and forgot about everything I once knew, I’m pretty much a complete noob ( pics help a LOT ). Also I apologize if my English is horrible, it isn’t my first language and I learned on my own. Also I had no idea which forum section to put this under so if it would be better suited elsewhere, I apologize.

I’m reading this board as much as I can, researching data and gathering information based on build threads, I don’t expect to be spoon fed what I should do, but I respect and consider suggestions from people that have more experience than I do. Mostly on the order of things to do, ie changing the TB before it needs to be changed won’t help as much as letting it breathe better.

Alright, you’ve read enough about me and the car, on with pictures ! Yes, it’s very dirty, but a good was and polish will bring her back.





Sincere thanks for going through the trouble of reading this,
Even more for any input,
Martin Saint
Quebec, Canada

 

You can go any way you personally want. I personally am trying my hardest to keep the stock TPI setup. It is frustrating and not cheap, but I know how they are when they are running right. I love a TPI when its dialed in.

My 91 305 TPI sat for 6 years and I had to change the injectors (I went with re-manufactured with test sheet), the fuel pump and filter, new brake pads in the front, fluid changes all around, and new serpentine belt. I paid a garage to do it and it cost me $1K, but if you can do it yourself it would be cheaper.

 

I plan on doing everything on my own, at least as much as possible ( if I need special tools or whatnot I would like to learn to use them, if not I'll let my more knowledgeable friends take over )

From reading around the forum the injectors will probably need replacing, as it seems to be a fairly common problem on the TPIs and the issues explained is similar to what the formula used to do last time I sat in it. I'll be using BOSH III with gasket and o-ring.

How difficult is it to work on the TPI ? I ordered the Haynes manual for 82-92 firebirds from Canadian Tire and hopefull it will have some info on diagnostic or tuning. Is there any insight you could give from working on yours ?

Thanks a lot
- Martin