3.4L DOHC Fiero Engine Swap Guide

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At this point you can remove the engine and transmission from the cradle.  Once the engine and transmission are off the cradle, you can clean and paint the cradle as you see necessary.

The next step is to install the flywheel and clutch assembly onto the 3.4 DOHC engine.  Note that you must use a non-counterbalanced flywheel with the 3.4 DOHC engine.  The 88 Fiero 2.8L should have the correct one, most earlier 2.8's used a counterbalanced flywheel.  I ordered a new flywheel for the 3.4 DOHC engine from GM, the part number is: 10162024.  You will also need 6 new flywheel bolts: 476576, and 6 new pressure plate bolts: 24571667.  Install parts and torque fasteners to factory specifications.

Once your clutch is aligned and all of your parts installed and torqued to factory specs, you can install the transmission.

After your transmission is mated to the engine, you can begin the mock-up of the powertrain mounting to the cradle.  In my case, I decided to use special mounts to lower the engine/transmission in relation to the cradle to give me better engine compartment clearance.  You don't have to do it this way which means you can use the stock Fiero 2.8L mounts, however this may make things more difficult later on in the swap.

I used the stock Fiero mount brackets and burned off the rubber mount part and drilled holes in the metal to accommodate a 75 Dodge Truck 318 V8 mount.  (NOTE: The 79 Dodge Truck 318V8 mounts have a safety catch and are preferred to be used in any location where the mount would see a pulling-apart force)  There are also some modifications you will need to perform to the cradle and mount brackets to get everything to line up and mount properly.

For the front crank bracket, it will need to be trimmed and redrilled to work on the 3.4 DOHC engine and with the Dodge truck mount.

For the rear transmission mount, you may have to notch out the cradle to make room for the Dodge truck mount.  Make sure you cut the hole big enough to allow the mount to slide a little.  This will help when lining up and leveling the powertrain later.

Using the Dodge truck mounts should allow you to get the oil pan of the 3.4 DOHC engine to sit flat on the same plane as the bottom of the cradle.  Setting the engine/trans any lower would put the oil pan below the bottom plane of the cradle which could spell trouble if you bottomed out the car on the road or ran over something.  I also had to massage a few areas of the cradle where the transmission was touching it so to not allow any metal-to-metal contact.  I think this is about as low as one can set this powertrain on a Fiero cradle.  There is still plenty of room for CV axle movement despite how low the powertrain sits.

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