The Pontiac Firefly is a piece of General Motors’ past that some readers of this site may have never even heard of. The Firefly was sold exclusively in Canada (and the Middle East, oddly enough) and was essentially just a rebadged version of the Suzuki Cultus.
The Firefly is obscure to begin with, but the one your looking at is particularly noteworthy. This car, which was recently listed for sale on Bring-A-Trailer, is hiding a 350 cu. in. Chevrolet V8 under its hood and has been converted to rear-wheel drive, transforming it from a limpwristed econobox into a mean miniature muscle car.
Not only is it packing a 350, the V8 has also been upgraded with ported cylinder heads, an aftermarket camshaft and a reprogrammed factory ECU with an aftermarket chip. Power is sent through a TH350 three-speed automatic transmission to a Detroit TrueTrac differential with 2.73:1 gears. The rear axle has also been lifted from a 1988 Pontiac Firebird.
Whoever built this pocket-sized hot rod cared about making it nice to drive, too, installing polyurethane suspension bushings and frame strengthening additions. It also has a roll cage (good for chassis stiffness AND safety) and fixed bucket seats. The tachometer and reverse light don’t work, unfortunately, and the car also has some driveline vibration at speed.
This looks to be a clean and well thought out build, but bidding is already at $3,500 and there’s still four days left in the auction on Bring-A-Trailer, so it may end selling for a bit more than it’s worth. Then again, it would be quite pricy and time consuming to build something like from scratch.
Check out the listing at this link for additional information and photos on this strange V8-swapped 1987 Pontiac Firefly.
Source: Bring-A-Trailer via Carscoops
Photos via Bring-A-Trailer
Comments
Fine. I’ll say it. The TA rims are actually kinda nice on it.
The wheels look good too
Chevrolet should take this as a hint.. build a Police cruiser using the 2019 Chevrolet Blazer equipped with the 460 hp 6.2L V8 then offer the Blazer as the SS to everyone else.
Back in the day, also the 80’s, someone was running a Chevy Chevette with a Big Block Chevy in it at OCIR. The thing was quick, anyone else remember OCIR or that light blue Chevette?
Want a taster? though it’s not OCIR!
https://youtu.be/js2bcG21Ayo?t=28
In my opinion; the reason 4 the vibration in the driveline is: the female slot 4 the driveline to the driveline end spline gear is loose! the diameter of the driveshaft needs to have tight clearance. the internal yoke of the rear end also needs NO play-space in operation! (2 drive it on the street it needs ALL visible lights to function)!