By Mike Spinelli

The Lamborghini Fiura Will Haunt Your Dreams

It's been a long, arduous three years since V8 Archie kicked off his Pontiac Fiero-based Lamborghini Miura replica project, and hell if he's not all done with it. Risking cries of vehicular blasphemy, we say this thing looks damn good.

The Miura thread on Pennock's Fiero Forum begins in December 2007 as V8 Archie issues his first missive. The commissioned build begins with a donor Fiero GT and a UK-built replicar body waiting in the wings. Archie, owner of Chop Top Fiero in Machesney Park, Illinois, has a long history of squeezing LS V8s into mid-engine Pontiacs. He submits that the drivetrain will be an LS1 w/6-Speed (it ends up as an LS3), not letting on—or perhaps he doesn't know yet—exactly how much work, and to what intensity level this build (and the thread itself) will reach before it's all over in late 2010.

Indeed, V8 Archie's Fiero-based Miura isn't one of those kit-car hack jobs we so often see around here. It's a serious endeavor, and easily one of the most detailed build threads in the history of the oeuvre. We'd suggest pouring a breakfast scotch and delving into it on a day when you've got nothing better to do than, say, watch the cat lick itself. If you're geek enough, this thread delivers.

For the attention-span challenged, here's how the Miura Fiero build progressed in 100X speed.

First it looked like this:

Then it looked like this:

Then this:

This:

First start of LS3

The Lamborghini Fiura Will Haunt Your Dreams

First Test Drive

The Lamborghini Fiura Will Haunt Your Dreams

This:

And finally:

Along the way, Archie and his fans trade ideas for making the faux-Miura as accurate to the original as possible without breaking the budget, and engage in occasional flame wars with passing Fiero buffs.

Whatever side you're on when it comes to replicars, there's no doubt Archie V8 absolutely killed it.