Let us now talk about the first year of the Fiero, 1984. Early in Fiero production, understeer as a major problem. It was not fixed until the last minute when engineer’s changed the suspension to that of a Chevette’s. It was inexpensive and offered enough power to keep understeer down. This new suspension lowered production costs. This leads us to a reason the Fiero was unsuccessful. The reason is the way the plants were designed. Each plant was strictly for Fiero’s, due to the new age space frame design. This hurt them because when the Fiero became unprofitable, they had to shut down the entire plant. The Buick Reatta also had the same problem. The design of the plants did do one thing right, called mill-and-drill. Mill-and-Drill is a process designed specifically for the Fiero. Here is how it worked: First, a Gillman mill-an-drill machine (2. 5 stories) would drill holes in the steel space frame, and then the body panels would be bolted on using the holes. There were 39 holes drilled into the frame, and the machine could turn out 30 space frames in an hour. This was a very fast and efficient way of manufacturing the Fiero.