Anybody know anything about em?

I had a 1989 with the 5.0 TPI engine and 5 speed.

Yeah, A bit. What'* your question?

If its the LO3 TBI 305 (round air cleaner), its garbage and don't buy it. They are as slow as the 3.1 in the camaro, and I had nothing but problems with mine. I ended up junking it. If it'* the TPI 305, they are a good engine. Nice and reliable.

A friend of mine had a TBI 305 in a TA that was a real dog until he scrapped the injection and put an Edelbrock intake and a Holley 600 on it. It ran pretty good after that. He sold it for more than he paid for it.

might be looking at a 5.0 TPI with a 4 auto....It would be a project car.

Ignore the engine and just look at the condition of the sheetmetal for rust, alignment, and any tell-tales of damage/repair. (Look under the rocker panels, behind the interior trim in the hatch area, and in the gaps in the subframes for wrinkles, filler, different paint color...anything that indicates the body had been in a accident. On a hard top car, look for cracks and rust where the rear piller meets the roof. On a T-Top car, check for rust in the T bar between the panels.

If the body and subframes are sound, you got a winner.

The 305 TPI isn't bad. Lottsa stuff you can do with it. (including puting a 350 crate motor in it'* place with the TPI for induction. The TPI system is a torque monster. If you want all out HP, then start thinking of using the LT1 system. Best ECM available for dicking with the motor is a Haltech. It'* really designed for the Holden cars down-under, but it will drive all maner of batch fired injection. Does require re-pinning the harness at the ECM.

Note: Cars with tags "RS" did not come with TPI. They came with TBI or a Q-Jet. If you have a TPI car that'* an RS, then somebody probably swapped motors. If it is running OK and not coding out, then don't sweat it, they probably have it installed correctly (It'* not that hard to play musical induction systems on the F-Body...GM designed the car to take any of the corporate powerplants from the 2.5L Iron Duke to the BBC. I've even seen a 3rd gen with a Straight 6 in it...why the owner decided to do it is beyond me, but the motor fit without any surgery.

Tranny will be the THM700R4 (aka the 4L60). Pretty durable. Not much needed save for a shift kit to firm up the shift points. Easy to replace if it goes kuputz. The tailshaft is the only F-Body unique part on it, and it unbolts easily.

Rear axle is probably a non-posi 10 bolt with a 2 series gear ratio. Not great, but not bad either. Scare up any of the 60 degree V6 cars in a junkyard and you'll get a 3 series axle that will bolt right up (Typically with 3.23 gears) and the car will be really peppy off the line, snag the Speedo gears from the same car . Avoid the Borg-Warner 9-bolt axles. Yeah, they got disk brakes, but they are also VERY expensive to overhaul.

Last thought: First mod to the car should be a pair of South Side Machine sub-frame connectors welded into the body. They get full welds at the sub-frames and stitch welded to the rocker panels. Car will be come indestructable after that. (I can still jack up the entire side of the car on my '87 and still open the doors...they make the car'* body that stiff.)

What'* stopping you? There are plenty out there and make really fun toys. Freind of mine in Kissimmee was in love with his restored '72 Monte Carlo. Drove it to Old Town every weekend. But even he just picked up a '86 IROC as a toy to go blasting around in.

Yeah, they aren't as flashy as the 1st Gens, 4th Gens and Vettes, but as they are slowly becomming classics in their own right.