Gears, making the difference

[MountainMoparRobin]

I can only say until you try changing them will you fully understand just what a difference they make, I went from 3:23's /440 to the 3:55's and passing gear will knock your head against the rear window, they aren't the perfect setup for my engine, for you still have a slow spot, however the difference is big, the 1/4 mile E.T. is going to be better by at least 1/2 second.

[Hobcobble]

I can only say until you try changing them will you fully understand just what a difference they make, I went from 3:23's /440 to the 3:55's and passing gear will knock your head against the rear window, they aren't the perfect setup for my engine, for you still have a slow spot, however the difference is big, the 1/4 mile E.T. is going to be better by at least 1/2 second.

I'm doing the same switch in my '67 Coronet R/T.
Hopefully, the engine build will be wrapping up
sometime this Summer.
John

[MountainMoparRobin]

I think you'll really like the difference, as far as get up and going, when you need to move out, I'm thinking the 3:91's would be even better, just wouldn't be very effiecent driving long distance

[Hobcobble]

I think you'll really like the difference, as far as get up and going, when you need to move out, I'm thinking the 3:91's would be even better, just wouldn't be very effiecent driving long distance

Yeah..... I thought about 3.91s. A friend who owns a '68 GTX [440]
ran them for a while and couldn't take them any longer so he swapped
in 3.55s. Another friend who owns a '69 Road Runner [383] went from
3.23s to 3.91s and now is in the process of putting in a 3.55 chunk.
Both guys said that, after the initial "fun" had worn off, the engine
revs got to them. I think that if I was just cruising around a city the
3.91 gear would be OK but I do a good bit of back road driving. Another
idea I have is to have a 3.73 gear put into my carrier. That is basically
splitting the difference between the 3.55 & 3.91.

Another good friend of mine has a '67 Mustang GT [390 4spd]. He recently
put 4.30s in it. I'm wondering how long it'll be until he goes crazy?
John

[runcharger]

I don't find a lot of difference from 3.23 to 3.55 and I usually prefer the 3.23 for fuel mileage highway burning at 70MPH plus. However going from 3.23 to 3.91 or 4.10 is a huge difference.
I ran 4.56 in my Hemi Challenger in the 70's and that was a lot of fun on the street with the automatic. 1st gear would have been a waste if it was a 4 speed though.
Nowadays I run 3.23 in the 383 Sweptline so I can drive it on the highway and my Hemi Coronet has 3.23s as well, in the Coronet I stroked the engine to 472in and I find the stroker crank and 3.23 gears is the perfect combo for street performance and highway capability.

Sheldon

[MountainMoparRobin]

I don't find a lot of difference from 3.23 to 3.55 and I usually prefer the 3.23 for fuel mileage highway burning at 70MPH plus. However going from 3.23 to 3.91 or 4.10 is a huge difference.
I ran 4.56 in my Hemi Challenger in the 70's and that was a lot of fun on the street with the automatic. 1st gear would have been a waste if it was a 4 speed though.
Nowadays I run 3.23 in the 383 Sweptline so I can drive it on the highway and my Hemi Coronet has 3.23s as well, in the Coronet I stroked the engine to 472in and I find the stroker crank and 3.23 gears is the perfect combo for street performance and highway capability.

Sheldon

Nice Car!

I ran 3:23's for 21 yrs with the 440, and 60-100 mph was great, but lower speeds the enging really didn't keep the carbon burned out, since putting in the 3:55's I can notice a big difference in the low end performance and now actually can enjoy the motor doing more of what I'm limited to doing with high gas prices, cruise shorter distance, I now feel the power band range droped down to 40-??, I plan on doing time on the track, curving roads, stop light to stop light, where it took the upper range of 2nd gear to kick @#% has now moved down to shuttin down challenges at the stop light to 45-50 mph so they can smell "premium gas" fumes from my tail pipes, 2800 rpms is 65mph, so if I'm driving the highway I can get my best gas mileage of 10 mpg, yes I will build it more, its all about fun

[digdoug]

I'm glad you like your new gears,Robin. The 3.55s are perfect for your truck. I don't feel so bad about my 67 crew cab's mileage now. I did a 400 ml road trip this weekend and did a little experiment. On the way up I drove in fifth(OD) at 65-70 mph(@2100rpm). I got 10 mpg. On the way back I drove in 4th(direct)(@2800rpm) at 55-60.I got 10 mpg.

[MountainMoparRobin]

It Seems the big Blocks will only give ya what they want if it wasn't for the adrenaline rush, I may have went with a small block


---

[rogerr]

The problem is you need more gears, not just a lower one.

On a manual setup, the top gear should be 1:1 and you should select the rear end ratio for highway driving, and then get the gears low enough to launch or pull what you want. That is easier said than done because outside of high dollar race transmissions you can't get whatever gears you want for a transmission. A couple of transmissions have optional gears but that's it. Getting a first that's low enough is a big problem for a really tall rearend.

The overdrive is a solution. Not the BEST solution but a fair one.

People just didn't demand the highway economy and the hard launch we do now thirty or forty years ago.

When I had my 472 Cad powered Camaro...yeah..I had one of the first Doug Nash Engineering five speeds. That was when American cars were all four speeds, a five speed was a Toyota or BMW thing, except a school bus. That was a revelation. I had a lower overall first AND good highway mileage. With no emissions stuff at all I was getting 19 mpg at a steady 60 mph. With 60 series tires. Then I got transferred to California and sold it as I knew it could never pass smog out there.


Five and six speed Richmond Gear manuals and the 4 speed TorqueFlite or an Allison five speed are the way to go if you can swing it.