We did the 2.73 to 3.73 gear swap today in my 96z. We did everything to spec, measured it all, torqued, you name it...we did it. our blacklash ended up being 5 thousands of an inch, and after taking the car down the highway and back, we notice a god awful whine. You hear it while accelerating (not too bad) and on the coast side (which is worse) It seems to be MUCH worse at the lower speeds, maybe 20-35 mph, on the coast side. ALso when im coming to a complete stop, it'll whine at me. Did we set enough play between the ring gear and pinion or not enough? We have yet to tear into it again as we are both beat and ready for a nap. If you have any hints or clues please let me know...its getting a bit frustrating.

Thanks.


Oh I think I may of just realized our mistake. I may of been reading the dial indicator wrong. Its a snap on indicator, and my question is, is each notch 1 thousands of an inch or 5 thousands of an inch? I hate feeling stupid.

 

Well, the good thing is, I was readign the indicator incorrectly. Instead of .005 of play i had .0005 of play (was very tight when we opened it today, couldn't feel any play) So we reshimmed it, and it is MUCh better. To those of you running richmonds, does yours whine a bit cruising, and coming to a stop do you hear it pretty well? The whine is still there but not very noticible at any speed until i go to slow down.

We set the backlash at .009. Seemed good for me and was in spec with richmond.

 

Richmonds are supposed to be noisy, last I heard. Glad to hear you got it sorted out.

Oh out of curiousity, is your name Clark? So's mine, I never really meet anyone with my name so its cool, lol.

 

A setting of .0005 is the same as the gears having no backlash at all, way too tight for Richmonds. In fact the noise you heard was probobly closer to a grinding sound and I will bet you could really feel it in the seat of the pants too.

.009 sounds more like the right setting for a Richmond gear and yes they tend to be a little on the noisy side but they are a very strong quality gear. My BL is set to .003" because I have a 2-cut OEM spec gear which is supposed to be real tight.

If you want the quietest gears then go with GM or another OEM spec brand. I have Yukon's in mine, Motive orange box is the next quietest and a tad stronger than OEM. My 4.10's have a slight whisper of whine which is damn good for 4.10's. The 10 bolts are noisy under the thin floored f-bodies.

 

It is my last name :P


As far as motives go, I have a series 2 carrier, and could not find the gears for a series 2 for motives. That was my first choice of gear but was afraid the series 3 style gears wouldnt work with mine.

 

Is it normal for the gears to whine a little louder when turning right? I've noticed this while driving aroudn town...just want to make sure it might be normal. I sure as hell don't feel like tearing into that rear again