hey everyone,, I have a few questions.. If I put 3:73 gears in my stock 96 z28 would that make a big difference in pickup,, and sound... I want that throaty sound,, and also what are my stock specs on gears and cams and transmission if anyone knows please let me know,,,I have an auto trans,,

 

I am contemplating putting new gears in my car i am probably going to go with 3.42's. The gears will not affect the sound of your exhaust. What gears do you have now?

 

actually.. the gears DO affect your exhaust sound. It's most noticable in an aftermarket exhaust system.
My car with the 2.73 gears sounded great... after I installed my 3.73 gears, the exhaust wasn't as loud... or throaty, but seemed to have more bass though.

The reason of course is that I now cruise around at a higher rpm, thus the air flows a little smoother at that higher rpm.
Of course, I lost about 50 mph to the tank of gas. And it is HELL in turns cause my car shifts into 2nd when turning and it is REAL HELL on a lightly snow covered highway. Nothin like having the backend come loose every.. time.. the.. car.. shifts.. into.. 2nd. EGADS!

 

I would think that you probably either have 2.73 rear gears or 3.23 rear gears. I'm not sure about the stock cam specs. and the tranny ratios.

And as CamaroGuy22 said, gears will not give you a throaty exhaust sound. For a different sound you need to look into exhaust modifications, be it a cat back, true duals, or whatever.

http://web.camaross.com/forums/showt...hreadid=132316
Check this out and see if it helps you figure out which rear gears you had.

Hope this helps. ---J.Bird

 

yes,, that helps,, I have 3.23 gears in my stock 96 z28 auto trans
thanks very much

 

http://www.f-body.org/gears/

nuff said

 

Acording to that chart i woudl never hit 4th gear lol, with 2.73's it says 4th gear is 158

 

I have a manual transmission, so my gas mileage will be affected differently, but going from 3.42 to 4.10s didn't take away any mileage so long as I don't gun it anywhere, as soon as I get on it, it goes down faster than with the old gears, I also stay around the same RPM as before, which means driving a bit slower, but I think it has helped retain mileage, I check my mileage evry tankfull, so its not just hearsay. As far as sound it doesn't make it any louder, but in a way it seems louder, with my old gears, the RPMs would rise pretty slow, now they just rev right into the upper RPMS in no time, basically an engine way up there will scream more than one barely moving, so in a way it does sound louder even if its not