axle gears

[frickenbored]

I'm looking to upgrade my axle gears but i'm not sure what to go up to.

its a 1988 k5 with a 383 and th400 and 31" tires.  right now i'm running 3.73 gears but i feel like the truck could be a lot more torque-y.  I'm thinking about going with 4.56 gears.  top speed is not really a concern for me, I just want something thats going to easily break my tires loose when i stomp the gas.  the 3.73's are pretty dissapointing.  The truck never sees the highway but i do drive it around town quite a bit.

[beastie_3]

you should be able to break loose the tires, I can with my 350, 3.73 and 33s...

[frickenbored]

I think what the problem is, is that i have a 3800 stall torque converter, don't ask why i have that.

[beastie_3]

I wont...but someone else will...

(i just opened the door!)

[Blazin]

Okay. Why don't you replace with a different converter. They run $100 maybe $200. Thats allot cheaper, and in my opinion less work than swapping two gear sets!

[frickenbored]

i plan on swaping the converter, i was still just wondering if anyone has run 4.56 with 31's, because Id still like to try it out.  eventually i'm getting 35" tires so i'll need the gears anyway.

[Irish_Alley]

i able to spin my 38s with only 4.10s I know my 94 has higher than 4.10 possibly 3.73 and she will spin her 30’s with only a 4.3

[figure843]

I have 38.5's with 3.73 gears on my 88 k5 with a 350/700r4/np208 and i don't have a problem turning them. Off road of course. I just can't use overdrive.

[frickenbored]

dont get me wrong my truck spins the tires right now with pretty much no problem, I'm just looking for even more torque.

[frickenbored]

well i installed the 4.56 ring and pinion in the rear axle today and wow!  Its like a whole new truck, everything works perfectly together.  I have great low end torque and i still have good high end speed.  I'm turnin around 3500 rpm at 60mph but that truck almost never sees highway speed.  Actually what suprised me was at 45mph with 3.75 gears i was around 3000 rpm but with the 4.56 gears at 45mph i'm at around 2300 rpm, doesn't really make sense but thats how it is, maybe it has something to do with the torque converter because when I bought the converter it came with a paper that said 4.10 or higher axle gears are recommended.

Anyway I couldn't be happier with the 4.56, super amounts of torque, good speed, and i don't have to be at 2500 rpm to get it to move from a dead stop anymore.  The truck just melts the tires now, half throttle will spin the tires on dry pavement and on gravel roads the truck will go sideways at half throttle. 

[big bear]

congrats man. im glad that it worked out for ya.

[Psycho71]

Yeah, the stall of that converter was causing the rpm anomalies at speed.

Glad it worked for ya. I'm running 35's and will be doing a gear swap before long. From 3.73's to 4.56's (probably).

[frickenbored]

thanks guys, Ill still have to swap out that converter when i eventually get my lift and tires or ill just have the same problem as before but thats another day.  Now i can't wait to get my 4.56's for the front.