hi,
im going to be going from 2.77s to 3.73s in my BW rear. weve never done a gear swap but we are the kind that feel youre never gonna learn unless you do it yourself! so we want to do it ourselves but we need a good good write up that explains in depth the procedure, things to check and double check etc. anyone know of a good place to find this? online or a book? thanks alot!!!
~matt

 

should be in any good repair manual, try a search of this site and you'll pick up some good info and try www.sethirdgen.org

 

Just an FYI, youll need a different series carrier to go from 2.77 to 3.77 in the BW.

 

im aware of that, unfortunately! drives the price up considerably!lol

ede or others, what is considered a good shop manual? thanks for the info, ill check out that site!

 

Yeah my total nine bolt investment is going to be close to $1300. The best shop manual to use is the GM shop manual used at dealerships, borrow one or find a used one you can buy. (EBAY?) You could always pay a differential shop to do it, thats what Im doing. Ive built and set up a ten bolt before, but I dont trust myself with an $1000 setup, better safe than sorry.

 

yeah im a bit "nervous" but its something i really want to do. maybe ill find a junkyard 10 bolt for a few bucks and practice on that.

 

motor or chiltons make good manuals, helms is about the best i believe. you can pratice on the rear you have all you want, unless you actually intend to run your pratice rear. setting up gears really isn't that hard to do, but it involve tools and pratices the are not used by most people. if you have to go out and buy all the tools at once you're looking at a pretty good investment, but for me i'm always looking for reasons to buy more tools.

 

the needed tools should be outlined in the helms manual correct?
about how long do you think a first time gear swap will take to do correctly?

 

i wish ron terry was here, he has the complete list of tools. basically you'll need a press ,bearing seperator, gear pullers ,0-1 mike or dial caliper, pinion setting tool or 2-3 depth mike and somethng to act as a datum surface to set the depth mike on, "special tool" to hold the pinion yoke, in/lb dial type torque wrench, ft/lb torque wrench, indicator and mag base. i made my datum tool from 1x.5 aluminum bar stock (works for all gm rears near as i can tell, and made my pinion yoke holding tool from .25x3x40 bar stock, used hole saws to make access holes for socket. my special tool is now drilled for several bolt patterns on pinion yokes. you also need marking compound, but that should come with the gears. i', pretty slow and careful because i don't do it every day, figure 3-4 hours. i prefer the rear out of the car too, i ithnk you'd save time pulling the rear. unbolt the backing plates and leave all the brake system in place.

 

thanks ede for the list!
i was planning to remove the rear. maybe later on today ill go get the helms manual and start reading up about it.