Ok so me and my friend were brainstorming last night, and came up with an idea but werent sure if it would work so im asking you guys. heres the deal. right now i have a 91 Z28. I have the stock 10 bolt in it with 2.73 gears and posi. he has his old 10 bolt out of his '85 IROC with 3.42 gears in it that wasnt posi. we were wondering if it was possible to take the POSI carrier and axles out of my rear end, and use the gears and housing from his rear end? is this possible? i know mine is a 2 series and his is a 3 but cant you space the gears or something? it was just an idea so what do you think, will this work to save me some $$$?

 

i beleive i remeber reading on here that the 3.23 up used a different series carrier that the lower gears.

Then again i don't even know what a carrier is tellya the truth so take this with a grain of salt (just heresay).

 

3.42 gears will fit on a 2 series carrier, but you will need a spacer. I think they are around 50 from summit. But it will work, just need a spacer and maybe some longer bolts since the thread contact will be less with the spacer.

 

flaming-ford,

A carrier is just another name for a posi. It's the thing the ring gear and axles bolt too.

 

thanks a bunch

 

Make sure you get the longer ring gear bolts with the spacer. They are pretty much impossible to purchase seperately.

 

yep, both are the 10 bolts, swap everything out shafts spiders, sides and carrier and all

happy swapping

hope you have the tools and know how to set pinion preload and carrier side shims

good luck

 

I have 2 and 3 series open carriers laying around
the size of the spider gears are different.
You will find out when you start messing with it
What will work and what wont.

 

I think some of you are misunderstanding the question. Let me rephrase it....take a 91 posi unit (no gears)and 28 spline axles out of one rear that had 2.73 gear set...... and put it in a 3.42 open 26 spline rear....should be no need to set-up pinion preload,depth and the like...maybe just double check the backlash to see that it hasn't changed from the old open carrier to the posi carrier.

 

Nope, you need to set pinion depth and everything due to casting differences in the differential case, carrier, and gears. they will bolt in yes, but will need to set up the entire rear end.

 

I had 273 open rear I was able to get 342 open
rear and swap rears, they were both drum brakes.

To change the 3 series open to posi there are a few options
the powetrax system allows for you to change the
internals without messing with ring and pinion.
This is especially good if you dont have any experience
with setting up the depth and backlash.

 

the whole point of this swap is to be as cheap as possible, i know about the powertrax thing but my posi is fine, just want a better gear ratio and we have all of these parts available right now for no cost. I guess if it comes down to it we can bolt all the parts in and i take the rear to a pro to set up the pinion depth etc. for me....hopefully it would be cheaper than the $450 they quoted me just to put new gears in. Thanks again for the responses

 

If time isnt a restraint, do it yourself, do some research(plenty of info on TGO here) and you should have no problem doing it, I did my own, been going for almost 2 years now

 

Ahhh that makes sense.... carrier dunno how i never connected that........ Furthest i've ever got top doing anything with a rearend in snapping a pinion on a ford 8.8 and checking the junkyard for a correct gear ratio hehe.