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Classic Cars Classic Cars - Archived Discussions recommend rearend for a 58' chevy pickup project 
10 messages, Last post on Jun 04, 2002 at 12:15 AM
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...one thing that I like about the Mopar 8 3/4 rear end is that the "guts" all come out in one piece, and it's supposedly fairly easy to swap gearsets out. I've never done this swap though, although I'm tempted to try it. I have a 2.76:1 8 3/4 rear end in my '68 Dart right now, but a few years ago, a buddy of mine gave me a Suregrip 3.55 that I've been procrastinating about trying to swap in. Just out of curiosity, are any of those Ford and GM rear-ends of the era similar to the 8 3/4, in that you can just pull the center carrier out in one big chunk and swap another in? There's an overturned '58 Chevy in the woods near my home, and I've noticed that it's the same type of rear end, where you'd just pull everything out the front, so Chevy did have 'em, at one time... |
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Yeah I know what you mean about the 8 3/4. I bought a 3.90 Sure Grip(?) for a '70 Challenger and never got around to installing it (fortunately, that's just too much gear) but it looked really easy. I don't know whether you can just bolt it in or whether you have to shim it. I'm going from memory here but as I recall the ring gear comes out the back on the GM and Ford units and you need to know what you're doing to set one up. One other thing about the ten bolts, there's two different cases, one for everything 3.08 and lower numerically (or maybe it's 3.23) and another for 3.23 (or 3.36) up. Most came with tall gears, especially the automatics. |
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| Your rear end ratio depends on what you want to do. If you are constantly accelerating and not doing hardly any highway, then a "low" ratio may actually improve your fuel mileage and your performance, crazy as it sounds. | |
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Sure, I can see that--you're getting into the powerband quicker, but with minimal freeway miles you're not winding the heck out of the engine. It depends on how much torque you've got. A car with no measureable torque like a Fiat 850 needs a ratio in the 4s, and a four speed that goes from stump puller first to OD fourth. I'm just a little leery of short gears. My MGB had 3.90s (I think, no OD) and it was so unhappy on the freeway I was a moving chicane--even traffic in the slow lane was cutting me off. And that was such a sweet torquey engine I think it could have pulled a 3.55 just fine and been a lot happier on the freeway. Your average Detroit V8 (even the "peaky" ones with peak torque at 3600 rpm) doesn't need help pulling away from a stop sign. I had a '62 Impala SS with a fairly hot 327 (Holley, Edelbrock, headers and some kind of solid lifter cam). Not a great torque-to-weight ratio so the guy I bought it from thought it needed 4.11s. Wrong. Way too much shifting around town, way to much noise and vibration on the freeway. Freeway driving isn't much fun when the engine sounds like it's tearing itself apart at 60 mph. Anyway, with the drivetrain in this '58 Chevy--torquey FI 305 and OD automatic--something like a 3.08 would be fine (and cheap, since everyone wants at least 3.55s). It's a little-known fact that early Mustang V8s came with 2.80s and 3.0s and they're still pretty quick. Something around 3.0 is a good all purpose ratio providing you've got good torque. |
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Thanks for the info. Well now how about the suspension? Any insite to keeping the original rear leaf springs, removing a few, replacing the bushings on the mounts. New mounts and leafs. Four bolt with coil overs. vette rear with coil overs. But with the four bolt or vette rear could I still haul something couple hundred pounds if I had to? |
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| Beats the heck out of me. Personally I wouldn't put much money in the project so I'd stay with leaf springs. IIRC you can rebuild them (re-arch, add leaves, shim) and that's all I'd do. Taking leaves out will soften the ride, adding leaves will handle the extra power better but make the rear end even more skittish than it probably already is. Maybe a spring rebuilder can build springs that're more progressive than the stock leaves. I don't think I'd use solid bushings for your application because of their effect on ride quality. | |
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try here they can custom make a unit to fit the truck. |
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