Two Big Questions for you hardcore IDIers

[BigNick]

I just found out my truck has a 3.55 rear end. This is not good at all, as I wanted to tow a 5th wheel....

How easy is it to swap out the final drive for a 4.10?

the second thing....


I just picked up a nearly-perfect bed for my truck. It's off a Centurion, and if I don't paint it to match, it will look really goofy. However, if I don't paint it to match, I'll save myself a ton of money.... like... $2200 in bodywork. Which way should I go...?

 

[1994IDI]

Nick; There's not an easy answer, but I'll see if I can help a little bit.

Changing the rear gears will depend on how mechanically incline you are. It is a very involved job, that is very time consuming to do correctly from what I've picked up from other members here although I've never done it myself. The other difficulty with that is that, since you have 4 wheel drive, if you change the rear axle ratio then you will need to change the gears in the front as well. Otherwise, when you're in 4x4, your tires will be trying to spin at different speeds, causing carnage.

As for the bodywork, that's strictly a personal decision in my opinion. Ask yourself how much you like the truck, how long you plan to keep the truck, and is it worth the $2200 to you.

Someone else will chime in with the specifics of the differential job. Good luck.

 

[88beast]

if you get a whole mew front piece (pumpkin) then bolt unbolt all shimmed and ready to go
can be had at a junkyard cheap if youre doing the gears only and never have swapped gears leave it to a pro or theyll have a list of issues

 

[Exekiel69]

Setting the ring and pinion is not hard, but it is very involved if You want to do it right. You'll have to get a complete bearing kit (comes all together in a box) You need a press and a bearing puller then You don't want to damage Your old bearings pull them in one piece and wear the inner cup so it will slide in and out easy clean them and start setting the ring and pinion with the new ring (can be a bit of trouble to set it right on the carrier) and pinion You got so You have close enough measurements to press You new bearings IN. Not complicated but involved and time consuming, I would go with the rest here and buy a good 4.11 rear (and front in Your case) and slap it in there.

 

[subway]

if you dont know how to change out gears using a press and some dial indicators to set shims you are better off swapping the whole rear end out.

cant help you much on the paint since i am not a body man but you could probubly do it yourself MUCH cheaper if you have the time and willingness to learn.

 

[fields_mj]

I was in the opisite boat last year. My truck had 4.10 and I wanted 3.55. Even with 4,000 lbs of fire wood in the back and trying to manouver through the woods, I don't miss those 4.10s at all. Now if I were pulling a 5th wheel ALL the time, it might be a different story. I'd hook up and pull it a few times and see what you think. I think the only thing you're really going to notice is when you start off in 1st gear. As far as the highway goes, worse case you leave it in 4th gear. I've noticed that there was only a difference of about 200 rpm between my current 4th gear, and 5th gear with the 4.10s. I can get up to 65 on the interstate in 4th gear. I don't do it often, but if I'm having to get up to speed quck to merge with traffic, I don't think twice about it. Now if you bought an automatic, oops... That's just my 2 bits though.

As far as changing the gears, I was able to buy a used center chunk for a D50 front axle with 3.55 gears off e-bay and it was about $100 delivered to my door. I also bought a set of 3.55 ring and pinion gears for the rear (Stearling 10.25) for about $35 delivered to my door. I had thought about doing the work myself, but decided that I just didn't have the time. So then I thought that I'd have the rear installed, and do the front myself. Then I lost the pinion bearing on my orig pumpkin on Jan 1st, so that accelerated my time line a lot and shot the idea of me doing any of the labor. After screwing around with the mechanic (NAPA shop) that I WAS using who insisted after having my truck for 3 days that a shim kit just wasn't available for my rear end any more. So when I got home with the truck I spent 15 min on the computere and did a search for "Ford 10.25 shim" and up pop's Randy's Ring and Pinion. I picked up the phone (at 6:30 PM on a Friday here in Indiana) called their 1-800 number, and in 15 min I had spent $25 and ordered all the shims I needed which arrived on Tuesday as promised. I then took the truck to a much better shop and dropped $700 for the labor to have everything installed. That also covered some new seals and another new bearing in the mix somewhere. I had quotes as high as $1000 for the labor, but I believe that what I paid was about average. I know that he charges $45 an hour for labor. All in all, if I were you, I would budget $1000 for it. That should cover the labor, parts off e-bay, shims, and any misc stuff that needs replaced along the way.

Don't know if this helps any, but that's what I know.

Mark

 

[Pearl_Diesel]

In my case, I just found a parts truck with 4.10 front and rear gears, and it was the easiest thing i've ever done. I went from a 1990 sterling 10.25/Dana 50 to a 1986 Dana 60/Dana 44HD, all I had to do was get new U bolts, unhook brakes, change yoke in rearend (wouldn't have to if same rearend) and take out the two center hinge bolts in frontend. Took me about an hour to have it all out, and about an hour or so to be back on the road.

 

[Rot Box]

I would just swap in a left side TTB assembly and a different rear axle. Gear setups are a pain in these axles and it will cost you a big chunk of cash to do it the right way. I can't imagine everything you need costing more than $400 from a pick and pull lot.

 

[Clydesdale]

Those were my thoughts.

I went from 4.10 to 3.73 at a net gain of $800 IN my pocket.

By swapping axles around.

 

[BigNick]

F** it, I am just strapping in a turbo..... I can always paint it later, I will just throw on the new bed, weld in the patch kit, and have all the other effed paneling taken care.... my wallet is gonna hurt....

Current price tag to make my truck look 100% again is $4900.

 

[fields_mj]

Ouch! Another 2K and you should be able to have an entire 2nd truck.... that already looks good and has the gears you want.

 

[burtcheca]

How about trading that truck for one that already has the rear ratio you want with somebody that needs the one you have?

I have an '86, 6.9L, T19, 4WD, flat bed, dump, with the king ping to tow goosenecks, or the regular 2" ball for trailers. I'm very happy with everything that truck has but it's too slow because the gears are designed to tow or haul very heavy loads. So when I'm working it's wonderful but when I have to take the highway it takes a lot of time to reach 55 MPH and only does about 12 MPG. My neighbor is always asking me if I want the dump truck he has in exchange for mine. His has a 460 with a 5 speed tranny but it's a gasser and I don't want anything to do again with gas engines. All I have, including my tractor and generator is diesel, only the weed eater, a portable generator and the chain saw are gas.

May be you can find somebody close that will be a good business for both to trade. Just an idea.

Burt.

 

[Diesel_brad]

I just found out my truck has a 3.55 rear end. This is not good at all, as I wanted to tow a 5th wheel....

How easy is it to swap out the final drive for a 4.10?

the second thing....


I just picked up a nearly-perfect bed for my truck. It's off a Centurion, and if I don't paint it to match, it will look really goofy. However, if I don't paint it to match, I'll save myself a ton of money.... like... $2200 in bodywork. Which way should I go...?

I would attempt to tow the 5th wheel. If you dont like how it tows, downshift, that is what 4:10 will feel like. All 4:10s will do is give you bottom end fot take offs and a higher rpm for crusing. If you decide to do a gear swap i would swap rear axles and a front 3rd member. You could possibly get them both for 500 or less. OR you could just buy these http://www.oilburners.net/forums/showthread.php?t=43056 and get rid on the Troublesome TTB all together and get 4:10s

For the bed. If someone is charging you 2200 to paint a bed and put it on you are getting SCREWED. That is about a 1000 job at MOST

 

[crazy4wdracer]

Body Work isn't all that difficult. It just takes time to do it right and make it look good. I have done lots of bodywork on my truck, I enjoy doing it because you can make stuff that looks like $hit in the beginning look really nice in the end. If there is NO possible way for you to do it yourself $2200 is still a ripoff IMO.

As for gears I would just look for a whole different rear end, they can be had cheap around here and you could probably get a front pumpkin cheap as well. Sell your 3:55's and you will just about break even. I like 3:55's better but that's just me.

 

[bike-maker]

I changed from 3.55 gears to 4.10 by buying a parts truck and just swapping out the front and rear ends. Not too hard. If you're going to put a turbo on her, I'd definitely do that first and see how it pulls. Try pulling it with the 3.55's; just don't plan on using 5th gear. My 5er is 31' and about 10,000 pounds, and my truck is NA. Not a speed demon, but it does OK pulling that big of a trailer.