Hows this for a combo 350 horse buick 350, 200r4 aut otrasn and 4:11 gears? Think its a good combo or am wasting my time with the 4:11 gears im trying to use what i have and round out my ride. Also how hard is it to install a 200r4 in a '69 skylark? -chris
OK, this opinion is only worth 1 cent. 4.11 seems too tall to feel right. Probably would never need 1st gear, and still feel like you needed another gear on the highway. Take advantage of the low end torque of the Buick engine and stay in the 3.08 to 3.42 range. :beer Unless of course you are using like 36" tires! ou:
The gearing isn't all that bad, in my opinion. Your driveshaft will be spinning a billion RPM, but your final drive ratio (including overdrive) will be under 3:1. I would probably only go as high as 3.73s, but 4.11s won't be awful. That is, as long as you have enough traction! Your first gear will be VERY steep. -Bob Cunningham
My combo is a BB 3.73s w/200r4. The 3.73s are probably enough for you too. Cruising at 65 is somewhere around 2400 rpm. You'd like the set up for highway driving. Low side may work okay with a 350.
The 200R4 has a .67 overdrive, so 4.11 X .67 = 2.75., about 2100 @ 60 MPH. 3.73 X .67 = 2.49, about 2000 RPM @ 60 MPH. The 200R4 also has a 2.75 first gear, that will give some great low end, prolly too much, won't do much for our traction problems.
Great feedback Any thoughts on how to hook up the 200r4 to my '69 skylark? Ok so 4:11 is to high with the 200r4. Im trying to think up a combo that will make for a "reasonable" cruiser down to Wildwood and back and not leave my ears ringin but I want to be able to still get ass end rollin. I also have a 9" open rear with disc brakes, think its worth the trouble of building to specs for a posi that streetable? Personally Id love a 3:08 and ill keep my turbo 350. But that overdrive would sure be a nice cruiser. -Chris
I have 4.11 gears with the 200r4 and it is great. The trans shifts very quickly thru 1st at part throttle so it dosen't seem too low. Runs 2100-2200rpm at 65mph with the lock-up. After installing the 200r4 with the stock gears(2.73 in '65) my 300 ran too slow, anything under 70 mph locked up had little response, so I picked 4.11 based on the stock gearing to get the rpm's that were as close to orginal as possible. Alex
The Inner Sancdom While I like cruising along listening to my car running, I hate the after effects of my ears ringing. How are those gears for cruisin down the highway, I don't like the idea of Dynamating the heck out of my trunk and floor. -Chris P.S.-Did I mention I dont like Dynamat?
After the installing the gears and a new driveshaft it was noisy, I told the guys at the shop and they said it will always be noisy with low gears. Most of the noise occurred at a certain speed so I looked the service manual about drivetrain noise and found that the is was called "car boom" and is due to a bent or out of balance driveshaft. After balanceing the drive shaft on the car it is much quieter- not as quiet as the old drivshaft as it was a tube over tube orginally. I spent a lot of time on my stereo system and was not going to let drivetrain noise ruin it. Alex
My combination is 3:73 with 200r4, 462 stage 1, 413 cam. I have to turn the lockup off unless I am going to be on the highaway because motor does not like to pull that much gear below 2000 rpm. I have to watch out for a 4 to 1 downshift at 40 to 45 mph because all hell breaks loose when it happens! The 200r4 bolts up no problem. You may have to have the driveshaft lengthened and do a new shifter or have the shifter modified. I put in a Megashifter. Make sure you have a good cooling system and it is probably a good idea to run an auxilary cooler if you have a high stall converter. So far I love mine. Waiting to see if it can take the abuse of a BBB.
I had a 83 Hurst / Olds and it came with a TH2004R with a 3.73 gear running 245/60 15 tires. It worked very well. Great on the highway, town and street racing.
