I found these on ebay and was wondering if it would work in my 71 skylark, has the 8.5 10 bolt rear end, 28 spline i belive. http://cgi.ebay.com/ebaymotors/ws/e...040930128&fromMakeTrack=true#ebayphotohosting I am also looking for a stock posi diff. Nothing fancy, just something that will hold up to a pretty much stock 350. Anyone know where i could also get the ring gear spacers for the 3.42 gears? i have the open diff. with i think its 2.76 gear?
Jon, I don't know gears very well BUT have a look here: www.buickperfiormance.com George N. has all the ins/outs of these cars.
The used 3.42's will bolt right on the low ratio carrier that now carrys your 2.73's, no need for a ring gear spacer. Be advised, nice looking used GM 8.5 ring pinions will not always be a bargain, esp those pulled out of questionably maintained high mile pickups and vans. From the late 80's up through the late 90's, I personally used to pull what appeared to be nice quality used 8.5 ring and pinions. Upon getting them home, would then build ''leader priced musclecar'' 8.5 posi r/e's with these professionally picked used gears. After doing so several hundred times, it eventually got to the point that even when super anally set-up, 2 out of 10 hand picked GM 8.5 ring and pinion sets, were howlers. Totally, not acceptable. As a result, I went to all new gears, ie, US Gear-Strange or Precision, on nearly all of our 8.5 builds... Result, NO more noise problems. Advising the use of PICK-N-PULL used gears is irresponsible, as the labor charges to propperly set-up a r/e twice often exceed the price to build with QUALITY new 8.5 gears. FWIW, for the last 6-7 years the only used GM 8.5 gears I'll even build with, is the occasional set of 3.08-3.73 used gears I've personally had in a running vehicle. Also the occasional set of hand picked GM 3.23's. US Gear and Precision do not make 3.23's, and for warranty reasons, I refuse to set-up and warranty the noisy Richmonds. Good luck with your r/e build. :3gears: Roger
not to sound stuck up, but you can buy a rear all ready made up for about 450.00. the gears will run you 138.00 new then the spacer kit is any were from 45 to 125. then you have to set it up, or you can do what some people do and just throw it in and see what happens. well let me tell you it works for the time but in the end it cost you much more. look for a rear already set up. go to library and look up in the car section for gear pattern. then, when you look at the rear match it up.then you can see if it :3gears: was it set up right :3gears: