Cascade Crew

Spikeophant · Posted: Fri Jun 04, 2010 9:38 am Post subject: Rear End Advice

I've read, and been told by some buddies, that the rear ends in these 3rd gens are a weak point. I have a 350 in mine, and am planning on swapping intake, etc, soon to get some new power. Right now I can't even go WOT due to some issues with my setup. Once I have swapped, I'm looking at picking up quite a bit of power due to simply being able to hit WOT fine, not to mention the increase from the intake, etc.

So my question is, what do you guys recommend to toss underneath the rear? It's a daily driven car, but I do hard launches sometimes for fun, I do spin the tires, and if I'm not around anyone, I've been known to slide corners here and there. (I make sure there's no other traffic before I do anything too stupid). I'm also thinking the T5 might have to go before I break it too. Let me know what I should be looking for, I still want to get decent mileage, so 3.23 or something like that would probably be what I'm after.

alloy · Posted: Fri Jun 04, 2010 10:22 am Post subject:

Well you really have about 3 options. One is the 10 bolt you probably already have, second is a 9 bolt which is stronger, but parts are hard to find and are expensive. Third option is an after market like a 12 bolt, dana, or ford 9". All will set you back $2000 or more. I think Mike has a 3.23 bolt he's going to sell at some point. Mike give him a shout and see.

I'm also going with a new motor and hopefully will add around 100 horses and had a T5. My thoughts on it were if I blow the T5 with the new motor it's worth squat. It was in very good shape and Mike bought it from me and I used the $$$ I got from it to help fund my T56. One of the best decisions I ever made. You can't even imagine how much nicer the T56 is compared to the T5. And for the rear I've got a replacement after market one I'm working on putting in place of my 10 bolt. I'm thinking the same thing, pull the 10 bolt and sell it to help offset the cost of the 9" before I scatter it playing with my new found power (If I ever get it put in that is).

Quasi-Traction · Posted: Fri Jun 04, 2010 10:34 am Post subject:

a 7.5" 10 Bolt will hold just fine with even a stoutly built 350 or 383, as long as you don't put slicks or drag radials on. The minute you get sticky tires....Trans, Driveline, and Rear are ticking time bombs.

As for the trans, if you need to preserve the life of your T5, best thing to do is fab up a transmission x-member and maybe look into like a Spohn adjustable torque arm. Relocate the torque arm to the x-member. Doing that will take a lot of stress off the case of the trans.

However at the cost of doing that, It may just be cheaper and easier to pickup a T56 that just needs a freshening up.

Spikeophant · Posted: Fri Jun 04, 2010 10:40 am Post subject:

Thanks for the tips. I have a related questions. Do you guys know where to buy gears for t56's? I was thinking I can fine tune for my setup if I have to freshen one up. I've always been interested in changing ratios in manuals, but never sourced gears. I haven't really looked online, as I like to buy my parts from a physical store, so it's easier to get replacements for faulty parts. I have 5 cars currently(that doesn't include the better halfs cars), and the Camaro is the newest. So as you can imagine I deal with faulty parts quite a bit. I'm going to be headed back to school to be an auto machinist, so if nothing else, I'm sure I can find a source when I get hired on at a machine shop sometime.

91RSVert · Posted: Fri Jun 04, 2010 11:26 am Post subject:

I have a 350, with a t5 that doesnt hold fluid. Been running it for 4 years now...few trips to the track, few times at autox, and daily beating it. Shrug

Also installed a stock 10bolt with posi and 3.42 gears. Seems to hold up fine. You can do a few things to the stock axle to beef it up. Likely cheaper then putting in some whole new thing.

iansane · Posted: Fri Jun 04, 2010 12:55 pm Post subject:

I picked up my t56 rebuild stuff from D&D Performance.

http://www.ddperformance.com/

I wouldn't say they're amazing but they got the job done. (albeit a bit pricier than places I found after the fact)

Twilightoptics · Posted: Fri Jun 04, 2010 2:22 pm Post subject:

You can't just change a single gear in the t56. There weren't very many options for the f-body case anyways. If you change a gear, you also have to change the counter shaft, and if the countershaft doesn't match the rest of the gears you have, you have to change them too.

It's pointless.

Fine tune it with rear end.