Whats a good hotrod gear ratio?

[caseyj10]

What would be a nice hotrod gear ratio for a 302 3 speed on the tree with about 400-450 Crank hp? The truck wont see the highway much if at all.

[papabug71]

I would say something in the range of 3:55-3:73's. Still good for off the line power & you could still drive it faster than 55 on the highway without it being wound up too tight.

The thing I hate most about the 3.03 tranny is the first gear ratio. 2:99 is a ho-hum first gear ratio. It sucks with a 3:25 geared rear end & 255/70/15 tires, I can tell you that..

[sargentrs]

That's what mine had when I first got her, except I was running 235/75-15's. First was virtually useless unless you were trying to pull a stump out of the ground. When my gears toasted on me I swapped in some 3.89's out of a slick from a junk yard and upped my tires to 265/75-15. Did wonders coming out of the gate and was actually able to get some headway in first before shifting but she wound out loudly going down the highway at 70mph. 3.55-3.73 would probably be a good mid range setup but I'd lean toward the 3.55's unless you wanted to smoke 'em out off the line. For my build I'm going in with 3.00's for top end at low rpm's instead of burnouts at the green light.

[gregamorton]

for a small block making 400+ hp I would think unless its a turbo engine it would have to have high compression and a huge,huge cam. With that being said you would need low gears because the engine would have no low end power to pull these heavy trucks. If the truck was auto you could use a higher gear because you would be launching the truck with the stall convertor. With all this I would use 4.11-4.30 gears if you want it to pull hard and dont drive much on the hwy. Turbo I would go 3.50 to 4.10s. If you was to go with a auto and convertor matched up with engine I think you could go as high as a 3.25 set of gears and have more top end. With all my years of messing with these trucks I could not imagine building up a truck with that much power and using a three on the tree!! Trying to shift from 1st to second can piss you off when racing! I would take off hard at high rpm in second and slam it into 3rd when racing but I was running 4.10s. Spend some money and get a really good clutch. Hope this helps you a little.