Ok, I am looking to get a small lift put on my Ram. I has the stock 20's on there with the stock 32.5 tires. I am going to be going to a 17" rim and 35" tires. My question is, will I need to reduce my gearing at all for this combo or will I have enough gearing left for my truck to handle all of this. I have a Hemi and the towing package so its got the 3.92 gears in it already. I mainly want to hear what everyone else thinks. I do tow some but nothing huge, no more than 7,000 pounds. I do 4wheel so that is something I do consider also. Thanks guys!!!!

 

you should be fine witht the stock gearing

 

You can get away with it. 3.92 is bare minimum with 35" tires IMO. I did a 4" lift and went to 35's as well, then posted pretty much the same question as you on a couple of other forums.
Response was like 98% telling me to change gears to 4.56.
So I did, adding an Auburn LSD to my open diff at the same time (addingnothing extra to the cost, labor wise, since he was in there anyway, so this would be the time to do it).
Night & Day!!!!! It's like something in the Truck "woke up", the truck will literally snap my neck back when accelerating from a dead stop. My around town MPG actually increased by 1-2 mpg as well (after the initial heavy foot period was over), as you do not have to give as much gas for the same acceleration with the new gearing. Highway mileage suffered about 1 mpg under 75mph and closer to 2 mpg over 75, as the gearing increases the engine rpm's slightly.
So I say, if it's within your budget, do the gear swap, just make sure you have someone do it that has ample experience changing gears, as it can be tricky, and forums are full of horror stories from people who either tried to do it themselves or had an inexperienced mechanic do them.
4 Wheel Parts has a pretty good "GEAR RATIO INDEX CHART" on their site, which shows that the optimal gear performance with 35" tires is4.56& runs the engine at the roughly the same RPM as stock tires on 3.92 gears. This was also where I had them done, at their Orlando store, and in over a year have had no issues or the first bit of "gear whine".

 

Thanks guys, it is a toss up on what I want to do, also did you have to replace out the front gearing for it to be correct or just the front?

 

i'd definately go to a 4.56 gear ratio with 35" tires. It will greatly help your power and gas mileage.

 

I put a 6 inch lift and 35s on my truck. I tried sticking with the 3.92 but it was flat out not cutting it. The 4.56 Motive gear is money well spent you will notice a lot of difference essentially bring you back to stock if not a little past it. If you have a 2006 like I doandstay at a 3.92 gear the MDS will be kicking on more often and it will drive you nuts. Just my 2 cents

 

In a 4x4 you must change the front gears as well, but a LSD and/or locker is not an option up front do to the IFS. You would have to have a "pumpkin" up front, such as in the solid axle 2500/3500 Dodge's.

 

Yea, I really wish my ram was a solid axle up front, but we cant always have what we always want huh? Now I dont know what the gearing is up front, anyone have an idea about that?

 

4.56's would help a lot, especially if you have lots of city driving. Make sure your installer knows that the inside of the housing in the rear needs to ground out a bit to fit those gears properly; the 06 housing is slightly different from the earlier 3rd gens and requires some space to be made in the rear. The 4.56's are a larger gear and have problems if that extra space isn't made.