Hello everybody, hope all is well. I wanted to ask you guys about doing a gear swap on my truck. Currently, it has the factory 3.92's with LSD. I am running a 4" lift with 35" tires. I have contemplated upgrading to 4.56's with a Detroit TrueTrac - is this the right route? Also, has anybody here successfully had a gear swamp on their lifted '11 Ram 1500's? Your thoughts and suggestions would be helpful - thanks!

 

My truck isn't lifted, but I have swapped the gears. I went from an open 3.55 to 4.10 with an LSD. It's also a 4x2, so I only had to do the rear axle instead of both.

Two of the biggest pieces of advice I can give is don't try to go cheap, and make sure you find someone who knows what they're doing. The first set of 4.10s that were put in by 4 Wheel Parts (specializes mainly in suspension work) was pretty cheap, but they screamed like a banshee at highway speeds. Even with a 40 series Magnaflow exhaust, no resonators, the windows up, and the radio on, you could hear them screaming like there was no tomorrow. I finally had them done right by a gear/transmission shop, and it's purred like a kitten ever since. Not one bit of whine.

I'm not sure how many 4th Gen folks have done swaps. I know there's a few, but not a huge number. You might get some better advice from the 3rd Gen folks. The gearing is the same between the two, and those guys have had years to do a lot more modding.

Good luck.

 

Be careful with 4.56 and lower gear ratio`s, somewhere within the 2011 model years and newer, they changed the inside dimensions of the differential housings i believe. You may have to have it machined out for the actual gears to clear. Hopefully someone will chime in here and know more about it than me... i`m only going by what i`ve heard/read from others with 2011 and newer trucks. And 4.56`s are a great choice with 35inch tires.

 

I was also thinking about a gear change. Currently I have the factory 3.55s; I want a LSD. Should I go with 3.92s or 4.10s? I drive about 70% city and 30% highway. All in all, I guess I'm not really looking for better mileage, I just want more oomph. Any suggestions?

 

Just my opinion, but i would definitely go with the LSD 4.10`s without a doubt in your specific application.

 

Good enough for me. Almost every forum I've read up on has suggested 4.10s; it just seems like such a short gear. On the other hand, these trucks have plenty of top end to work with. I'm guessing it won't make much of a difference.

 

Yes I have also heard from a few different ring and pinion companies that the newer Rams have "EZ" axles now which means they do in fact have contrasting differential housing from previous years. The rear I hear is okay but it's the front that requires drilling to accommodate gears lower than the factory 4.10's. The three shops that are willing to do the job haven't expressed any concern doing this, though; but perhaps maybe that's because they're unaware of the change. I'll know in the coming days...

 

It looks like all the off-road and transmission shops in my area are all declining to do a gear swap on my truck due to the new differential housing in the front end..

When I called Randy's Ring & Pinion the guy told me to stay away from having the job done because it requires drilling in the front and that I should wait until they make a kit designed for the new EZ axles. Has anybody else bumped up against this problem? Sucks...I was looking forward to the 4.56 gear swap the most.

 

I believe i had mentioned this already before, about the newer diff clearence issues.
To have "anything lower ratio than a 4.10", the 2011 (and newer) diff housings have to be clearenced to accept the lower ratio gears

 

Will custom fabricating of the differential always be the case or will companies eventually offer a ring and pinion that will custom fit our axles?