Transfer Gears


Transfer gears work by increasing the final drive gear ratio of your transmission. Because of the design of the FWD platform, you can't have a straight run to the axles. So in the transmission, there is a set of gears that "turns" the power around so it can be brought back towards the center of the car to be redistributed. These gears have a ratio of 1:1. So for every one turn the input shaft makes, the output shaft makes one turn. Transfer gears change this ratio. The gears you're looking for are a 1.22:1 ratio. That changes the mechanical advantage of the gearing. Now for every one turn of the input shaft, the output shaft turns about 1 and a quarter turns. This makes it easier for the motor to turn the wheels, which translates into faster acceleration, and 1/4-mile times much like the manual transmission equipped cars. However there is a price for this newfound power. Now at 70mph in a stock ratio, the motor will run at 3000RPM. By changing the ratio, at 70mph, the engine will now run at 3700RPM. These extra RPM will cause you to get worse fuel efficiency at highway speeds. The largest problem with transfer gears is that they need to be shimmed to match up properly. The shims are sold in increments of 0.01", and if you don't properly match up the gears, they'll whine when you drive. This whine is the gears binding and eating themselves up. The metal shavings that are produced will also destroy the rest of the transmission as well. Forward Motion Inc. used to sell these transfer gears, they stopped because for every 20 sets or gears they sold, only about 2 people managed to install them properly. Now they're only sold, preinstalled in their race built transmissions. To find transfer gears, you need to look in 1978 through 1980 L-Body cars. these were the Omni, Horizion, Charger, and Turismo. look in the cars with the 1.7L VW engine, and the auto trans. you can also find these gears in some early 80's carbureted Minivans. the top gear has 49 teeth, while the bottom gear has 60 teeth. to remove the gears, simply pull the drivers wheel off, remove the access panel, and expose the gears. now with a 32mm socket and a breaker bar with a pipe on it (the bolts are torqued down to 200ft/lbs) remove the nuts. then use a regular power steering wheel puller to remove the gears. they should come off easily. written by Mookie ©2003

Transfer gears work by increasing the final drive gear ratio of your transmission. Because of the design of the FWD platform, you can't have a straight run to the axles. So in the transmission, there is a set of gears that "turns" the power around so it can be brought back towards the center of the car to be redistributed. These gears have a ratio of 1:1. So for every one turn the input shaft makes, the output shaft makes one turn. Transfer gears change this ratio. The gears you're looking for are a 1.22:1 ratio. That changes the mechanical advantage of the gearing. Now for every one turn of the input shaft, the output shaft turns about 1 and a quarter turns. This makes it easier for the motor to turn the wheels, which translates into faster acceleration, and 1/4-mile times much like the manual transmission equipped cars. However there is a price for this newfound power. Now at 70mph in a stock ratio, the motor will run at 3000RPM. By changing the ratio, at 70mph, the engine will now run at 3700RPM. These extra RPM will cause you to get worse fuel efficiency at highway speeds.

The largest problem with transfer gears is that they need to be shimmed to match up properly. The shims are sold in increments of 0.01", and if you don't properly match up the gears, they'll whine when you drive. This whine is the gears binding and eating themselves up. The metal shavings that are produced will also destroy the rest of the transmission as well. Forward Motion Inc. used to sell these transfer gears, they stopped because for every 20 sets or gears they sold, only about 2 people managed to install them properly. Now they're only sold, preinstalled in their race built transmissions.

To find transfer gears, you need to look in 1978 through 1980 L-Body cars. these were the Omni, Horizion, Charger, and Turismo. look in the cars with the 1.7L VW engine, and the auto trans. you can also find these gears in some early 80's carbureted Minivans. the top gear has 49 teeth, while the bottom gear has 60 teeth. to remove the gears, simply pull the drivers wheel off, remove the access panel, and expose the gears. now with a 32mm socket and a breaker bar with a pipe on it (the bolts are torqued down to 200ft/lbs) remove the nuts. then use a regular power steering wheel puller to remove the gears. they should come off easily.