The kit is made by Richmond Gear. My cousin recommened them after he had great success with them in his Bronco. Anyone heard of or used these gears before?

 

I've heard of them but don't know anything about them.

 

Got my gears in over the weekend. It wasnt too bad of a job took about 4hrs to complete with two people. (My cousin doing most of the work, me being the "go for" haha). Man what a diffrence those 4.10s make its like i have a whole new truck. I have experenced power that I never thought the little 4.6 was capable of putting out. I would def recomend 4.10s to anyone who is looking to get more out of their truck but dont have thousands to spend in afteramarket mods. Havent really taken notice to gas mileage but what a difference it makes in the city. Thanks for all the advice guys I would never even thought of a gear swap if it wasnt for this forum.

Thanks Again,
Duane

 

Congrats man! I thought the same thing after I did my gears.

 

I also have a 3.55 from the factory. The Richmond gears are suppose to be favored by guys building race cars. After a little shopping around, I settled on Ford Racing Performance Parts 4.10. The main consideration was the price. My local dealership is a Ford Racing vendor. The install was at my local 4WheelParts.com. When the 35" tires went on with the lift kit, I noticed a drop in mileage and performance. With the 4.10 gears, my truck seems to drive better than it did when it was new.

 

Man, you should have seen the stuff that was floating around in there. Luckily, I have a Mag-Hytec differential cover with a magnetic dipstick & drain plug. Most of the metal particles stuck to the magnets. The Royal Purple was clean & purple going in, but thick & black coming out. Everybody should change out their fluid after the initial break-in period, and continue to monitor it closely the first few thousand miles.

 

just markin it, thanks for the info

 

I just wanted to add a few thins i think are important.

1. the shim under the pinion should be used as a referance point. it will get you ballpark into your pinion depth but not always will it be correct. unless your stock gears have a depth writen on them and the new gears depth is the same. you may have to install th pinion without the crush sleeve and get a mesh patteren to verify the pinion depth is corect ot use a or make a tool to check the pinion depth. then install the crush sleeve or spacer kit. . as a cheater tool you can add a pinion shim to the crush sleeve and reuse it since they are a pain to crush.

2. backlash and runout should be check both can be done with a cheap dial indicator. you cant assume the shims that were stock will center the ring and pinion the same as the stock one did. and provide the needed back lash.

deffinatly utilize bill vistas gear install for help.

 

Sometimes i hate this site! I need NEW GEARS ASAP!!! Thanks for a fantastic write up and input! I'll be back asking questions for sure!

 

just a update from when i did my gears I had t add .010 shim to my pinion to get the pinion depth correct. stock the 9.75 was aprox 3.020 and i needed 3.112 my kit only had .010 and .15 and .020 shims . so adding .010 to the stock .030 was close enough.

front i was able to remove shim to get the 2.550 depth.


i was able to measure from the bearing cap mounting surface to the pinion face as it was centerline of teh axle

 

I have a 2005 f150 with 3.73's. Will 4.56's fit on my stock posi??

 

I know nothing about this stuff. But.....if I have this correct, by changing the gear ratio your truck with respond faster with better gas mileage? I have a 2007 FX4 5.4L and I'm putting 33" nittos on. This sounds like something I might wanna look into. How much would I be looking at for install at a local shop?? And how much would i be looking to pay for the gears?? Any help and info would be appreciated. Thanks.

 

Great advice. The OP was very lucky that he got a good pattern from just using all of the stock shims. That is not usually the case. There are 4 main variables that you have to play around with: Pinion depth (shims), Pinion preload (shims and pinion nut), backlash (shims on carrier left and right side to move the carrier/ring gear closer or farther to the pinion gear) and the carrier preload (how many shims to wedge in the carrier).

There is a reason that more experienced gear shops charge a pretty penny to do proper gear swaps. Not having a correct pattern and both carrier and pinion preload has a great efffect on how much stress they see and how long they will last. Something to think about.

 

​Lots of good info in this thread.
Subbing for future reference.

Andy