I hope y'all don't mind... I'm kind of using this list to short circuit my normal practice of getting knee deep in a project before realizing why it was a bad idea to begin with....

Anyhow, has anyone tried to change the 5th gear to something taller to make cruising at 75mph at, say, 2200 rpm possible? I'm thinking that there are so many common parts between vehicles in the early years that maybe there would be one that you could press on the 5th shaft without much trouble.

Thanks for any thoughts about this.

TC

To change out the fifth gear, you'd likely need to change out the transmission. It would be more economical to swap ring and pinion gears to dial in the RPMs you'd like with your drivetrain and tire size (or vice versa with tires).

Randii

TOMMY , RANDI IS ABSOLUTELY RIGHT ON THIS , FIRST IF YOU HAVE THE LATE 88AND UP MUA TRANS THERE IS ONLY ONE 5TH GEAR COMBO IF I REMEMBER CORRECTLY AND IT IS ABOUT 16-16%, THE OLDER MSG TRANSIT WAS AROUND 18 % NOTHING OVER 19% , BEST THING IS TO TRY TO CHANGE YOUR CRUISE SPD WITH TIRES AND GIVE A LOT OF THOUGHT TO WHICH ENG YOU A RE GOING TO BE USING, NO ISUZU ENG THAT WE EVER GOT IN THE U.S HAVE ENOUGH TORQUE TO MAINTAIN 75MPH AT 2200 RPM WITH OUT LUGGING THE HECK OUT OF IT AND THERE GOES YOUR MILAGE , A LIGHT WEIGHT EARLY PICKUP WITH THE NEW 3.5 AND A SET OF 4.11 GEARS AND YOU MAY MAKE IT , THE EARLY DSL AND THE EARLY 4 CYL GAS JUST NOT ENOUGH TORQUE, JERRY

Jerry is right I wish they would have put 5.38's instead of 4.88 so I wouldn't spend so much time in third

yeah I would strongly go with Jerry, I went from a 235/75/15 to a 31x10.50x15 and got My RPMs down. At 75 I sit at little over 2300 RPM, and In some cases with a head wind and a 16 foot boat trailer with boat, it lugs it down and have to go back to 4th. it still gets reasonable fuel mileage like 21 to 24 MPG on regular unleaded with my current tire size. I want to see how it does with mid or even premium but gas here in Wyo is still 2.72 a gallon for reg and 3.10 for premium.