Do new ring/pinion gears have to wear in?
 

Just got a Vanquish under drive ring/pinion for my Capra. Install was pretty straight forward. Got plenty of grease in there. I can feel a slight resistance as I turn the pinion but not much at all. I removed the front drive shaft and just ran the rig around the basement and the pinion got real hot after only about five minutes. Is this normal? Do they have to wear in?

Re: Due new ring/pinion gears have to wear in?
 

I’ve never heard of gears having to wear in. I’m pretty positive they don’t have to.

If it’s getting really hot, it may be your gear ratio. I’m not an expert on ratios, hopefully someone with more knowledge on ratios jumps in.


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Re: Do new ring/pinion gears have to wear in?
 

I was running in rear wheel drive only so not sure the ratio would have been a factor at that point.

Re: Do new ring/pinion gears have to wear in?
 

Yeah, no break in period needed for those gears. Check and make sure all your bearings are seated properly and look at adding a shim or two on the end of the driveshaft and that may help some. Occasionally you may need to shim the sides of the spools but I haven’t had to do that in a while since I had some China special eBay axles.

Since the Capra has portals, the drag could be there as well so the portal boxes might be worth a look if you can’t get the diff happy.

Re: Do new ring/pinion gears have to wear in?
 

Uhm, hypoid gears need to be secured at both ends of the shaft to mesh happy. Meaning the head of the gear on the inside of the housing, and the driveshaft on the outside. So if you did not have the driveshaft installed when you "broke them in" then you likely have a funny wear pattern started by the front pinion trying to be sucked into the housing by the hypoid gears.

On 1:1's that are going to see abuse, like rock crawling, drifting, towing heavy loads, then breakin is highly recommended. On toy trucks with precisely made gears it is far less critical. I tend to just drive it real easy for the first back and then wiggle check my mesh before I start abusing it.

Re: Do new ring/pinion gears have to wear in?
 

I ended up putting a little bit thicker shim ( from .01 to .03) on the drive shaft side of the pinion. I think that took care of it as it seems fine now after running it again in the basement (raining here). After I was satisfied with the lack of heat running in RWD only, put the front shaft back on and all seems fine. Only a slight bit of overdrive but I can notice the turning radius is definitely better. Can't wait to try it on the rocks.