Two metal gears, and one plastic.
 

I was thinking about weight placement, and was thinking of running the stock plastic gear on the highest-most mounted gear in the diff. I run all metal gears right now, and they have a fair bit of weight to em. I figure this Mod might save me some above-axle-line weight to keep the center of gravity down. My axles are clocked inwards about 20 degrees allready to bring my 540 motors and first gear closer to the axle line.

Any opinions on how this gear should hold up?

it should be fin but if the plastic gears go use the metal one much smother drive line ;-)

you mean smoother? I run metal now. I was just wondering about durability of it running between two metal guys.

All you guys who have stripped gears before upgrading; what gear(s) stripped? Did anyone strip the top one?

I first thought about drilling a bunch of holes in the gear webbing. But anyone who has tried drilling out the 10 tooth pinion for 540's knows, These are tempered to be some hard ass metal. They just eat drill bits.

Too bad there wasn't a plastic gear web with metal teeth. good for a light-weight build. might become a weak point though with some of the harder drivers.

Idid the exact same thing left the one gear hightest plastic, stripped it on the first outing climping a small ledge, put the steel gear in, now all steel gears hd pins alum adapter plates, much smoother running! little neverseize for grease, yea the gears have a little weight to them, but it can be a advantage also.

Thanks crawlernut. That answers the question perfectly. I think you just saved me a fair bit of hassle, as we all know, our diffs are alot more than just 4 screws to open up!

Be sure to do both axles with the steel gears, I had a bad idea to just do the front axle when i broke the diff pin, the rear axle was still running the plastic gears, dropped down a rock ledge on the throttle and used the drag brake too quick, bam! stripped the rear gears instantly. lessened learned, do both axles when upgradeing to the steel gears,the 10 tooth pinion in the front an 8 tooth in the rear probally helped also.