I have a 1981 Trans Am, Not a normal T/A by any means. I shoe horned a Caddy 500 and a '72 Pontiac th400 short shaft. What a mess and challenge that was. Anyway I am in the process of rebuilding the rear end now. I have never done this before. It had a 3.08 Posi that I swapped a set of 3.42 in. Thinking its about as much gear that Big Block will take with a 3 speed. I have 26" tires. Ill try to post some pics. Got a few goodies in the motor but not much. I am building this car for street fun.
While I had the gears out I called Jim for some help! I actually called him about some parts he had on Ebay! He helped me understand what I was looking at and how everything worked together. Pretty cool dude. Now I know the difference between the pinion gear and spider gear. Spider are the drive gears and the pinion gears are the little gears the have the pin through them.
I just installed a Hughes BOP25 converter too. Also just finished up the detent switch for passing gear! I had a cheater button on the shift I rigged up. That really wok up the car. She was a blast to drive. That was before the gear and 'vert swap. So I am expecting a lot more with the combo. I am itching bad to drive her, But I need to get the rear back together.
So I will be asking a few questions on the other part of this forum.
PJ
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Trans Amillac
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- Joined: Sat Mar 16, 2019 7:02 am
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Re: New to the site
pj gLAD YOUR ABOARD... 
Just to clean that info of spider gears.
all four (some times 6) are nicknamed spider gears as a set. (actual proper name is Planetary carrier gears.)
then individual gears on the cross shaft (carrier pinion shaft) are pinion gears and are usually smaller than the SIDE gears where the axle spline is cut into .
so we have pinion spider gears and side spider gears
Side gears will be the ones that the clutch and the cone in limited slip will be attached to also.
Thanks for introducing yourself...PLEASE any diff questions that you do not understand will try to help the best we can If not will try to find the answer or tell you we plain do not know.
tHAnks, Jim Mitschke
JD
Just to clean that info of spider gears.
all four (some times 6) are nicknamed spider gears as a set. (actual proper name is Planetary carrier gears.)
then individual gears on the cross shaft (carrier pinion shaft) are pinion gears and are usually smaller than the SIDE gears where the axle spline is cut into .
so we have pinion spider gears and side spider gears
Side gears will be the ones that the clutch and the cone in limited slip will be attached to also.
Thanks for introducing yourself...PLEASE any diff questions that you do not understand will try to help the best we can If not will try to find the answer or tell you we plain do not know.
tHAnks, Jim Mitschke
JD
J D Race