Has anybody done, tried, or researched doing a first gear swap?
I was thinking about putting something with a higher ratio (Higher Top Speed - Lower Acceleration) in place of the stock one. I've done stuff like this on ATV's, Dirtbikes, etc... but I'm not too sure how easy or realistic it is to do it on our car. The higher ratio First Gear will help out a lot with traction, take-offs, so on so on.

But I need info on our stock first gear. What its ratio is... I've done some searching... and found nothing. Just wondering if anyone has checked into this before... I might just end up giving GM Performance Division a call. Any input would be appreciated.

 

talk to jbody performance

 

??? and what can they do?

i'm not an expert.... but other than raising the stock rev's, there is not much that u can do.

 

should be quiet possible i know lots of f bodys with swapped gears

 

F bodies are quite a bit different also. Just about everything with them is based on their gearing. They can go from a 3:73 to some 4:10's for torque purposes. The setup for a rear wheel drive vehicle is much different then ours. There aren't many options if any at all for doing something of that nature for our vehicles without going completely custom.

 

Cobalt SS gear ratios:

1st - 3.38
2nd - 1.76
3rd - 1.18
4th - .89
5th - .70

Reverse - 3.17

Final Drive: 4.05:1

I think we could defiantely benefit from a lower first gear - something closer to 3.00 - then it would be easier to tune more boost into 1st gear and give us musch better 60' times. the only thing you may want to do with this is go with a lightweight flywheel to help with low RPM starts - the stock flywheel is a heavy bitch.

 

JBP is in fact working on gears for my transmission. We are going with a longer first gear and we are also changing the final ratio\input output shafts, to a much harder steel. In fact I will be going with all new gears that far surpass the strength of the stock gears. The complete transmission jobs cost will scare away 99.9% of you but a single gear or the input\output shafts won't hurt as bad.

 

Awesome... i know you can change the FINAL gear ratio... because they did it on the Grand Am Cup Cobalt. A longer first gear is exactly what we need, I guess I'll give GMPD and J-body Perform a shout and see what they can do. I am sick and tired of having to ***** Foot first gear.

 

Our cars have the F35 transmission in them. As long as this transmission has been around at GM, there is not an alternate gear set available that I am aware of. Victory Red SS is right that if JBP is working on coming out with an alternative, the complete gear set will probably cost you a pretty penny to upgrade and even to just go with a new first gear, you will have to get a new counter shaft and first gear. Not necessarily cheap. Keep in mind too that if you go with a higher ratio (lower numeric ratio) first gear that you will be that much more into the power band of second gear when you hit it. I don't know about you guys, but my car smokes the tires all the way through 1st and 2nd when I climb into it all the way.

 

Yeah... that's what I figured... it would be $$$ because you'd have to change like 5 parts. Hmmm... But that would be what I would be looking for, I've never had trouble with tires sticking in 2nd, so I'm not worried about that. I think top speed of 1st gear right now... is like 40mph, and that is full throttle, 7k rpm (if I remember correctly). But Full Throttle is such a risk in this car. But, One of my automotive knowledge friends seems to think that all that will do is make the tires spin out FASTER.
But he's a Camaro Freak, calls my SS a Cavalier all the time, and has never driven, riden in, or seen my car in action... but he has a Automotive Technology Degree.

 

Beat me too the punch! I personally like the current set up minus first gear. I think the 4.05 final drive ratio is perfect. Its just high enough to make 4th gear (technically an overdrive gear) still a gear thats fast and quick as hell. 5th gear is also perfect, modded cars can still accelerate pretty good in 5th, and cruising at 80 is exactly at 3000 rpm, so its not like a honda cruising along a 4500 rpm!

 

x2!!! I agree 100%! I only have a problem with 1st gear. I was hoping that changing it would be some what similar to changing a gear on a ATV or Crotch Rocket... new gear... that's it. We do it at work every now and again. But it's doesn't appear that way... i'm gonna send out some e-mails tonight and get some scoop from GMP and J-Body.

 

whoever decided the ratio for 1st gear must have been high on crack and meth that day

 

you guys arent going to benefit much from diferent gearing. a 4.05 is already a good spot. you don't want to go any shorter because you will just smoke the tires like crazy, but going any taller will probably not help your traction enough to compensate for the loss of acceleration once you get traction. the reason you see f bodies and mustangs doing gear swaps is we have very tall gearing stock. i for example of 3.31 final drive! many people swap to 3.73's or 4.1's. this will increase acceleration but bring down the top speed (doesn't really matter much). with you guys...you are already pretty well set, i wouldn't mess with it.

changing first gear only is gonna be very odd to drive under normal conditions and will throw you into a weird spot in 2nd once you shift. the longer you make 1st without changing the rest, the less 2nd gear you are going to have when running it hard. it really isn't worth it imo.

 

thing i learned with front drive cars, leave the gearing alone, what you'll end up doing is catching 2nd too late, and if you're hard shifting into 2nd, you'll have to go right to third. it'll just be a pain in the butt.

you're better off just short shifting into 2nd if you don't wanna beat of 1st.

the only reason i can assume you're doing this is because you're tired of the 8mph shift into 2.

personally, in my BMW, i start in 2nd unless i'm going off the line hard, or am pulling into the garage. but, having a 3.91 rear will do that for you.

 

I'd like first to be a bit longer so i can enter 2nd about 800-1000rpms higher..

then i'd be happy!

 

what do you enter it at now? because on my 2.4 if shift as soon as the shift light blinks, i hit it at around 5k, which is pretty damn close to perfect.

 

Don't forget the bottle of vodka he chugged...

 

2.4 = COMPLETELY different tranny, including totally different gear ratios

 

x2!!!

 

you might be right about most fwd cars but not the ss/sc. The first gear is retarded short. it's like a towing gear and 2nd is a bit tall so what happens in this car is you'll spin/wheel hop all through first then shift to 2nd fall to 3400rpm and be flat on your face. It's a stupid setup but if first gear were taller to the point where you could hit 50mph in first it would solve everything.

 

x3.... completely different amount of power as well. Especially with Stage2.

 

My thoughts exactly... that's what I told the guy at work today. He's used to Camaros and was trying to give me advise. I said, "Trust me... THIS first gear... it Sucks... Donkey *****."

 

Regarding the comments about the 2.4L, it uses an F23 trans which is lighter duty that the F35. Regarding the Guy being on crack and meth when he selected the ratios, I would have to agree if this trans were designed for this car, but it wasn't. Ya gotta understand that in the corporate world, you have to reuse some of your products to keep the cost from going out of sight. It would be nice if there were a little less split between 1st and 2nd, but there isn't, so the solution is to compensate for it in your setup. I got rid of wheel hop and on race tires, the car just hooks and goes, but on street tires I spin when I go to the floor. Oh well, either don't go ALL the way to the floor or quit bitchin about having to buy tires. Personally I got tired of buying the 18's and went to 17's which are more readily available and lower cost.

 

Interesting reading.....this has been discussed this previously.
Here is the link https://www.cobaltss.net/forums/show...5&postcount=80