maximus75

iTrader: (5)

The 4th and 5th gen 5spd ratios are:
3.285 1st
1.850 2nd
1.272 3rd
0.954 4th
0.795 5th
3.428 Reverse
3.823 Final

Using altima gears they could be changed to:

3.400 1st
1.955 2nd
1.272 3rd
0.954 4th
0.740 5th
3.428 reverse

Final drive ratio ( :1)
3.823
If theres enough interest I may purchase an altima tranny and experiment. Another idea would be transplanting the 6sp into a 4th-fifth gen 5spd. I am currently working on this. If there is enough interest I'll work up a parts and price list.

Frank Fontaine

Here's a straight-up question that I haven't seen answered yet. What is the purpose of the 6-spd tranny? At least with the Germans, final drives are the same. All I can imagine is it'd be nice to be able to pull away from an annoying 5 mph EZ Pass lane in 2nd without lugging the motor, which is not the case with my 4th gen. My buddy that has the A4 3.0 hates his 6-spd and says he wishes to *** that he got the 1.8T with the 5-spd. He feels his 6-spd is nothing more than busy work. Anybody know?

IceY2K1

iTrader: (3)

I'd be interested in swapping my 5th gear for a 6spds' 6th gear ratio.

Damn HWY rpms are way too high.

Sin

I totally agree about the 5th gear!

maximus75

iTrader: (5)

I havent opened up the 6spd yet but I'm 99.9% sure the parts won't interchange with the 5spds.

mtrai760

iTrader: (19)

I'd be interested in finding out more on cost and if this will work or not...

Kevin Wong

I'm also contemplating my gear ratio swap. I'm looking into getting a Quaife Diff and changing my final drive and 5th gear. Just to share the wealth of information, the 2000,2001 Altima 5-speed has a much better gear ratio than the preceding models. Edmunds.com stated that it definitely helped the 0-60 times as well as fuel economy. I think we should look into that.

Also I have a church friend that is the general manager of the largest transmission component distributor in the nation. He'll know what fits and what won't.

Deac

I'm coming to see you this week Jeff!! I may be interested in this too!

Deac

mzmtg

iTrader: (11)

The altima tranny, while having the same model number as ours, has a different bellhousing. You would need to transplant the guts of the Alty unit into a Maxima case.

Sprint

iTrader: (10)

does shorter gear ratio's mean faster accelleration and lower top speed?

mzmtg

iTrader: (11)

Yes.

Shorter gearing combined with the highend power of the VI +JWT ECU combo would make a killer street racer. But, it would probably require a shift to 4th in the quarter mile, so times might suffer a little.

I'm sure someone with cartest can figure this out...

ejj

iTrader: (5)

Actcually, the Altima gears would give you both.

Because of the shorter 1-2, the same 3-4, and a taller 5th, your highway RPM's would be dropped a bit, therefor allowing for a higher top speed (without ECU limiter of course).

SteVTEC

4G VQ30DE's are already very light and I think the gearing is pretty optimized as it is. Any shorter 1st and 2nd gears and you'll just spin and spin and spin. I can already break the tires lose from a roll in 1st and I'm stock. Also, unless you have the MEVI, you'd need another shift to get to 60 mph most likely, which will slow your 0-60 time, but that's just a paper stat anyways. A slightly taller 5th gear would be nice though, but it doesn't seem like the Alty's 5th gear is tall enough over the Maxima 5th to really make it worthwhile unless you already have the tranny apart.

I think the heavier 5G VQ30DE-K could definitely use some shorter gearing, though. But going with a shorter 2nd and leaving 3rd the same might cause the engine to drop out of the peak powerband when doing the 2-3 shift. For best performance, you'd probably need to also shorten 3rd gear. The VQ35DE has MUCH more mid-range power than the DE-K does and can probably get away with the wider gap between 2nd and 3rd. But the same might not be true for the DE-K. The net result might be poorer overall performance.


So just keep those things in mind.



Good luck on any swaps

Dave B

The difference between gears 1 and 2 on the Altima vs that of the Maxima is a mere 3-5%. You won't see squat of a difference in acceleration. It usually takes an increase of 15-20% to see any real measureable difference in 1/4 mile acceleration assuming the car is undergeared (the Maxima isn't undergeared). When I say 15-20% increased gearing, I'm talking about it in every gear as in changing out the final drive ratio. Going from the stock 3.42 in the 6 speed F-Body to a 4.10 will drop you about .15-.20 seconds assuming you can hook up. That's a 16.6% increase in overall ratio. In the 96-02 Mustang Cobra, going from a 3.27 to a 3.55 is worthless, going to a 3.73 is okay, going to a 4.11 is pretty good, and going to a 4.33 is flat out ideal. Yes, the NA Cobra is woefully undergeared. A 3.27 gear teamed with an engine that makes power to 6800rpms is not a good thing.

The 95-01 Maximas come with 3.823 gears already close to ideal, but a 4.10 would be perfect assuming you could handle cruising at 70mph at 3200rpms. I could. Look at the 95-01 M3s, they cruise at 3500rpms at 70mph. I believe they have 4.20 gears.


Dave

Jr'sMaxima

Id like to see a lower 5th gear so we get better MPG for sure

MardiGrasMax

iTrader: (14)

Lower 1-4
Higher 5th
and I'm in

IceY2K1

iTrader: (3)

I wouldn't mine going to a more ideal final gear also, however my car is mostly a hwy flyer so I'd have to have a better 5th gear for less RPMs.

97maximase5spd

I agree with Dave B. I assume if anyone is modifying their gear ratios it is to make them shorter and better spaced for performance. I could care less about gas mileage and what RPM's I am at when cruising in 5th. I doubt anyone here would drop ~2 grand on putting together different gear ratios so they can save gas money. (Unless you're a tree hugger on a mission)

For me to get in on this the ratios would have to me a bit more agressive then the Alty's especially for the cost of doing this mod.

Also, you would have to think of the mods people would have already. 1st gear any shorter would make any max with bolt on's spin straight though 1st on a roll. 2nd gear could be shortened a tad for N/A maxes but any boosted ones would spin straight though that as well. A more agressive 3rd and 4th gear may be the way to go, IMO.
Good luck on the project!

Frank Fontaine

Looks like 6-spd may be a gimmick. Nobody who owns one has stepped up and cited how it's different or better than a 5-spd as far as the Max goes. My buddy with the 6-spd AUDI specifically said he regrets not having a 5-spd which is only available in a 4-cyl wrapper. Again, I think people here mistake an extra gear for a higher gear, when rather it's the same range spread out over 6 choices. More is better when somebody else is doing it for you I guess, like in the new 6-spd autos. More gears, more complicated, but not for the driver, for the machine.

Sin

I just want a fifth that will allow me to cruise at a more reasonable rpm.

JsL

iTrader: (5)

A guy over at g20.net put a SR20VE in his G20!! That thing pushes 200hp and redlines at 11,000 RPMS!!!!! Can you guys imagine running first to 11k rpms! Hey...maybe we can swap a SR20VE in our cars and swap a ferrari chassis while we're at it.

This has been a very informative topic. I think it would be great revving to 7200 rpm with a MEVI through shorter gears.

ericdwong

I'm not seeing the dislike of the 6 speed here, even if it really is just 5 + 1 more overdrive gear. I now have 2 vehicles that have 6 forward gears. The Corvette and the CBR600F4i bike. The Corvette I dont know if its really 6 speeds or 5+1. I believe its more 5+1 cause I've heard the T56 is very much like the T5 just plus the 6th gear. The 5th and 6th gear on the corvette are both overdrive gears (ratio'd below 1). 6th gear on the vette is pretty much a super overdrive gear, I believe a .5 . I find I use it alot in traffic as long as I'm above 45 mph. I have ZERO acceleration but it sure keeps the RPMs down. Same with the bike. It really saves on gas milage and thats one of the reasons I didnt like short geared cars, like the Maxima was at 3000 rpm when cruisin at 75 IIRC. I bet on the highway the corvette gets better MPG does then the 4 g Max with the 6th gear.

IceY2K1

iTrader: (3)

First, I could give a rats *** about fuel economy. I'm concerned with spinning close to 4K rpms for HOURS at a time on my road trips, which is going to reduce the life of my engine.

At 80-85mph in 5th gear I'm spinning close to 4K rpms, where as a 6spd is spinning 3350rpms in 5th and 2550rpms in 6th gear at 80mph. That is a considerable difference in how hard I'm working my engine when I'm going on flat ground.

Second, I would NEVER spend $2K for this. When I replace my clutch, add a lightened flywheel, and add a Quaife differential(~$700 installed), I'd have the gears installed which would be much cheaper.

97maximase5spd

Yea, I forgot to talk about that as well. Umm.. let's see. I can understand anyones concern for keeping the engine healthy. But, there's a price you're going to have to pay for performance. This is one of the drawbacks of modding ANY car. If people thought like this there would be very little boosted maximas out there, no one would be using nitous oxide... and maybe there would have never been a Fast and the Furious movie...(maybe it would've been better if people thought that way ).
There are drawbacks to some performance mods. Its up to the individual to make the decision. More reliability vs. more power. I thought most people knew that. Guess I was wrong...
Ask Harold or Neigel if they really care that their turbos will place a lot more stress on their engines and make them less reliable and see what they say or ask anyone on the .org concerned with performance mods.


Oh..and I kinda threw out the 2grand price because I have no clue as to how much it would be to purchase and have installed. I was shooting from the hip on that one.

And about your concern with engine wear based on RPMs. I think SteVTEC had a very interesting post on that topic. There are other variables that influence engine wear. The VQ30DE isn't really working much harder than the 2k2 + maxes in 6th gear even though the RPMs are higher. It all depends on the bore and stroke and theVQ30DE has a shorter stroke than the VQ35DE, if I'm not mistaken.
I think it would be interesting to see what kind of an improvement it would be to the current gearing. And you can keep 5th gear tall to calm IceY2K1's concern for reliability over long trips.
You know I got nothin but love for all you .org people

97maximase5spd

If 5th gear was significantly taller, I would hate it. I can imagine cruising at 60mph at 1900 rpms and having very very little passing power. I like the way the rpms are now. I feel good that I can drive on the highway in the tallest gear and still be able to accelerate to pass someone. It would be more of a pain to have to downshift to 4th or 3rd everytime I wanted to go. Does anyone else feel this way or is it just me?

SteVTEC

The 3.0 VQ's are barely working up a sweat at 4k. You're not going to reduce the engine life at all. The piston speeds in the 3.0VQ's are so low (2.89in stroke) that even at 4000rpm, the piston speeds aren't any higher than a Honda V6 (3.39-3.67in stroke) at say 3000-3500rpm.

http://forums.maxima.org/showthread....t=piston+speed

5th gear *could* be a bit higher. But I like being able to stomp on it at 80mph in 5th and have so much acceleration that I don't even need to downshift. The Maxima 5spd has pretty much identical highway gearing as BMW's and other performance cars nowadays, so that just goes to show what Nissan had in mind when designing the ratios.

Not sure about the Audi 6spd, but at least in the Maxima 6spd, the first 5 gears are pretty much identical to the G4/G5's and 6th is just an extra overdrive gear to keep the fuel economy up. A VQ35 turning a G4/G5 5th as the top gear would probably only get about 25 mpg which would hurt Nissan in their fuel economy average. With the 6th it gets 28 mpg.

Dave B

You're spinning close to 4K at 85mph? How does that work out? Are you running shorter than stock tires because I'm spinning ~3600rpms at 85mph. SteVTEC made an important discovery calculating out the piston speeds. This engine really isn't working hard and when you consider all the other fancy work on engine like a knife-edged forged crank, specially coated pistons and rings, etc. I much prefer having a good 5th gear for passing power at 65mph+ vs a slightly lower cruising rpm. My car feels perfectly happy running along at 3000+rpms. I don't get vibrations, hear the motor, exhaust, or intake. If you think 3K @ 70mph is bad, try my old 90 CRX Si which was spinning 4.5K at 80mph

Seeing that my car gets 25+mpg on the highway while running along at 3000-3300rpms, I'm perfectly content with the gearing. But that's just me.


Dave

IceY2K1

iTrader: (3)

Good point about piston speeds.

However, 4000rpms vs. 2500rpms on a 3.0 is still more wear and tear. Will I ever own this car long enough to notice the difference, probably not.

It's still a waste of power I don't need and I'd rather have a shorter(taller?) ratio for high speed extended driving intervals.

I wouldn't change 1st-4th, unless I saw some serious 1/4-time changes and I could shorten 5th.

IceY2K1

iTrader: (3)

I could be off. That's just an approximate. Plus, I'm never doing 80mph, I cruise closer to 90.

Even if it's 3500rpms(which it's not that low), the 1000rpm difference is a waste for MY TYPICAL DRIVING habits.

97maximase5spd

You'd need a taller TOP gear for lower engine rpms at high cruising speeds.

I respect anyone's opinion because everyone has their own driving styles and if you are a highway cuiser a mod like this isn't for you. I on the other hand would love shorter 3-4 gears and keep 1,2,5 about the same.



You mean make 5th longer.. right?


I wouldn't really care much for 1/4 mile times when doing this. I'd feel nice knowing that if I need to pass/race someone for a couple of seconds and i'm going 50mph, I could drop it into third and pull almost as hard as 2nd gear does. Or on the highway I could drop it to 4th and pull almost like 3rd gear. 4th gear feels too close to the 5th gear ratio, IMO. There's just not enough oomph in 4th gear for me. I usually save a shift by shifting from 3rd to 5th alot because 4th feels almost like 5th to me.

IceY2K1

iTrader: (3)

Hey, if you can swap 3/4, I can swap 5th. Hopefully, something is possible.

Probably, I always get it backwards anyways.

I defintely wouldn't mind SLIGHTLY shortening(right?) 2nd/3rd, 1st/4th is fine, but 5th is too damn tall for my 95+% HWY driving.

97maximase5spd

And you got it backwards again...lol

Taller gear = higher top speed/lower rpms at any given speed/slower acceleration

Shorter gear = lower top speed/higher rpms/faster acceleration

Dave B

I'd prefer to have shorter gears in from 1-4. The gears are just too long. There's way too much of a drop from 1st to 2nd, IMO. A 4.10 ratio would be perfect.


Dave

IceY2K1

iTrader: (3)

Taller = bigger diameter right?

SteVTEC

So buy an automagic.

Seriously, though. The engine is fully lubed so there's already little to no engine wear when you're just cruising. Most of engine wear occurs at startup.

Some tard that used to live near me got a BRAND NEW Toyota Corolla. Every morning he'd wake me up because he'd start up the engine and immediately rev the shia out of it to warm it up I guess.

The engine was blowing oil smoke in a matter of months because he performed about 300,000 miles worth of torture in just a few months

97maximase5spd

"Gearing is an overlooked and often poorly understood part of tuning. For those of you already not well versed in tuning concepts, the choice of gear ratios in the transmission can have as much to do with the character of the car as the actual power output of the engine. (Well, within reason anyway!) Differences of 2-4 percent in ratios will alter both the feel and acceleration ability of any car. This is because the torque multiplication of the engine power is a product of the overall ratio (gear ratio times final drive ratio) of each gear. This the area we examine in this section. We will only discuss the WRX 5-speed in this section.

To me the most disappointing fact about the world market WRX is the very tall gearing we share with the 5-door version of the WRX NB turbo in Japan. The taller, wider ratio gear box has a near useless fifth gear. Changing to a closer ratio gearbox that has closer 3rd, 4th and 5th would magically improve mid to high speed acceleration off of corners. It would also limit your desire to wind the motor out all the time in the intermediate gears and better utilize the mid range torque the motor effortlessly produces. Yes, the car would run down the freeway at higher rpm, but it is a trade I will take any day, six speed gearbox not withstanding...

My own car has this 1993-96 gear box with shorter 3rd, 4th and 5th gears. I enjoy it and do not mind running the motor between 3400 and 4000 RPM on the open road. After 120,000 miles the motor does not seem to have minded either....

we might claim that an 'average' American consumer would also be alarmed at 3500 rpm plus engine speeds on cruise control. Both are in fact true reasons for selling a wide ratio gearbox outside of Japan, but in reality our EPA gas mileage test cycle has long favored a very tall 5th gear to get the fuel mileage as high as it possibly can. There is wide ratio and then there is w-i-d-e ratio. We have the w-i-d-e ratio.
When the Japanese WRX shifts to third at 60mph it starts pulling from 5000 rpm, the world gearbox is pulling from only 4600rpm. Huge difference in power to the wheels and the Japan model is going to just walk away. With the pulling power of fourth gear a Japan WRX is going to run away and hide....

When driven with moderate RPM, say between 3500 and 5000 rpm, the US car becomes very sluggish above about 60 miles per hour in comparison to the close geared WRX. The Japanese WRX will pull very strong between corners to about 100 mph without ever going above 5500 rpm! This is what is meant by gear ratios affecting the car's character. Not only is the Japanese set of gear ratios much sweeter to drive in the intermediate speeds, the US car basically has nothing left to it after the red line in 3rd gear when compared to the acceleration ability if the Japan gearbox.

This closer geared transmission is perhaps the most substantial difference between the Japan WRX and the world export models, certainly as important as the difference in power."

...some more insight on gearing for you.
may not be about a maxima but one can see that torque can be applied much more efficiently to the wheels with a closer geared tranny.

IceY2K1

iTrader: (3)

NeeeeevAr!

You are right about when most of the engine wear occurs, but is constantly running 1000-1500 rpms higher for LOOOOOONG periods of time negligeable wear and tear?

How much wear is there on the accessories(alt, water pump, A/C compressor, power steering pump, etc.)?

I guess I'm a over-reacting, but it just kills me. Maybe I should just put a big Type-R sticker over my tach, so I can't see it.

That neighbor of yours, . I see that all the time though at my work. Not reving it, but as soon as the starter disengages, they slam it in gear and go. Ouch! They don't even give the engine time to back down the RPM spike at startup before the trans SLAMS into gear. I wince everytime.

CKNY

iTrader: (1)

jeff, get the 6 speed transplant working =) you KNOW you want to hahaha

Nealoc187

iTrader: (23)

I'm surprised Steve or Ari haven't plugged this into cartest yet

Anyhow, I did. The results are negligable. I used my car for reference, which I have accurately modeled in cartest to .01 of a second, using my real WHP numbers, etc. Changing the ratios from stock to Altima gear ratios yeilded a .01 gain in 1/4 mile in every stage of modification, stock, ypipe/intake, MEVI ypipe and intake, even with the hypothetical numbers my JWT ECU will give. Trap speeds were unchanged down to 1/100th of 1mph. Top speed however changed nicely, up 3mph in almost every test except the MEVI+ECU car which was unchanged.

Gains to other spees were negligable also. On average the car with STOCK gearing got to 140mph a full second faster than the car with Altima gearing, though the top speed of the Altima geared car was higher.

I also took the liberty of changing the final drive ratios to the suggested 4.10 rather than the stock 3.82. 1/4 mile ETs improved about .05 seconds, though trap speeds suffered about .5-.75mph. Top speeds were lowered.

So, the stock gear ratios are pretty much ideal, changing them is definately not worth the effort unless you crave that extra 3mph top speed.

Dave B

On my lunch break I went and tested out 5th. At 85mph, I was right at about 3350rpms. That's not bad at all.

Neal,
I guess a 4.33 is the only way to go with the MEVI and JWT


Dave