How to Measure Your Pinion Angle | QA1 Tech

When you build a high horsepower hot  rod you want to get that power to   the ground. Let's talk pinion angle and  how we're going to get that power down. Hi I'm Damien Brase with QA1. Today we're  going to talk about pinion angle adjustment   or more appropriately driveline adjustment. So  when we're looking at pinion angle adjustment   we actually need to look at the entire driveline  and the angles associated with the driveline and   the driveshaft in order to get everything set  appropriately. When we're talking pinion angle   adjustment we really need to look at the entire  driveline as a system and that's why we want   to start with the engine. We want to figure out  what angle or engine and transmission are at so   we can make sure that our pinion runs at an angle  parallel or close to the engine and transmission   angle to get everything set appropriately. So we  want to have them run approximately parallel to   each other and we'll adjust the pinion up or down  a little bit depending on the application and the   vehicle how everything's actually set in relation  to each other. But there's a couple tools that   you're going to need to do this. First off we're  going to start with an angle finder. Now you get   the inexpensive dial type like this from the local  hardware store. A digital angle finder works much   better or you can also get a phone app that would  allow you to do that as well. We're going to use   the digital angle finder today. So first thing  we want to do is find a surface on the engine   transmission or slip yoke where we can get a  measurement from. This car has exhaust running   underneath the drive shaft so it is difficult  to get to the slip yoke but we can actually go   off the front of the balancer this car has an  LS and a nice flat surface on the front of the   balancer. So we're going to put our angle finder  up here zero it out on the front of the balancer   and we're going to use that for the rest of  our measurements. With the manual transmission   in this car it does have a nice flat surface on  the bell housing here. So we'll double check it   and make sure that it's still  zeroed out. And that looks good. Now if you've got a machine slip yoke you can use  that as well this car we just don't have access   to it with the exhaust running underneath and  it's pretty tight up against the floor pan up   here. So we've got our angle we'll go to the rear  end. Now on the rear end we've got an 8.8 in this   car so we've got the nice flat flange on the  front of the diff that we can measure off of we   can also measure off the u-joints on the housing.  This car we've actually got about a half a degree   or so of pinion up. Now this car has the factory  upper trailing arms in it they're non-adjustable.   Putting an adjustable trailing arm in like the QA1  trailing arms would allow us to bring that pinion   angle down a little bit and reason we want to do  that is under load that pinion is going to wrap up   the rear diff is going to wrap up and it's going  to straighten out that angle. So having the pinion   pointed down a degree or two is really going to  help everything operate more efficiently as the   car is under load and going on the track. Now that  I've covered what we're measuring now we need to   look at the how. If you've got adjustable trailing  arms like these that we've got right and left hand   threads so loosen up the jam nuts you can actually  adjust this on the car. With this car in order   to rotate the pinion down a little bit we would  actually lengthen the upper trailing arm if you've   got a car where you need to rotate the pinion up  you would want to shorten the trailing arm up.   So if you've got a leaf spring system you would  use shims differing types of suspension have   differing methods. But in general we're looking  at the same type of thing and making similar   adjustments to it. When measuring driveline angles  and making adjustments to the pinion angle the   suspension does need to be loaded and the car  sitting at ride height. If you don't you're   going to get wrong angles because you do have some  dynamic changes in the rear suspension that will   change those angles. Proper drive train angles are  going to help apply the power to the ground and   extend the life of your drivetrain components. For  more information visit QA1.net and go drive it.

Channel: QA1

Views: 33,491

Keywords: QA1, QA1 Precision Products, Car Parts, Suspension, Suspension Upgrades, QA1 Equipped, Go Drive It, Made In The USA, Bolt-On Suspension, Suspension Swaps, RestoMods, Pro-Touring, Muscle Cars, Classic Cars, Street Performance, Drag Racing

Id: IJQWk3Xcdzo

Length: 4min 16sec (256 seconds)

Published: Tue Apr 04 2023