9310 experience / longevity concerns?
- Thread starter Fouledplugs
- Start date
OP
Apologies. Looking at 9310 forged steel gears for a SpiderTrax, as most of the big 9 inch stuff uses 9310 steel instead of the common 8620 steel.
Mumblewood
TJ Enthusiast
9310 is a better steel over 8620 but not by much, I doubt any real significant difference for a jeeps application. I used to heat treat a ton of 8620 and 9310 gears for various companies and always did way more 8620 parts.
OP
Right. Seems like the only steel for the big 9 inch stuff like the 9.5 inches are 9310, as if its standard. So not looking for it based off its claim of being “stronger/softer,” it just seem its the way of the world when it comes to the reverse rotation big 9 gear selection.
My biggest concern is long trips on the road with it.
Probably similar to 4340 versus 300M? Has to be an intense application to justify the increase in cost for not a whole bunch more performance?
I'd be a lot more concerned with the case hardening and the skill of the treater than I would be the alloy selection.
Mumblewood
TJ Enthusiast
Pretty much, if both properly heat treated either will work extremely well for our jeeps and should never notice a difference
MallCrawlOnTons
TJ Enthusiast
So my brother works as a driveline tech for a heavy equipment truck company. They had a contract outfitting front axles in 2-5ton truck for a power company. They got sold into buying 9310 gear sets and bull gears from a gear company cause it saved money. Some trucks were fine, but a few that got on the interstate at 60mph had rounded off the ring gear teeth in 150-200 miles. Granted they were like 6 or 7.xx ratios so they spun faster than say a 3.73 gear set. They lost the contract after that.
You might want to talk to someone who builds gear sets and get their opinion. For highway use, you’ll burn up 9310 in my opinion. Once you talk to the professionals, update this tread. Interested to see what they say. When it comes to heat treat, 9310 and 8620 are heat treated completely different, but different shops will do differnt things. Try calling mark Williams and see if they can give you real wold insight.
You might want to talk to someone who builds gear sets and get their opinion. For highway use, you’ll burn up 9310 in my opinion. Once you talk to the professionals, update this tread. Interested to see what they say. When it comes to heat treat, 9310 and 8620 are heat treated completely different, but different shops will do differnt things. Try calling mark Williams and see if they can give you real wold insight.
Mumblewood
TJ Enthusiast
Honestly to me that sounds like shit heat treatment mass produced 9310. If the gears are rounding then they didn’t take the case (hardening) good enough and probably mass produced. A good shop will run them in batches with samples in each batch that will be cut and inspected to ensure proper heat treat throughout the batch. If it’s one thing I know it’s heat treat, I’ve been doing this since 1996 and take a great deal of pride in good heat treat, weather it come from me or not.
In my experience throughout a lengthy career in this field shit that comes from China is just that, SHIT. But they’ve gotten a lot better in the last 10-15 years, parts that come from the U.S. great, Germany, also great.
MallCrawlOnTons
TJ Enthusiast
Possible. But they lost the contract because of it.
Are 9310 gears usually heat treated and case hardened or just case hardened to slow down the wear.
Mumblewood
TJ Enthusiast
Heat treat is a broad term, case hardening is just a type of heat treat.
An example of how’d you heat treat 9310 after machining it would be to carburize then normalize then temper
Or normalize/carburize and temper.
It’s been ALONG time since I have done gears in a furnace so it’s hard to remember off the top of my head and there are different types and materials I’ve done that to. If I had my books and spec’s I could find it really quick, but I haven’t had to deal with that stuff since probably 2003 or 4. I went into specialized induction hardening full time around then and the last few years working a vacuum furnace training since my last shop did primarily that.
But now I’m all courious again and will have to check My books to get a proper answer lol
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OP
Thanks for the reply.
Trying to clarify for future reading. Your source for this story is your brother? And he is a driveline tech (awesome job btw), telling you about the contract details between a ring and pinion company and the company that he works for? Seems that having that level of detail, you could tell us who the 9310’s were made by, I’d like to know.
Just to make sure I understand what you are saying, a company sold the more rare 9310 gears at a price point that was cheaper than the very common 8620 gear sets?
Anything to back this up? An invoice or maybe a quote that compares p/n’s, brands, product descriptions with prices...?
How many miles is the Baja 1000? Baja 500? The Score off road races? They run 9310’s and go about 60mph or more for many many miles. Strange and USA gear both build their 9310’s in the USA and sponser (supply) most of the race teams with their 9310 gear sets. Including this guy!
You are familiar with or watch the ultimate Adventure, right? Remember all the road/highway miles they put on the ultimate summer camp Jeep?....yep, 9310’s front and rear.
Owner/engineer over at GearWorks posted this addressing 9310’s:
OP
I did a lot of reading and calling around. I’ve already made the decision and purchased 9310’s and high pinion 10 inch axle setups.
I’ll work on Mark Willams and reply back. Hope this will satisfy your questions/concerns with 9310’s and going down the interstate with them.
I’ll work on Mark Willams and reply back. Hope this will satisfy your questions/concerns with 9310’s and going down the interstate with them.
MallCrawlOnTons
TJ Enthusiast
It appears differnt company’s use differnt specs when it comes to 9310. I’ve read from a us gear manufacture that “constant speeds and traveling long distances on the road will result in severe wear and premature gear failure.” You may get talked into using it on the road and it work fine.
Which company did you go with on your 9310 gears. Hopefully not the company I quoted.
Baja 1000 comparison? So you driving 1k then doing a full rebuild like the baja guys? Maybe that’s a bad comparison.
OP
You seem to leave out all the details that matter. Is there a reason to this practice that you have built a pattern of? Who says this? Strange?
You have yet to name the brand who manufactured the 9310 gears that your brother’s company utilized which failed at 60 mph on the interstate in less than 150 miles. The unnamed vendor claimed a savings in cost by purchasing the rare 9310’s which you have failed to show an invoice or receipt showing the savings. It’s odd to think that 9310 would be cheaper than 8620.
As stated before, on the Ultimate Adventure’s Ultimate Summer Camp Jeep, it has been driven ~5x’s that amount of milage on the interstate, utilizes 9310’s front and rear, and has yet to run into issue. Which completely voids your opinion on interstate driving issues with 9310’s. Again, they went much more than 150 miles on the interstate at speed at or around 70mph and the ring and pinion didn’t melt, didn't shear, didn't round off the teeth, nothing bad happened.
Here is a video of all of the UA guys driving from KY to NC including Fred in the Ultimate Summer Camp Jeep with it’s 9310’s front and rear. KY to NC is 539 miles. I believe it shows up on video briefly at the 10:30 mark.
You didnt quote any company or any brand. Still waiting on that. Re read post #14, a few questions still go unanswered.
I answered all your questions, added examples, and even quotes from legit sources.
I would only ask you to answer mine as well.
Notice a pattern here?
As to my rear axle build, Ive posted about it. Look around the forum. It’s a high pinion 10 inch Spidertrax setup. Something very similar to this:
https://bomberfab.com/products/gear...-drop-out-5-43-billet-35-spline-billet-locker
MallCrawlOnTons
TJ Enthusiast
I don’t know why your so defensive about this.
So you want my bother to reach out to Georgia power to get contract copies and receipts for specialty built brush fire trucks they made from older 2wd 7300 trucks years ago? ain’t gonna happen. I ant avoiding your weird requests, but I can’t answer it ether.
like I quoted before(in quotes you must have missed it. “9310 is not meant for daily drivers because constant speeds and traveling long distances on the road will result in severe wear and premature gear failure.”
Thats from us gear, a USA company making gears in the us. All other company’s aren’t as transparent. Like strange making the 10”(9.5”) 3rds for Gearworks. We will never know who gets what from where besides us gear.
What brand gears did you buy and what ratio?
OP
I’m not upset, I’m simply defending facts and you are sharing opinions and stories that cant be corroborated. You post are of hear say, nothing to back up what you are saying with the exception of a copy/paste from US Gear’s website.
No mention if you talked to anyone in the gear industry. However, I was able to post the owner of Gearworks as he shared his insight on 9310’s longevity.
And the fact that the Ultimate Summer Camp Jeep runs them just fine. Even after hundreds and hundreds of miles on the...road.
Right? Gearworks has yet to make a name for themselves. Real pieces of shit, no serious race teams or builder uses them...not even rock bouncers down here in our states run them...wait, thats not true.
If it's stronger/better steel why in the hell would it be more prone to failure with extended driving? If true that makes a real good case for never using it.