I was thinking about getting a cam shaft gear drive for my car. I had heard that they hold up better than standard timing belts but I would like to hear about experiences with them from people that have owned/used them. How noisey are the noisey gear drives? I see people selling theirs on ebay complaining that they were too loud and some people selling the quiet ones for the same reason. A lot of people put them up on ebay just after a few hundred miles and little use.

Any feedback about this would be appreciated.

 

Well first off if you are talking about a SBC, there is not "standard" timing belt. They use timing chains. You can buy timing belt kits, but they are about $500 bucks. If you are looking to upgrade but dont want the noise (personally I love the noise a gear drive puts out), get a double roller timing set. You can get a cheap one that will hold up fine at the auto parts store for $30 bucks. Gear drives are nice, but not worth the money if you arent making any serious power.

 

Well the car's already around 275hp but I'm planning on pushing up to around 400 in the end. I knew about the timing chain also but I think my head is still in my suzuki which I replaced the timing belt not too long ago after the first one shredded itself when I was going about 65 down the highway. Luckily nothing was torn to hell during that trip and it still runs strong with just replacing that. 230k miles and still running strong. Most of the work I've done is just standard replacement and repair, never really upgrading and pushing an engine until now. I've never come across anyone that I know of having the noisy double gear or quiet one for that matter. How loud do they get? My car's pretty frickin' loud already and I don't mind the noise. I just wish I could hear one before making the purchase.

Heh, just do a search on youtube and people have them up there...

Thanks for your help and opinion.

 

Really it is just a loud wine, personally I love it, but when I built my 350 I just went with a double roller chain.

 

Yeah, I think that's the way I'm leaning too. I saw some cloyes, lunati and a few other name brands that were pretty affordable (around 20 - 40 bucks). Any suggestions that you might have towards that?

 

The problem with timing gears, aside from the fact that they do not add power, is that they transfer crankshaft vibrations to the camshaft and cause the valve and sparktiming to be more erratic than with a chain or a belt drive. The more power the engine produces the more the nose of the crank oscillates. A chain, and especially a belt absorb much of the vibration and keep the camshaft and distributor rotating at a steady speed.

 

what pete said.

I used to run a quesit gear drive on my old 327, it pretty much sounded like a powerglide whine, wasn't very noisey at all. The noisey ones are extremely noisy.

 

I can vouch for that...AND I LOVE IT!

 

Hey, drive down to Raleigh, NC and let me hear it! ha ha!

 

My opinion is that whine =harmonics and they have a tendancy to push the cam up against the bearing. I personally dont see the need to use them but I know guys who do and like them so I think it is just a preference issue more than anything.