Andy FitzGibbon

Right you are- but I'll probably never be driving at 6000 RPM. 70 MPH in 5th with stock tires is about 3111 RPM, with 27" tires it would be about 2650 RPM. Put the 27s on and shift to 4th, I'd be running about 3295 RPM. If I wanted to get closer to stock engine speed 28s might be a better choice. This is assuming the tires are actually that diameter, and as we all know they never are. Thanks everyone for setting me straight on this- my last four vehicles have been 84-89 Toyota trucks and 4Runners and it's taking me a while to adjust my brain to the Subaru drive train Andy

Cool, that's all good info. Thanks. I did more searching, didn't realize the 5 speed trans has two overdriven gears. Then it occured to me that going from 23" stock tires to 27" would be about a 500 RPM drop, about the same as shifting from 5th to 4th gear. (I'm sure lots of other people have already figured this out ). Thanks again for all the help. Best, Andy

It's a 5 speed, so I guess it's a 3.9. I saw some references to 4.1 in some other posts, but looking back at them they looked as if they pertained more towards the Legacy. Thanks again for the info, Andy

Thanks for the reply. It's 4WD. I will take a look on the diff tomorrow (it's dark now). Hope the tag is still there (WV is nominally part of the rust belt). Would like to lift the car and run some 27" tires, but not unless I can drop the gear ratio- it barely makes it up the mountains around here now... Thanks again, Andy

I just traded for a 92 Loyale and have been having a lot of fun with it. First post here, been reading a lot of the back posts and am learning a lot. Couldn't find one about how to tell what axle gear ratio I have, though. Can anybody point me in the right direction? Thanks a lot, Andy