[goaztecs]

Ron,

You're right. I'm probably not wording this as clearly as I'd like to. Torque is a rotational force that can be measured in a number of places in your car. Two of those places are at the flywheel and at your rear wheels.

A certain mechanical advantage is gained in gear reduction. Think about the tiny gear in your starter turning the large gear that is your flywheel. The fast-spinning small-geared starter gear is able to apply the necessary torque to the flywheel due to the mechanical advantage that is gained by using a flywheel gear that is many times its size. If the flywheel were the size of the starter gear, your starter would not be able to turn your crank against the compression in the cylinders.

In the same way, your actual torque at the rear wheels would be your engine's torque multiplied by the gear ratio in your rear-end, in theory.

Without modifying the engine - wouldn't a change in gear ratio effectively produce more absolute torque at the rear wheels?