[oil pan 4]

Just about everyone on here is looking to reduce vehicle electrical consumption as part of some grander scheme or just simply reduce vehicle weight.
It seems like a lot of people on here are using direct drive starters.
The difference between direct drive and grear reduction are as simple as their name sake implies.
In Direct drive the motor and starter gear turn on the same shaft, at the same speed.
The gear reduction starter reduces the rpms coming off the starter motor before it reaches the starter gear, the gear spins slower but has lots more torque.

It may not seem possible but the more complex gear reduction starters are usually quite a bit lighter and smaller than their direct drive counter parts.
As you can imagine they use less power too.
The gear reduction starter allows the DC motor to spin much faster allowing it to develop more torque and run more efficiently than the direct drive starter that runs at half to 1/3 the speed of the more efficient gear reduction starter.

Gear reduction starters are more expensive. High end gear reduction starters with rare earth permanent magnets are even smaller and lighter.

My diesel takes 350 amps to turn over with its optional OEM style gear reduction starter. The standard direct drive starter took over 500 amps.
The gear reduction starter gives me almost 2 more inches of clearance to run the exhaust and its around half the weight. A rebuilt direct drive starter would have been up to $200, the new gear reduction starter was $250.
The gear reduction starter allowed me to switch to LiFePO4 batteries in my suburban, the weight savings from the starter and lead acid battery removal allowed me to lose over 100lb of vehicle weight.

The starter quit on my camaro back in 2010, so pulled the starter off and instead of running down to autozone and picking up some cheap $70 made in china pos direct drive, I ordered a powermaster rare earth, gear reduction starter from summitracing. Its claim to fame is its 1/3 the weight at 5lb and 1/3 the size and draws less than half the power of an OEM starter.
It cost around $200 and was made in U.S.A.
And it did all of those, the starter that came off weighed about 20lb. The high tech replacement was tiny compaired to what failed.
OEM starters are said to draw 300 too 400 amps, I measured this one taking in 200.
If they made one of these to fit my diesel I am confident it would start it.

So gear reduction starters:
are smaller
lighter
use less power
help your battery last a lot longer

Switching to a gear reduction starter may be able to help you:
reduce weight with starter its self
run a smaller battery to reduce or relocate weight
Make it possible to do an alt delete or solar assist
Jump start your car easier with cheap walmart jumper cables


With out gear reduction starters my LiFePO4 battery mod and relocation would have much more difficult to do.