[Alan Roehrich]

For the vast majority of OE 12 bolt housings, start with a 0.035" shim on the pinion. Odds are, you'll be within 0.005" of where you need to be. If you're taking a similar gear out, use the shim from the previous pinion, and you'll be within spitting distance.

The numbers they give you are the opinions of the guy running the Gleason machine they test the gears on. What matters is the pattern.

And yeah, unfortunately, Richmond hasn't been great lately, and Motive buying them is quite unlikely to improve that.