Last month, I had my f150's 8 foot bed filled with 8 10-gallon buckets of ice and then the rest of the bed packed with snow. With a full tank of fuel, boy did it sit low. I was the only 2wd moving in the snow. Weight does help.

 

If you were replying to my question, you misunderstood what I was asking. Somebody advertised a fluid coupling that would go between the transfer case and the front driveshaft. It would give you the best of both full and part ime 4X4. You could run on dry pavement in 4X or 2X whatever you wanted and there would be no gear bind. You could choose how you wanted to run at will.

 

On my '89 the door tag says C5 which is 4.10 L/S. Does that mean both axles are L/S? If not, how can you determine if the front axle is L/S?

 

thats just your rear axle.

you can lift the center,so both wheels are off the ground.lock the hubs and spin a wheel.if they both turn the same direction,you have LS.if they dont,then she's open.

cool rig btw.

 

Have you guys ever heard of pushing in the e brake to get the other tire to spin, in an open anyways, and only the back of course. it actually works . when i head of this i tried it in a parking lot. one click at a time and you can find the spot were they both spin. of course your causing wear on the brakes and other stuff and if you have 4x4 you could just pull the lever. but i heard about it and had to try it. kinda neat. ive got opens and plan on changing that soon.

 

Invest in a good set of winter tires. It is amazing how much better they grab on slick/icy surfaces. Big mudders are about as good as a racing slick. I put some winter tires on my FWD car and it goes night and day better after I got stuck in my flat driveway on ice.

My dad has some crappy all seasons on his truck and they looked aggressive and it went for crap in 4wd...got some newer tires that dont look too mean at all and that thing will go better now in 2wd with an open carrier than it did in 4wd. Tire compound/design can make an unbeleivable amount of difference when the roads are slick.

Got my big mudders on my truck with locker in the rear and quite frankly they do great in deep snow when there is something to grab under them but you just cant beat some winter tires with siping in them. They say they perform better than studded tires do in most cases even. Get a set instead of all that pain and agony of axles/lockers/limited slips.

Snowshoe ski resort shuttles are just bone stock vans but got siped winter tires all the way around and them guys were going all over the place the weekend I was there and got 30" of snow. Other 4wd's were getting stuck on flat ground. Just some FYI.

 

I feel lucky that min has l/s front and rear. I didn't know that it was so rare to have it in the front. All the trucks I have owned had the l/s front. Geuss maybe it was due to them being from the northern snow belt?

 

just to chime in...there was mention of making castings for blocks that could put in and removed when necessary...anyone going this route should That make sure they also have the weight secured over the rear axle in the bed....if the weight happens to be sitting up against the tailgate and you lose traction mid corner it could become an interesting ride very quickly....that being said, in the dually (4x2) anytime I am going to be going into weather I keep my rear tank totally full and about 700lbs in the bed....have yet to run into an issue.

as far as full lockers....in my XJ I had front and rear ARB's.....if one tire had any amount of grip you were still going somewhere....only got it stuck once, and that was just my own stupidity

 

I'll admit to only skimming over this thread so sorry in advance if any of this has already been mentioned.

AT tires are not generally well suited for snow and can be as bad as 3 season tires (sometimes incorrectly refered to as all seasons). Rubber compound is too hard and becomes slippery in colder temperature. Depending on the age of the rubber, it will be even worse.

What tire pressure were you running at? Dropping from the 80 PSI (assuming load range E tires) closer to 40 PSI can help.

Sometimes turning the steering wheel from one side to another will change the weight distribution on the tires enough to get you moving again.

We tried cable chains on the front tires of our 4x4 ranger and while they were mild compared to real chains, that thing was unstoppable while still being compfortable on hard ice or exposed pavement. Cables were angled instead of reaching strait across the tires, so that helped keep noise and vibration down.

Tried real chains on my Dad's truck (Old, hard, AT tires) and it was nothing but headaches having to stop so often to tighten them over and over again. Ended up taking them off and took my chances.

 

The Eaton True Trac looks like a nice unit, but I did not see a price either.
Since it uses gears instead of clutches, I am going to guess more dollars.
Other than that, fine unit.

If you have a worn out LS unit, you may be able to get new clutches installed and be back in business.

I had mine set up a bit more agressive than normal.
With the transfer case in neutral if I jack up one tire on either axle, you can not turn it by hand.

If you add weight, something like buckets or another hard balast needs to be secured so it don't move while driving.
More so if you would happen to go off road, a 5 gallon bucket full of sand or concrete coming through the back window will hurt when it hits you.

Most generally, full blown mud tires may work OK in snow, but will always be stuck on ice well before a good snow/ice rated tire will be.

If you compare the wet traction, winter traction and off road traction in these three tires, you will see the ATR and ST have better wet and winter traction than the mud rated STT tire.

Cooper Tires - Discoverer ATR - All-Terrain Tires
Cooper Tires - Discoverer S/T - On/Off-Road Tires
Cooper Tires - Discoverer STT - On/Off-Road Tires

Yes the correct tire does make a huge difference in what your truck can handle.
In some instances, probably more difference than equipment like LS or a locker.

However, a good LS or Locker in combination with the correct tire, well you get the idea.

Marianna, I must not be aware of the type of fluid coupler you are talking about, but it still sounds like it would take away from the 4x4 capabilities in hard core use and also have an overhead in two wheel drive applications.
I have no problem turning hubs in and out or shifting my transfer case when required.
At least that way, when I lock in the hubs and put it in 4x4, I know equal power is going to both axles and all four tires as long as the LS units are working.

With any type of fluid coupling in the front driveshaft, that probably would not be true.
I remember a full time setup one of the manufacturers had on the market back when they first came out with full time 4x4.
For the sake of simplicity it was like a third differential where the transfer case is.
In extreme situations, one tire off the ground and a 4x4 was helpless since no power was going to the other three wheels.
Might be OK for someone, but of no interest at all to me.

 

Cars with full time all wheel drive have that type of fluid coupling in a transfer case mounted differential. The fluid is designed to become more viscous as it heats up from slipping in a traction loss event. So if the rear or front wheels start to slip, the coupling locks (well gets more stiff, in reality its not capable of 100% lockup) and some power is forced to the other end of the vehicle. After you get through the sticky situation, the fluid cools down on its own and the hard lock turns off automatically. The idea of the system is to remove driver thinking from operating the 4wd system. Now the system thinks for you instead.

Thats most likely what that honda CRV had.

Works well for light passenger but for true off roading, you need to have a solid selectable connection between front and rear axles. AWD cars can sometimes find themselves in high angle climbing senarios that put so much vehicle weight one axle, the fluid coupling simply slips anyway and if you aren't careful it can burn out. True off road vehicles to this day still use the part time transfer case setup instead of computer traction control assist AWD setups.

So far the best setup I've had experience with (admittedly not many) was that diesel ranger. Simply drive with the hubs locked and engage the mechanical transfer case when needed. The worse setup by far was Dad's GMC with that stupid axle disconnect setup on the front end. Often it took 5-10 seconds to engage 4wd depending on how cold it was outside. I've since jambed the thing in the deployed position after if failed for a second time. Now its the equivalent of running with the hubs locked all the time and 4wd is instantly selectable via the manual shift transfer case just like the ranger. He's happy with it now.
Mom's Rav4 works great in the snow or mild loose packed roads, but I would want to take it off road. Usually a 1 second slip event is enough to lock the transfer case so when it works, it works very well.

 

Thanks guys, you were talking about 4X4 traction. I just wondered if any of you had any experience. I guess it wasn't practical because it seems to have disapeared.

 

Marianna I don't know if it is the same one you are talking about but I had a cousin that had a weird fluid coupling on a late 70s ford it worked allright, but you could get in some situations where the front would spin without the rear spinning and vice a versa, All mine have been part time except the old ladys 99.

 

Marianna's Idea is great for most on-road situations where the driver wants no involvement...the downside is 99% of the systems are limited to sending at most 90% of the torque to the opposite end (at that is in extreme situations, with everything running perfect). We an awd setup on the sienna that works that way...deffinatly better than 2wd in heavy rain or snow, but in snow/ice conditions with a full load, even with sipped billzzak's it left some to be desired.

In short I bought it cuz the wife liked it, and for her driving it works great...for anything else, not so much

 

The one my cousin had I don't think came from the factory.