The design on the front end is exactly the same between a full time and part time except the manual hubs, the difference was in the tcase.

 

ok im not going to argue this with anyone im just saying occasional use is good and necessary but 70 mph down the highway with it locked in is stupid and completely unnecessary why run parts that don't need to be.... thats like leaving all the lights on in your house when no one is home your just wasting your money in the electric bill running it locked 24/7 your just going to be buying more u joints and changing the front differential fluid more often. and needing to grease the bearings more frequently due to the increased heat from the additional moving parts.

 

Well I quess I'm stupid according to you., But mine is sitting out there with the hubs locked in and has been for about a month. This happens every winter I doubt seriously if it would untrack right now without it. What I call stupid is when some fool gets out when a light turns green to lock his hubs in and leaves me sitting there for another red light just because he has some stupid idea that it will magically hurt something. The full time and part time frontends are exactly the same part for part and ford and chevy sold thousands of them. I like the part time better because you actually can save a little fuel when the weather is good. If yours is making funny noises when your hubs are locked then either your lockouts are bad or your ujoints or even the spindle bearings, either way you need to repair them before you need them.

 

unless you have a locker up front, keeping the hubs locked and it in 2wd wont damage anything. the point of the open diff is for one side to spin faster then the other. i wouldnt suggest it for long time travel but as long as your not already wearing your front end then you will be ok.

 

With a properly maintained vehicle, you can drive in 4wd at any speed you want. However, it will increase the rolling resistance of the truck as all 4 tires are pulling & therefore increase fuel consumption. Increased fuel consumption is the ONLY reason that part time 4wd became common place in the 70's. Prior to the fuel crunch, there wasn't a huge concern about locking hubs or part time transfer cases.

You're concerned about an increase in service frequency? You should already be servicing your front axle at every oil change by checking the gear oil & greasing the wheel joints & ball joints anyway. Once a year, you should be pulling your wheel bearings out and re-greasing them. You should be servicing your axle even more frequently if you put lots of miles on your truck, or you like to drive in abusive situations, IE: mud, water & the like.

You're concerned about an increase in front axle wear & tear? There is no magical difference between a front and rear axle, where carrier & wheel bearings suddenly become fragile, or more prone to wear out, or cause the gear oil to need changing more frequently. Likewise, there isn't a magical difference between axle shaft u-joints & driveshaft u-joints that make an axle shaft u-joint more prone to failure, EXCEPT PEOPLE TEND TO IGNORE THEIR FRONT AXLE MAINTENANCE! Then when all that ignoring catches up to them, and something breaks in the front axle, they blame it on "delicate" parts.


EDIT to the OP: Leaving one hub locked & one hub unlocked is hard on your carrier, especially if it's an open carrier. The spider gears will spin without spinning the carrier, meaning that the gear oil isn't being circulated like it is supposed to be. Eventually you will gall your spider gears in the carrier. A limited slip or locked carrier will spin the entire carrier, and will just create some really, really odd handling characteristics.

 

A locker will make absolutely no difference in this situation. If power is not applied to the locker, it will unlock and ratchet, allowing you to turn, just the same as an open differential.

A spool or welded spider gears will make a difference, as they never unlock, but most folks are smart enough not to put a spool in their front axle, anyway.

 

i have never seen someone get out of there truck at a stoplight to engage there lockers i wouldn't know why they would need to do that.... if you know the weathers crappy then engage it before you leave if the weathers nice they shouldn't need to be engaged.... if you drive into bad weather then stop and engage them at an appropriate place not an intersection wow

 

That's basically become how I do it now. It's very hit or miss out here, coming and going throughout the day.

 

well if your not going a bunch of miles then i wouldn't see a problem with it but going long distances highway then its just not necessary thats what im getting at but everyone wants to jump my as$ about it for some reason all im saying is if its not necessary don't do it and if it is then well do it its a tool use it if necessary

also if the axle is unlocked and the shafts are not turning and the transfer case is in 2wd then the driveshaft won't be turning then there should not be wear on the differential which would mean the lubricant would not become contaminated and would not require changing at a regular interval provided the seals are all good and not allowing water and dirt in. such as the rear differential where as wear occurs everytime the vehicle is driven justifying changing the lubricant regularly

 

The weather has been bad here for at least a month and will not get any better until spring, so all but idiots leave their hubs locked all winter.

I'm just saying there is no danger in it hurting it mechanically it does affect mileage a little, but that goes to pot in the winter because of warm up times. And I have had to even get out in the middle of the interstate more than once in the lower 48 when I stopped at a wreck and couldn't untrack.

I'm not saying just run them locked all the time but if you live where you need to or in inclimant weather it will not hurt anything.

 

if the hubs are locked and its in 2wd the driveline will still turn but not be powered.

 

and that's all ive said from the start of this its a tool use it when needed but don't leave it in if its unnecessary

 

Not jumping on you 1994F250, but when you told about the previous owner leaving them locked and destroying the bearings. that info is false and we try real hard for the info on this site to be correct. The problems you had were bad maintenance and normal as a lot of people doesn't maintain there frontends like they should, and the maintenance has to be done at the same intervals whether the hubs are locked or not.

 

in my case with my 4runner. The front bearings were serviced less then 5k miles before. Someone locked the hubs in, 800 miles later the bearings were shot, I unlocked them and kept driving til everything was toast.

 

Oreo, in the case of your 4runner, there is an underlying problem. Locking the hubs in should not cause properly set up bearings to go bad in 800 miles. Could have been that the preload was set too tight, or wrong grade of grease was used, or you got some contamination into the grease, but the locked hubs should not cause the failure.