What is the easiest way to find out if my 4x4 is working. It is manual and it lights up but I don't really notice a difference on the snow. Any ideas?

 

drive on pavement and turn. If steering wheel does all type of crazy crap during a tight turn on dry pavement its working. And then after that dont do that again cause its not good for you 4 wheel drive to be driving on pavement haha

 

You should be able to tell easily in snow. Put the transfer case in 2wd and stomp on the gas, then shift into 4wd (lock hubs) and repeat. You should notice a big difference. Or find a parking lot and go into 4wd and turn the wheel all the way left or right and drive in a circle, you should notice some jerking,pulling in the wheel. Only do it on snow though, really hard on things when its on dry pavement.

 

NOTE: do NOT shift while stomping on gas..... stop first, shift then try again.

if on snow hold the brake and attempt to do a "burnout" if the rear tires spin then ur in 2wd. if the whole truck moves then your in 4wd or your front brakes dont work lol

 

Those are helpful. Thanks for the tips.

 

yeah locking the hubs might help...

i made that mistake one time, after 7 years of driving my jeep with auto hubs - i forgot all about manual hubs... felt like a jack *** when i called my friend frantic that the 4x4 didnt work

otherwise you should definably be able to tell... try putting it in 4x4, drop it in reverse and give it a goose on the throttle. then back to drive/1st gear and you should be able to tell if your locked in

 

The 4x4 works with the hubs locked, but I thought it was also supposed to work with them not locked. Kind of like an awd arangement where you could run. It on pavement too. Maybe I am think wrong?

 

No. the 4wd only works with the hubs locked

 

Ok. I've only had automatic locking hubs before. So I didn't know. So the 4x4 works. Only problem is the front and rear diff are not the same gear so I can't really use it.

 

what are the ratios front and rear?

 

Thought the part about shifting into 4wd & making sure hubs were locked, then repeating the process implied a pause between the 2wd & 4wd part.
You should be able to shift on the fly from 2wd to 4hi, don't think I'd do it under throttle.

 

The numbers should be .01 apart from the factory if thats what you mean.
For example, if you have 4.11 gears in the rear, the front will have 4.10s, or if you have 3.55s in the rear the front will be 3.54.

 

So now we know the 4wd works when you get out and lock the hubs. How do you know the gear ratios between front and rear are different? It takes a peek out the window to know if your front axle is live while spinning and only a glance will tell you if you have auto or manual hubs. So how do you know the front and rear have different gear packages..did you do a swap?

 

I think someone before me put in a new rear end because the guy I bought it from said it is rough in 4x4 and when I tried it it was kind of choppy like the front was spinning faster than the rear.

 

easiest way to find out is buy a 5 gal bucket of diff fluid. and new seals. pop em open count your teeth and put em back together... its never a bad time to change diff fluid