I just wish I could say they same about their slushboxes!

 

I know, they haven't made a good one since the Torque Flite 727. I actually can't believe that they have not improved them.

Mike

 

Another point to make, is how often does the 4x4 actually work in the Z71?? My father's RARELY ever works on the first try when he needs it to. I can just pull the lever in mine and its ready to go.

 

add it up and those 32 gears are like 3:73s or 3:55s when used with those 32" tires. in my petersons 4wheel and off-road, the dodge off-road package did poorly due to the shocks hitting the frame rail and a few other things. it did do well in the rock crawling and all other off-road test except for fire-roads.

the general really shouldnt have went with that thermal/vacuum/whatever lock for the 4wd. i have heard countless horror stories about them and people being stranded. luckily the aftermarker makes a cable activated system. another thing, i know the older gov-lock lockers really didnt engage well and needed decent (5mph or faster) to enguage and when they did it was a terrible bang/clunking on some.

as for the ford, the early off-road packages i dont know much about but i heard they were just skid plates and stickers. the new FX series seems to be the best overall package introduced since the dodge. cant beat all those goodies.

 

These new trucks are so horribly expensive, and you really can't buy them the way you used to, to handle real world off road conditions. I find it much more economical to buy an older rig and upgrade it and beef it up handle the kind of off roading I do. I love my manual transfer case and lockout hubs!! I can't afford to buy what I want...so I build what I want!

 

im seeing alot of miss-information here, regarding the GM off road stuff. Forst of its not a locking diferential, trust me. I run whith the GM crowd quite a bit and the diff is an Eton Gov-Lock. Its just a limited slip rear, nothing special. But i would never take a chevy or a GMC for off roading for one reason, the 10bolt rear end. Its a piece of junk, if you hammer it too hard whith one wheel in the air you have no more spiders left. I have never seen a ford 8.8 do that.

 

I have to be very carefull here.....I am a chevy fan, but love coming to this site to read all the info and some misinfo given out. Just from experience, I owned a 96' Z71 - that was the first year for the vortec. It had an open diff (1 wheel wonder), but did have nice suspension and skid plates. Then I owned 01' Z71, 4 wheel disc, "LOCKING" diff (not limited slip), skid plates, and offroad shocks, and who could forget......stickers of coarse. It has been tossed back and forth here that chevy's do have locking, they don't have locking.......Well, they DO have a LOCKING diff. If you watch TV on early Sunday morning, GMC has an infomercial comparing their truck to the competition and one of the tests is they run the truck through a simulated ditch to get 1 rear wheel off the ground to prove it has a locking diff. They test a dodge with a limited slip that just spins the wheel in the air.

I will say that the pre 99' chevy's did have issues with engaging 4x4, but that problem was fixed with the newer trucks.

As far as a solid front axle on the Superduty vs the independent suspension on the HD, I will say this. You would have to hit "something" pretty dang hard to see the benefit of owning a solid front axle, and if you did hit that "something" so hard, you probably messed other things up on the truck. I would much rather have the smoother ride, besides, who is going to put a $40,000 truck in that sort of a situation??? Granted, I am a hunter, and I don't have a problem taking a truck off the paved road and getting it dirty, but I will not do any rock-crawling, or ditch hopping with a $40,000 truck.

Just a little about me, I am 25, been married for 2 years, got a great job out of college, but currently have to drive 60 miles 1 way to work (soon to change to 15 because we are relocating). I took my wife's Monte Carlo and since she didn't want to be driving my Z71, we traded it for an Escalade (AWD with 6.0L).....It towes my 28' powerboat good, but would rather have a diesel, so after we move and get settled, I am going to look at BOTH Superduty AND Duramax and make an educated decision. I will never own a DODGE...I have 2 brothers that did own dodges and BOTH had troubles, 1 pretty severe and received no factory help.

Boy that was long..........ok, comense the bashing!!!!

 

Some of us like the firmer ride of the solid axle leaf sprung front end! Heck I wish my 84 F150 did, then I could hang one of those big winch bumpers on the front!

 

The problem with ifs in my opinion is simple.... If you get rough with it and work it you end up in the alignment shop... And or replacing front half shafts. I have had a few chevys and the z71 is two skid plates... One for the front diff and a tranny skid plate. The shocks are bilstiens and cheap ones at that. The dodge offroad package was 4.10 gears and a taller stance with the 5.9 which was a beefy motor with gears to make them pretty stout. The best off road package to date in a fullsize truck has to be the power wagon. It has a 4:1 tcase, selectable lockers front and rear and lastly a factory winch. They only made it with a hemi which is why you don't see many around. i have owned chevys and for a v8 gas truck that is what I would be driving. fortunately I wanted a heavyduty truck so I got a psd

 

ur missing out on the best feature of the solid axle..

when ur actually offroading the ground clearance under the axle doesnt change...unlike IFS that when it starts moving drops ground clearance quickly and is easily stuck/hi centered...

when i used to go offroading, everytime someone with a IFS chevy/GMC came along they would always be teh first to get stuck.. or broken...hahah...

 

you have to pay a fee to ressurect 5 year old plus threads....

 

I have an Eaton G80 locking axle with my 2 wd GM. A locker IMO is better in most traction limited situations. The locker locks both axle shafts (wheels) when it detects slippage..so you have two wheeld driving. A limited slip transfers power from one wheel to another..whichever wheel has the best traction...so in a real limited grip situation you could have one wheel get power...than the other..than the other.

But a locker on ice...glare ice can be dicey. If you are turning then hit some glare ice where both drive wheels are affected...the locker locks and distributes power to both wheels...but on glare ice...no grip and you can swing your rear end out in a nano second.

In these situations..give me limited slip as it will 'hunt' from one wheel to the other...but not have the tendecy to slide out like a locker on no traction glare ice.

My experience...give me a locker for snow, mud...etc...but a limited slip or better yet a simple open axle for glare ice.

 

The limited slip is nice..... When you have a lot of throttle and it hunts it goes kaboom chevy limited slip isn't that great unless you buy it new and trade it before 75k anything after that and you might break it backing out of the drive way

 

Chevy's truck line don't use a limited slip, they use a locking axle which is different.

I have had a Chevy locker, bought it new and drove it far more than 75 K and 10 + years. I used the locker a lot in different situations. It didn't go 'Ka-Boom'...never a problem, just kept on functioning like new.

The G80 locker, actually an Eaton design and manufacture has been around for years. It was based on one of Eaton's military designs.

 

I dont know if the Chevy is a real locker or not, but it certainly acts a lot different than the detroit my buddy put in his ranger. His 05 Z71 definitely a whole lot different.