space-junk

iTrader: (1)

hey guys, i have a ujoint thats just about gone in the rear, and i have some races that i HAVE to go to tonight in placerville...

ive read up on it and i have seen mixed opinions on it on good versus bad, but do y'all think id be okay to run about 100 miles on front wheel drive alone?? i mean, id pull the read driveshaft and keep it in 4wd...

i know that Norbert did this for a few MONTHS on his DD and didnt have any problems, i just wanted a second opinion...

thanks guys...

iamsuperbleeder

I don't see any issue, providing your front u-joints and CV's are in good shape, then go for it


the furthest I've gone in FWD is just down the road to the parts store, when I got stuck in the middle of doing my rear u-joints and that was with SHOT CV's; both of them, lol

a4runnerfreak

You can. Just don't push it, would be my suggestion. Stay a lil under the speed limit, and leave earlier.

Tofer

i drove from portland to tacoma (~160 miles) with just FWD..... and i have a square drive shaft. it was fine even at 70mph

ozziesironmanoffroad

supposedly it handles better in fwd lol

khany2002

I was in a similar situation as you just a few months ago (you should be able to do a search against my name and find the thread) -- I decided to get started on some summer maintenance a little early, and a 2-hour u-joint job turned into over a month long fiasco.

I kept driving the truck, as it is my DD.

I would say I put on about 1000 km in "FWD", although I always drive like a granny in the truck, and, never took it over 60 miles per hour for long. It had to be like that for so long as I had an election I was campaigning for (and won), and then final exams and projects -- I was packed up solid.

It definitely felt a little less refined than RWD, probably since the front driveline gets 'used' a lot less than the rear, but other than that, the truck was no worse for wear.

I've double checked most of the 4WD system, and it seems to be perfectly fine, and all I plan on really doing to offset the additional stress is re-pack the front hubs as a preventative measure.

So, in short, I wouldn't recommend street racing the truck in FWD (although I've heard of people having ACTUALLY gone out and street raced, off-roaded, and rescued stuck cars with the rear driveline dropped) -- just take it easy, and you'll be fine.

There are a few driveability tidbits you'll find, such as, if you are in drive, and throw it back into 2wd, the rear output shaft will spin with nothing stopping it, so if you throw it into park, it doesn't sound too pretty, but, nothing will get damaged.

Good luck!
khany2002

iamsuperbleeder

you know what else you can do in FWD?

pull the parking brake and dump the clutch, and roast your front tires

although I wouldn't reccoment it... but you could...

dropzone

iTrader: (6)

you should be fine...now if you are running a locker up front, be prepared for an interesting driving experience

by now you are probably already to placerville

aviator

I ran for about 5mos on front end only [figure about 5-6000 kms] with no issues of any kind on my 87... maybe even slight improvement on mpg...
just handles a little differently is all when cornering, but if you've driven a FWD before no worries...
just don't load it up to the rails with rock/firewood and all will be good...

stupid_mud_gremlins

I did 100 miles on mine in FWD for Xmas (seized the rear diff and br0ke off the driveshaft and stripped the gears in the diff before removing the front yoke to get going again) made it about 80 of the above with a BUSTED u-joint in the front end. One H of a drive that was...but yeah, go for it I say...