I've put 35,000 miles on a street driven spool- I'd rather have a spool than a rear Detroit. They "behave" better- no locker wiggle, clunking, banging, etc.

A spool behaves just fine on the street. It pushes straight ahead in turns, so a little more effort is required to turn. It will bark tires on pavement and concreate, but in reality, not much worse than a Detroit does in a pickup. You do not "lose it" around turns. Even on wet, muddy, or loose surfaces you don't "lose it"... From a stop, snow and ice on pavement is easy once you figure out what you need to do.

The only draw back to a street driven spool is tire wear. You can figure you're going to get half the normal tread life you ordinarily would. MT/R's went 20,000 miles of hard trail and pavement use.

 

Thx for the help man. I woud do it, but i dont have the money to buy tires more often...I guess i'll see what happens

 

Yep. I had a Lock-Right for about 2 or 3 years and it was okay. I've had a spool for about 2.5 years and it is much more predictable and driveable.



People always claim that you can't control your turns with a locker/spool, or drive safely on ice and snow. That's retarded. Just use some common sense. My worn out 22RE couldn't spin my back tires if I wanted it to, and I have a flatbed back there that weighs less than 200 lbs.



My truck isn't a daily driver, but over 2.5 years I've noticed increased tire wear. My tires get beat up even worse from wheeling though. To increase tread life, and minimize tire chirps, I run about 32 psi on the road. Anything less and it chirps more than I like.

 

I dunno what to do. If i run a spool and wear tires out fast im gonna be pissed. I dont have th emoney for that many tires. I have another truck and an impala!<that needs money too! So what do you guys suggest? If it was your truck, and it was yrou everyday driver?

 

Option #1 = notalotdough

If you are tight on cash, I'd get a Detroit E-Z Locker or something similar . They don't require setting up gears, provide great traction, and are reversable if you save the parts you pull out.

Option #2 = alotadough

If I had saved up a couple more G, I would have gone w/ ARB's front and rear instead of being spooled front and rear. The hard front locker makes turning a &%$^#@ in tight trail situations, even with the truck in 2x4 and the hubs locked.

Spools are great for the traction and durability, but, they do require a full setup since the ring gear must be pulled off the stock carrier. If you wanted to change gear ratios, it's a great time to do so.

 

Leave it stock...or sell one or both of the other ones....offroading is an expensive hobby!

It sounds like you need to have two trucks: a stock daily driver and a trail rig that you can mod to your heart's content.

 

I recommend Detroit Truetracs front and rear if you don't do a lot of extreme wheeling and do drive on the road a lot. Truetracs are very durable and they offer good traction off-road, not as good as a locker but much better than an open diff.