Both wheels on the right side of my 90 geo tracker are locking up in for 4 wheel drive. cant tell if it is in 2wd. if i back up a ways it seems to free them up and let me drive foward.
are you driving on ice, mud , snow, or hard dry pavement.
if on pavement and in 4wd, you are winding up the 4wd system, causing it to jam.
stop doing that ( there is even a service bulletin saying how to unwind)
you car does not have a Spider gear , front to rear so windup is possible.
I suggest you test each wheel raised and check for proper action in both 2wd and 4wd.
you could have something very dangerous to you and the car.
are you front locking hubs, autos or manuals, oem or aftermarket.
make Darn sure the front wheel bearings are not going bad. < very dangerous on kicks.
it's been doing it on ice and snow after it's been sitting for awhile. that doesn't matter it's been fine on these wyoming roads. where's the bulliton at? the wheels are auto locking hubs. think oem, not sure.
no words on hub locks = oem , most likely
the TSB is just telling people that drive on dry roads, that if it does lock up
then raise one wheel to unlock it. keep hands away from tires as jacking, bang, unwind.
it is not AWD, it is exactly like a ww2 jeep, same driveline.
if it were mine....
1, put car in neutral tranny and transfer case, chock wheels.
2. jack each wheel in turn and see if all feel loose and free.? NO? , bad news.
3. now put the car in 4wd. (4H) and tranny in Park or 4th gear as approp.
set front locks to unlocked, jack each front wheel and check that each wheel is free.
no , then bad locks.
yes, then now lock each hub and spin tire, it will be locked so you cant spin it.
if not, the again the locks are bad, broken, dirty , rusted , corroded just mangled in side. what ever.
if you can not spin a wheel in front with either locks unlocked OR, 4wd lever in Neutral then the wheel bearings are bad or the calipers are bad.
IN this state, it is a very dangerous car to drive, if it siezes , the axle can explode.
from there it gets ugly beyond belief. Cascading fails are bad news.
that's what I would do , pronto.
if you need that bulleton I can mail it to you, but it is just from the OEM to crazy people. kinda sad people need a Bulleton like that when it says not to do it in the op guide and every FSM ever made. unlock the hubs on dry land.
Ignore all posts for people (?) that say I do it all the time and nothing bad happens.
yah, and I walked across the street blind folded yesterday, and nothing happened.
if you do wind up , put right tires in ditch to unwind , easy. the do unlock or do 2wd.
JTGH, I'm intrigued. What is being referred to here by wind up or lock up which happens as a result of driving locked up on dry pavement? If I am interpreting correctly, no spyder between front and rear, can one diff or the other build up torque? I have had to run with man. hubs locked the last couple of days due to a bit of grinding (am going to service them tomorrow, promise). And what about in this scenario...sometimes in winter here we get strong winds which blow drifts onto the highway, but between the drifts it is basically dry pavement. It's kind of nice to have it in 4 High for stability when hitting these snowy spots, but does this mean we probably shouldn't? Sure don't want to cause the little bugger any distress in those diffs :-). (Holy exploding axles Batman--- don't need that).
While 4WD wind up is a serious issue and shouldn't be taken lightly this is a 100HP 2700lbs vehicle not a 300HP 5000lbs truck. I have experienced Alberta winters with a Sidekick for 14 years and exploding differentials is extremely unlikely. I have gone 150KM/H on dry pavement in 4WD and regularly engaged/dis-engaged at speeds well above 100KM/H. This is not recommended operation but shows the extreme durability of the Suzuki drive train. I would not worry about driving on a snow drifted highway in 4-HI and would say it's much safer than not driving it in 4WD. If you follow jtgh's TSB recommendations and keep in mind that this is really only a dry pavement concern then you shouldn't have any major issues.
the blow up ?, just happened to someone here last month.
siezed axle, ring pushed up violently into pan, scratch axle and engine. my be he will chime in?. I bought some of his parts.
I was trying to help him. Was glad, he was ok.
on ice ,dirt,mud, wet,, no problem,
in 4wd on dry ground and you are doing lets say 60MPH and one axle siezes , it can be how they say "interesting". I think it was a front wheel bearing seizure. (while locked).
mostly anytime the running gear, drags, screams or pulls, it is time to look real careful.
sorry, I was not trying to imply that driving kicks on snow blown roads is bad, not at all , they can eat them for breakfast.
I try to find people in dangerous situations and try to get them to look at the problem very carefully. losts of front bearing problems posted here.
still not sure about this binding issue.
one guy posted about binding steering, turned out autotranny was
slipping, he had so little power car would not turn.
that one was fun.
While 4WD wind up is a serious issue and shouldn't be taken lightly this is a 100HP 2700lbs vehicle not a 300HP 5000lbs truck. I have experienced Alberta winters with a Sidekick for 14 years and exploding differentials is extremely unlikely. I have gone 150KM/H on dry pavement in 4WD and regularly engaged/dis-engaged at speeds well above 100KM/H. This is not recommended operation but shows the extreme durability of the Suzuki drive train. I would not worry about driving on a snow drifted highway in 4-HI and would say it's much safer than not driving it in 4WD. If you follow jtgh's TSB recommendations and keep in mind that this is really only a dry pavement concern then you shouldn't have any major issues.
I was wondering if it is hard on the front diff to run the manual hubs locked but still in 2wd high? I like to lock the hubs when I start up the mountain so I don't have to get out when I hit the snow. And is it OK to put it in 4X4 while moving?
Thanks
Bear
No it's not hard on it as the front and rear are not connected but will wear out the axles and differential sooner and increase rotational mass so it will have a negative effect on fuel consumption, acceleration and braking. It's best to stop before shifting the transfer case but I rarely practice this and as long as none of the wheels are slipping and theres no load on the drive train and the transfer case is warmed up it will shift smoothly.
You guys might shake your heads at this one, but I actually can shift from 4L to 4H "on the fly". But you have to do it right. After driving heavy trucks for over 30 years, it's all in speed vs gear vs engine speed synchronization. You have to get up to about 45 km/hr in 5th gear 4L, clutch in, drop tranny into 3rd or even 2nd, pull transfer case into neutral carefully, let out clutch, wait for rpms to drop, and "gently" "feel" it into 4 High. It slips in effortlessly as the rpms sync. with speed. I don't reccommend trying this unless you have a feel for this type of thing, and understand exactly what I am talking about. You can turn gears into iron filings or worse pretty quick if you don't do it right. I just thought I'd share this for the heck of it. BTW Schoner, what kind of rpms does it take to get a tracker to 150 km/h? I think mine would have to be 7 grand to get that kind of speed. :-)
G'day all.
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HELP! Wheels locking up
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