Traction question. Need answers before hitting the road!!

[Stainbox12]

As some of you may know, i've been fighting a problem with my car, regarding engagement and disengagement issues. My front wheels are jacked up, but the rears wheels are in the ground, my Transfer was down, while i was doing some transmission work. To make the story short, i had a friend look underneath the car, where the small shaft connects to the transfer. Whenever i had the clutch in gear, and i release it, this little shaft started moving, and faster if i gave it gas. But im wondering, why would my front tires not spin? maybe its because its jacked? i thought that dsm's had front wheel traction distributed through the transfer case to the rear wheels. I guess that if i connect the transfer, and unjack the car, i would have only a RWD car. Help me, because im about to hit the road. Thanks.

 

[Portilla]

With open diffs, power goes through the path of least resistance hence why people go to an LSD for traction. To run front drive you need a welded diff.

 

[jredgo1234]

The car is designed so that when wheels are slipping power will be diverted to other wheels with traction. The viscous coupling does this, but is not designed to handle free spinning wheels such as when your car is jacked. Read inside the driver door and it says "danger this car is equiped with a viscous coupling, never operate when the car is on jacks" because doing so screws up the viscous coupling. I hope yours is still alive.

 

[S Ladd]

wow, I did not know that... hope you did not break anything

 

[Stainbox12]

Alright guys, i found out the problem, i removed the car from the jacks, and its moving. Apparently its true that if the front wheels are jacked, they don't move at all. Well as everybody said, i hope i didn't mess up my VC. Thanks for the help and support for the past months.