Outer Limits 4x4 Board

is it true that they stuff up your gearing
cheers

no!

Mini spools have nothing to do with your gearing. Gearing refers to the ratio of engine rpm to road speed.

*madly polishes crystal ball to try and work out what you meant*

I guess you heard that mini spools "break stuff" and might "break you diff gears"

A mini spool will not break anything else in your drivetrain any differently than any other sort of locker when it is engaged Of course, a mini spool is engaged all the time, so that really mens that there is more load on the diff and axle shafts than with an open differential, or a locker that's engaged.

That will result in a few effects.

A) If you are already really pushing the limits of stock parts with big tyres, more power etc, and do stupid stuff, say, on road ( like try to do circles or something) you will be more likely to break an axle than with an open diff (which wouldn't let you do the circle in the first place)

B) There will be increased axle spline wear. I have no idea how long it would take before this is a problem, but it would be a long time. It is a fact though.

C) The increased drive loads will increase thrust on the pinion, which increases the chance of the pinion crush sleeve collapsing. This will eventually lead to poor gear contact pattern, and eventual gear failure.

Only B is really significantly different with a mini spool to another type of locker. A and C will occur with any locker given time.

Personally, I think that auto lockers are harder on the driveline than a spool because of the cyclical unlocking effect.

Steve.

thanks mate
i herd that after a while driving on the highway it stuffs up your gearing

would you recommend a welded diff or a mini spool

you didn't really get what he wrote did you?

IT HAS NOTHING TO WITH YOUR GEARING

Sorry I'm totally confused. You asked a very difficult to understand question, I answered it as completely as I could as someone who has owned welded/mini spooled diffs and explained WHY it has nothing to do with your gearing, and you kinda repeated the question back to me?

There's good reason why poeple get sick of posting on Outers.

there's no basic difference between a mini spool and welded, but a badly welded diff WILL break and may take the gears with it A diff welded well will last for years. A spool can at least be taken out and moved to another diff, so there's less waste.

In operation, they will be the same.

I have welded quite a few sierra diffs and currently run mini spooled rear/airlocker front.

steve.

Actually, you all need to all go read a dictionary and learn some english.

Gearing is the correct term to use to refer to a set of gears. You've all just decided for yourselves that it refers to gear ratio and nothing else.

well in nearly every case when referring to gearing in a 4wd situation people are referring to the gear ratios and the changing of these. Going by his very limited sentence and awkward manner in which it as structured it was a fairly safe assumption to make. But by all means I will admit I'm wrong if in fact he was referring to the physical gears.

and of course if you look up spool in the dictionary it is a

n.
1.
a. A cylinder of wood, plastic, cardboard, or other material on which wire, thread, or string is wound.
b. The amount of wire, thread, or string wound on such a cylinder.
c. Something similar to such a cylinder in shape or function.
2. A reel for magnetic tape.
tr. & intr.v. spooled, spool·ing, spools
To wind or be wound on or off a spool.

so we should have maybe answered about his wool

Gwagensteve wrote:Personally, I think that auto lockers are harder on the driveline than a spool because of the cyclical unlocking effect.

Steve.

That's an interesting thought..... you can certainly hear the effects of a spool breaking traction on the bitumen and my guess that the tyre slip is a fairly controlled unloading.

The autolocker ratcheting on the other hand ?

Any information on the relative loads...... I've been considering a spool of late

I have no idea of the relative loads, but it's the harshness of the ratcheting when going from closed to open throttle thats the concern in my opinion.

I know some of the newer designs are supposed to be better and "ramp load" to some extent, but mostly, I don't I don' think an auto locker is necessarily kinder on driveline than a spool.

Steve.

my fault as you aid i worded it poorly

thanks any way guys
got the info i needed

If you can afford it, go an airlocker... Best for your car.

r0ck_m0nkey wrote:Actually, you all need to all go read a dictionary and learn some english.

How about just using one 'all' while you're at it. There's more to English than just using a dictionary

if a spool or welded is your only real option and your not a great welder id go with the spool.Ive had a few welded diffs break now probably caused by my own errors but for the small price of the spool and the option to remove it,i know thats where i'll go next.They seem to be strong enough

Turbo Tonka wrote:if a spool or welded is your only real option and your not a great welder id go with the spool.Ive had a few welded diffs break now probably caused by my own errors but for the small price of the spool and the option to remove it,i know thats where i'll go next.They seem to be strong enough

Ive welded a few now using low hydrogen electrodes, made sure to clean everything thoroughly and pre/post heated it. Every suzuki diff ive done so far has snapped axles before the centre's had any problems so i recon there the go but saying that i welded my mates zook diffs about 10years ago with a pos gasless mig and that hasn't broken anything (yet ) but its 100% stock and only gets used on the beach for fishing.

And just a warning for people running spools i now know 2 people that have had there cars confiscated under anti hoon laws both driving through petrol stations because there tyres were squealing on the cement and when one tried to explain he had a locker they put a yellow on his car aswell. The police can confinscate your car for wheel spin and you cant do anything to stop them.

I run 9/34 swampers and I get zero tyre hop or squeal on tarmac, but that's mostly because I have zero traction on tarmac

The Prophet - I assume you are in QLD?

Vic's getting worse but geez, I don't imagine it could get that bad for 4WD's down here.

(PS if I was in a carpark and had a spool, and a cop car was there, I'd find something else VERY important to do until the police lost interest....) It's one thing to have an "unsafe"car, and another thing to hoon, but there's no need to attract their interest for the sake of it.

Steve.

i run 31 muddies and get bugger all noise when they are pumped up.if aired down it hops and squeals and carries on.I turned at a intersection once slow infront of a copper with my locker making a racket infront of him.He saw i was idling past him not being stupid and gave me a wave

i still dont agree with having them on the road tho at times

i run 40psi on the road wich is bumpy as hell but reduces all the squeals and hopps of the welded rear, anything under 32psi and its horrible to drive.

I would take the pops and clicks over 40psi in the tyres.

The only thing I can think of in realtion to stuffing up your gears is if you dont re-install the centre properly and you stuff up the allignment of your crownwheel with your pinion.

Otherwise it will have no effect on numeric gearing, it may however feel like you have a little less gearing offroad due to the added traction. IE some situations as you would previously get wheelspin whereas now you will just grip until you overwhelm the grip of both tyres instead of just one.