LuigiVampa

I have a 2010 F350 Diesel pickup truck which I use as my two vehicle. It is a 4WD with manual locking hubs up front and I have to shift inside the cab for 4WD low and high.

Many times I keep the front hubs locked just because I am lazy, forget or for convenience. I poked around the internet to see if there is any detriment to keeping them locked and there are mixed reviews with most pointing to no problem. So why lock unlock? Anyone have any thoughts on this?

Found this as a reference - http://4x4abc.com/4WD101/hubs.html

One other questions which I was not able to figure out. In my Ford F350 with 4WD engaged by steering radius goes down as I can't turn the wheel as much as when it is unlocked. My 2010 Infinith has AWD as well as 4WD and even in 4WD mode this does not happen. Different setup I guess?

So anyone leave their hubs locked?

ohenryinatlanta

i have an excursion which is basically the same thing. mine has a in cab selector but i can lock them manually should i choose.

keeping the hubs locked creates a bit more wear as the axle/diff internals spin with the wheels. likely also creates some drag hurting gas mileage.

Bill Verburg

Talk about old school tech, last truck I owned w/ those was a '78 Scout which turned to rust decades ago.

Manual hubs are there solely to increase gas mileage and reduce wear on front axle, when engaged but w/ the transfer case in 2wd, the front wheels drive the front axle and front driveshaft, none of this movement is necessary for travel in 2wd. A reason to leave them engaged is that you will want to change to 4wd w/o exiting the truck to lock the hubs,

If you aren't normally using 4wd then you leave the hubs unlocked, now the front wheel no longer drives the axle and all the connected hardware back to the transfer case. The only issue is if you want to use 4wd you now have to get out and manually lock the hubs

FOS373

I've had two Ford SuperDuty's - a 2000 F250 7.3 and current '16 F350SRW 6.7l. I've nearly always left them locked. The few times I unlocked them, i forget which way to unlock them as the weather was ****e and it was cold and dark.

LuigiVampa

Thank for the answers - I kind of figured its OK to keep them locked. Basically wear and tear on front axles, which is no big deal, and slightly reduced gas mileage around town. I keep them locked in the winter and unlocked during the summer. I don't do any long distance towing in the winter so they are not locked for any long haul driving. Just wanted to make sure I wasn't screwing something up.

Yeah, its old school and its hard to shift into the various gears, but it works.

BlueBarchetta

LuigiVampa

We both joined RL Nov. 11 - you have 66 posts and I have over 8000 posts. I am going to treasure this post!