legacycentral bbs

I was talking to Hardy last night about this, and it sounds like it is a HORRABLE idea to do this. Now I had never really thought about it before, but it makes sense after he told me about it. It is sapposedly really bad for our center diffs. Once the rear wheels are locked the center diff wants to keep the front axles and rear axles spinning at a relatively same speed so it is really hard on it. Even as week as our open centers are it sounded like it wasn't a good idea.

Sapposedly ralley cars disengage the rear or the center basically once the ebrake is pulled.

Anyone else want to chime in here on this topic? If it is a bad idea, it would be best if we told others about this so that we don't find a surplus of people destroying their center diff.

-Ryan

I've just never done that.. not in my AWD legacy, anyhow.. I've done it a few times in my FWD, but I assume that doesn't do much wrong, as there's no RWD going on..
Why do it to kick the back end out, when there's other ways for us to do that with AWD and enough speed? I stopped doing it mainly cause it's some little ricey-honda trick, IMO.. but that's just me.

I just think it would be a good idea to let others know. Whenever I did it, which has only been three times since owning the car, I did it completely off the gas with the clutch in. I never really thought that much about it since my transmission was disengaged and I didn't engage it till my ebrake was off again, but others may not think about that. Also, if it is really bad, I think people should know why.

The idea is it is still bad even if your not on the gas. I sappose it could be ok if you disengage your transmission, but is the center still having problems even with the transmission disengaged? It would seem that it is still working based on the axles moving.

It's definately a bad bad thing to do.

Rally cars, and the STi all disengage the center diff, basically unloading all power to the front wheels. Not the best thing to do, but it beats killing the center diff, mid race.

Hardy's right, as usual. Loads the center diff. I do it in the snow, as i dont think the traction im generating is enough to do any harm. I'll let you know as soon as i discover this is untrue.

Flicking the wheel and romping on a gear that's high in the revs is enough for me in the rain up through 3rd. You can also tap the brakes and then gas it to use the weight shift to load the rear wheels. And of course there's the infamous clutch kick (this one is a bit easier in a 5speed) but i wouldnt do this with a non-rental/beater

Of course it's bad. renmaxi didn't seem to understand that after his winning rally I posted earlier. He was telling me about a handbrake turn and I later explained to him that it's bad on your center diff... He said it was alright coz his clutch was out

It's easy to think about, anytime you pull the handbrake in a turn, you have your front wheels spinning and your rears locked up, you're pissing off your center diff. Think: you're all of a sudden towing your car with the front wheels on the ground.

georryan wrote:Even as week as our open centers are it sounded like it wasn't a good idea.

Well it wouldnt be a problem if the center diff were open. Since if it were open there wouldnt be a visc goo to shear. Does that sound right to everyone else? If you were to lock the rear wheels with an open center, all the power would be sent to the front wheels but the center wouldn't try to limit the slip. Thus no damage. Right?

Don't we have open centers and fronts??

I thought the only limited slip was the rear. (for me)

all ej 5mt's have lsd's in the center. turbo legs, svx's, wrx's, some leg gt's, some forester's some outbacks, and some rs's have lsd's in the rear aswell.

Ah.

So then, the technique that is taught at high performance driving schools of doing a 180 is not advisable to do? Part of the technique is to lock the parking brakes while having the car in neutral while the car makes a 1/4 turn on its axis at about 25 mph.

OK guys, now I'm confused. I knew our cars had a rear diff and a front diff but what's a center diff?