Why is 2WD only rear wheel drive?


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Posted by David Sherman [72.47.9.228] on Sunday, January 02, 2011 at 20:05:34 :

Over the holidays this woman asked me a logical question -- why is it than when she shifts her 4WD pickup into 2WD it drives the rear wheels rather than the front. She observed that she has no weight or traction in the rear when the truck is empty so it seems like it should drive only the front wheels. The more I thought about it, the more it seems to me that there should at least be an option of selecting front, rear, or both. I can see that when traction is good, you'd rather be pushing the power through the rear axle, which is simpler and has fewer parts to wear out, but I wonder if the idea of having the rear axle be the 2WD axle isn't just a mater of tradition as much as anything. After all, we have pretty large front-wheel-drive vehicles these days, and pretty small four-wheel-drive vehicles. Front transaxles are reliable. Drivers are used to the handling of a front wheel drive. I like the the idea of going up a long grade that might have icy spots in front wheel drive rather than rear wheel drive, so it won't surprise me by fishtailing. On the other hand, I'm always nervous about going down a steep slick grade in a front-wheel-drive vehicle using engine braking because it seems likely that the car would want to spin around backwards. I'll often lock the hand brake on a couple notches just to make sure the rear wheels stay in the rear.

Any thoughts on why 2WD is always rear wheel drive? Any examples where it's the other way around? Any good reason why we couldn't have a "front/rear/both" transfer case?



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