Locked or open transaxle

I looking for opinions. Lock or open diff? And why? I had some good conversation yesterday on a thread and would like to see others opinions. Peerless 930 woods beater.

If you lock your diff, you risk the locker coming apart and damaging the trans. Everyone has their opinion, some people really like a locked diff and others don't. In my opinion, instead of locking the diff I would get some decent rear tyres that suit the terrain you are going to be driving on. For woods and rocks I would recommend knobbies style tyres. For example, I mostly have a lot of sticky muddy ground, and on my Westwood I run a set of 18x9.50x8 ags on the rear. The diff isn't locked, but I find I can get through almost any type of mud/water hole, even with a trailer on. It's up to you though.

Here in western PA I have everything from packed dirt roads to river bank slop lol

I've been on the fence on that. My rule of thumb is, just play? I lock mine. If work around the yard and play. I leave it unlocked unless the terrain requires a locked trans to work more efficient.

I would get some bear claws or mud lites, heck, even swamp lites, and then leave it open. With a 930, you could not get tires like that and put them on a locked diff, because it would immediately destroy the locker, and probably a few gears with it.

It is just a play toy. Can't afford a quad so I'm building the next best thing lol

Well, what is your tire budget?

0$ lol

I'm here laying down with a wife and two kids. And I don't make very much money lol so I'm gathering all the free run down garbage people are throwing away that I might be able to use haha

Shane87 wrote:

0$ lol

LOL, okay, in that case, I'd recommend going to a bunch of tire shops and looking in the scrap. You could probably find something good enough to run. Then from there, depending on the tread, you may need to lock it or you may not.

That's why I'm cutting and Welding pulleys and making them work LOL I use the deck Drive pulley off of stock pulley stack for the motor, and I'm using another deck Drive pulley for the transaxle. I'll have to look around see what I can find. Thanks for the advice I appreciate it guys

Shane87 wrote:

That's why I'm cutting and Welding pulleys and making them work LOL I use the deck Drive pulley off of stock pulley stack for the motor, and I'm using another deck Drive pulley for the transaxle. I'll have to look around see what I can find. Thanks for the advice I appreciate it guys

Your welcome! Yeah, I would do that too, if I had a welder.

I got lucky with the welder LOL picked up the yard sale for 15 bucks all I did was replace the power wire

I'm just hoping I don't lose my low end torque for climbing Hills with a 5 to 5 ratio

If you have more than 10 hp you will be fine with a 5 to 5. Mr modified has a simplicity with a little 7 horse

Okay good I have a 14.5

Yeah, you'll be fine with that, most ATVs have higher ratios and less horsepower.

So from my personal experience with locked and unlocked diffs, I'd you weld the gears they can grenade and ruin the case , if you run a peice of solid steel (7 bucks from the metal yard for 36" of cold rolled) and make a locker similar to the original doc locker the issue you will have is breaking bull gear teeth but not the case unless the broken teeth wedge somewhere. With the open diffs I have had with 22 inch itp mudlites the diff will blow the case open from flexing too much in the middle. Bit if you use smaller tires around 18 inches with less aggressive treads and have more wheels speed the tranny have lasted very well for me until I become stupid and lock them.

biggasmowers wrote:

So from my personal experience with locked and unlocked diffs,  I'd you weld the gears they can grenade and ruin the case , if you run a peice of solid steel (7 bucks from the metal yard for 36" of cold rolled) and make a locker similar to the original doc locker the issue you will have is breaking bull gear teeth but not the case unless the broken teeth wedge somewhere. With the open diffs I have had with 22 inch itp mudlites the diff will blow the case open from flexing too much in the middle. Bit if you use smaller tires around 18 inches with less aggressive treads and have more wheels speed the tranny have lasted very well for me until I become stupid and lock them.

No offense bigg, but I doubt he will be abusing his trans like you do, haha.

Double W Cross Ranch wrote:

biggasmowers wrote:

So from my personal experience with locked and unlocked diffs,  I'd you weld the gears they can grenade and ruin the case , if you run a peice of solid steel (7 bucks from the metal yard for 36" of cold rolled) and make a locker similar to the original doc locker the issue you will have is breaking bull gear teeth but not the case unless the broken teeth wedge somewhere. With the open diffs I have had with 22 inch itp mudlites the diff will blow the case open from flexing too much in the middle. Bit if you use smaller tires around 18 inches with less aggressive treads and have more wheels speed the tranny have lasted very well for me until I become stupid and lock them.

No offense bigg, but I doubt he will be abusing his trans like you do, haha.

I don't abuse! I just use , and use , and use , until it breaks. Which is about 3 months......

@biggasmowers That's some really thoughtful input.

You can lock a transaxle for next to nothing and get great traction.  4x4 off road guys and car guys have been welding their spider gears on the cheap for decades to get traction with good success, however these cast aluminum transaxle housings just dont seem to hold up to well except for the 820 which can be found cheap.

On the other hand used aggressive tires can be found for cheap too, but not next to nothing.  I've run open diffs with bear claws and I have found their limitations mainly on hills and thick mud that's like motar.  One issue you run into with an open diff is when you get one tire in the air you lose all traction and then when that tire gets back on the ground you gain traction all at once kinda like popping the clutch.  It's kinda round on your machine and has caused me to get my front end in the air when I wasn't planning on it.

Sounds like you're leaning toward the next to nothing option.

@Double W Cross Ranch try ebay, I picked up a decent little flux core 110v welder for $80 shipped, it's not great but it does the job I need it to do.

I have alot of hills to climb, and nasty river bank mud lol

I have severely rolled a few machines from having an open diff with aggressive tires going up hill. Almost broke a finger once and then almost broke my back when one la see on top of me.

So.... Lock it?