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4WD in reverse different?

Young04

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I was trying to back up a driveway that had about 8 or 10 inches of fresh snow and got nowhere. Not in 4hi, 4lo and when I was totally stuck, even put my lockers on for sh*ts and giggles. Spun the Jeep around and, to keep it "somewhat" scientific, went to the other half of the driveway (with the same amount of virgin snow) and drove forward up the driveway in 4hi with no problem. Can someone educate me on what happened here? Both times I came to a complete stop before trying to go up the driveway.
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JIMBOX

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Sorry, but if you're actually driving a RUBICON and got stuck in 10" of snow in 4hi/4lo/w lockers---

Either you don't know how to engage the lockers, or don't understand the jeeps 4wd !


W.E.

JIMBO
 
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Young04

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Sorry, but if you're actually driving a RUBICON and got stuck in 10" of snow in 4hi/4lo/w lockers---

Either you don't know how to engage the lockers, or don't understand the jeeps 4wd !


W.E.

JIMBO
Just not ass first. Not how I roll.
 

Almost

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What tires do you have? They're probably direction specific.
 

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Headbarcode

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We're you spinning tires in reverse and it just didn't want to climb? Or was the jeep fighting what you wanted to do?

I rented a fully loaded 2016 Jeep Grand Cherokee unlimited a couple years back on vacation in Colorado. After clearing snow off, it fought me from backing out of a spot. Took a few minutes in the first jeep product I ever drove, for me to realize that it was sensing the berm of snow I created behind it as an obstruction. Is that possibly what you encountered? The rear sensors got close enough to an inclined driveway with 10 inches of snow coverage, and got tricked into thinking it posed as much a threat as a brick wall?
 
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Young04

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We're you spinning tires in reverse and it just didn't want to climb? Or was the jeep fighting what you wanted to do?

I rented a fully loaded 2016 Jeep Grand Cherokee unlimited a couple years back on vacation in Colorado. After clearing snow off, it fought me from backing out of a spot. Took a few minutes in the first jeep product I ever drove, for me to realize that it was sensing the berm of snow I created behind it as an obstruction. Is that possibly what you encountered? The rear sensors got close enough to an inclined driveway with 10 inches of snow coverage, and got tricked into thinking it posed as much a threat as a brick wall?
Just spinning freely. It was odd. My KO2s are not unidirectional either - looked it up.
 

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TRJeff

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In deep snow turn off traction control, try not to spin tires, spinning creates heat, melts snow, snow turns to water, water freezes, ice verrry slippery, getting out of a self made ice hole can be difficult, stopping and letting tires freeze to snow can help
 

Sheepjeep

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To first answer you question yes there is a difference between forward and reverse as forward has many gears in the transmission and reverse has one that is geared somewhere between first and second gear, but other than that no.


That being said it is not uncommon when stop and go driving in deep snow for something like this to happen when you lose traction on a direction but and move in the other, what ends up happening is the weight of the Jeep compresses the snow and turn it to ice and this can happen under all 4 tires at once so lockers do not help. You change direction you are rocking the Jeep and moving off that ice patch 1/2" all you need to shift to get traction.
 

aldo98229

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The Rubicon transfer case is notoriously stubborn to engage due to its high 4:1 ratio. By contrast, the 2.7:1 transfer case on Sports and Saharas is considerably easier.

Normally Jeeps need to be rolling slowly to engage 4-Lo; Rubicons even more so. Further, 9 times out of 10, Rubicons also need to be rolling to engage the lockers.

Lockers only engage in 4-Lo; not in 4-Hi and certainly not in 2WD. If 4-Lo doesn’t engage, by extension the lockers aren’t going to engage either.

Could it be that the Jeep hadn’t rolled enough to engage one or the other, or perhaps either of them?
 
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KnG818

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A lot of tires are direction specific.
Directional specific tires are highly uncommon and are mostly used on high speed vehicles for more specific reasons.

I can almost certainly assure you they wouldn't be on the Jeep. You cant even rotate them. But, if for some crazy reason they would be on a Wrangler it would not effect just merely backing up a little.

Amount of snow, type of snow and personal know-how would be a much more contributing factor.
 

wv18jl

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Indian, not the arrow.
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