My wife drove all the way to work with the CDL engaged...... (1 Viewer)

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Are we talking more about our wives or damage from a CDL on while on pavement?

As stated earlier... happy wife, happy life!

2004 Land cruiser... I have a 2003 and it actually says in the owners manual that the CDL can be engaged anytime and will NOT engage when the transfer case is in Low range unless the button is pushed. I think in previous years (98-01) the CDL would automatically lock in Low range. I have driven mine around on dry pavement in High range with the CDL without binding or tires squealing. I did it just for test purposes and would not suggest doing it all the time.


I don’t think locking the center diff would engage the 4low in my 99
I have to physically put in 4low
 
OP-

Did you get the spares? You should run to the dealer and get your old parts for sure.

And were you the one that left the CDL engaged prior to your wife driving it?
 
As others have said, I'd be very suprised if the Diff seals, CV's, and such started acting up as result of the CDL being engaged for a few days.

OP, You mention in your original post you'd only had the truck for 5 days when you realized your wife was driving with CDL engaged. Did you recently buy it from a dealer? Private party? Did you have a PPI performed? Previous wear seems much more likely than a few days of CDL.... but even that doesnt add up.

You said it had 32k miles on it?!? Like others have said, that just doesnt add up to the type of damage you're talking about. I hate to sound alarmist, but did you do anything to substantiate the dealer/service centers claims? It sounds like an opportunistic service advisor decided to prey on your fear of what unknowns your wife couldve caused. I would try to get the worn parts back as others have said to use as spares, but more importantly to check them for the wear the dealer claimed they had.

Keep in mind though that $800 for all that work isnt unreasonable. Toyota Carlsbad down the street from me is trying to get $600 per axle before labor.

I'm always surprised when I hear about people dumping tons of money into their trucks/cars and dont think to empower their wives with the appropriate knowledge to operate them. My wife has almost had more instructional seat time than I have on and off the track. Took her a while to get comfortable with the older Land Rovers (non-synchromesh), but was worth my time to know she can drive any of my cars for any reason without me having a heart attack.

I can tell you that most of the time, I prefer my wife break something on my race car before I do (within safe boundaries) because it's easier to justify the expense of repairing parts on a race car she's gotten to beat up and break than one I enjoy alone. This way, when I go break something much bigger and more expensive than her - like a $5000 transmission - it's all part of the SOP in her mind.
 
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Why does everyone assume that it was me who hit the CDL? This isn't my first go around with this drivetrain. Prior to this we had a 4Runner 4wd with the same Torsen system. I also have a manual FJ Cruiser with a similar but different Torsen set up.

The thing that was crazy about it was that she hit the CDL on that vehicle too and the same exact damage occurred on that vehicle. That's why I was quick to take it to the Toyota dealer immediately after finding out what she did. I know what a CDL activation looks on the dash and would have noticed that immediately when looking at the vehicle. After that incident in the 4Runner I told her to specifically avoid the "wheels button with the X through the center". But I guess that didn't translate to the Land Cruiser. The light was on in the dash when she drove it to work as she told me. She knew something was wrong but continued to drive it anyway instead of telling me immediately.

This vehicle was bought at Carmax and I looked the vehicle up and down before purchasing as well as looking up the VIN at the Toyota Dealer's website for maintenance history and it didn't alert me to any serious repairs or damage and it had a good history.

I didn't recover the spares but I'll do that if I ever have to replace the CV's again. I was hoping to hold out on a CV replacement until after I got my lift because I've read they can be damaged after something significant like that.
 
Driving on high traction surfaces with center diff locked puts strain on the drivetrain between the center differential and the axle differentials. This includes the center diff, the drive shafts, and the axle diffs themselves, but less on the CV joints because they are still able to be fully differentiated left to right (there will still be some strain because the whole front end will NOT be able differentiate relative to the rear end).

That said, if locking the center diff on pavement was a recipe for breaking differentials and CV joints, then we wouldn't even be able to wheel these trucks. We lock the diff precisely because we need different axles and wheels to take more of the strain (traction). Most of us here have spent hours at a time in low range with the center diff locked crawling around on rock, chriping tires, binding up the turns, and loading individual wheels and axles far more aggressively than driving around town with center diff locked.
 
Looks like my wife did this again today, while reaching for some sunglasses that had fallen down. This time she immediately realized that something was wrong. She knew by feeling that fact the front tires were scrubbing in a turn. After cycling the button everything was fine.

The issue this time was that there were no lights on the dash. I recently had to replace (at the dealer) the airbag switch and now I'm wondering if the dealer inadvertently messed something up with respect to the CDL dash lights?
 
There is a delay between when you hit the switch and when the indicator light comes on.
 
That is true, however in my case I know the Cruiser was driven for a while with no lights on.
 
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First thing to go our LX upon purchase.

CDL dont touch.jpg
 
Eh, even on high traction surfaces, locking the differential is only a problem when turning. Then you can get drivetrain binding. Usually, noticeable by the extremely loud popping noises when the front or rear differentials thunking and sound like they are going to explode. That is the ring and pinion slipping as they can't hold the pressure anymore.

You can hear it when sitting in a Seven Eleven parking lock at the F150, Suburban or most part time 4WD systems turn off the snow covered road into a nicely clean plowed parking lot. Most trucks can handle it once or twice as long as you aren't gunning it when it happens. Still not good to keep allowing that type of release of drive train binding.

If you hear it. Stop, put the truck in reverse or transfer case into neutral (most of the time almost impossible to do with drive train binding). Turn off CDL when it disengages continue on with your day.
 

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