What did you do with your Tundra or Sequoia this weekend?
- Thread starter Bryanseye
- Start date
This site may earn a commission from merchant affiliate
links, including eBay, Amazon, Skimlinks, and others.
Unfortunately, I question ARBs reliability in my wheeling conditions: I want a locker for snow and single digit to negative temps. So much cool stuff designed and built in south is unusable when beer cans start to burst. As an example, I could not use my Hi-Lift, because polyurethane handle clamp shrunk and was impossible to remove. Had to take a knife and cut it. Another example is ARB awning pictured above. It was low 30s, and I was not able to zip lock it, because the shell shrunk. Had to wait a couple of hours for sun to heat it up. Marmot tent is hard to pitch in frost - compare it to Swedish Hilleberg. Heck, this all happens even to cars: Toyota doors freeze every morning in winter, Volvo's ones are like butterHave to live all your life in north to design and build things for north.
For my use case I can't add any rubber and expect it to be reliable. So, perhaps Eaton. Also snow is less demanding for diff clamping force than rock crawling.
Or I just leave Tundra stock reliable and use winch more oftenI age and loose interest in extreme winter camping.
Fwiw, I tracked air lockers on group off-road trips for a few years. Failure rate was about 10% of them on each trip average. Either air lines, seals, or compressor issues. My personal vehicles, I've owned one ARB and it worked well, but was so noisy in a Toyota add clamshell in 2wd because the spider gears are forged vs cut/ground that I removed it. Rear application wouldn't be a problem.
I did like the ARB speed of engagement. Would go elocker myself in the future. I've never had an elocker failure in my Toyotas or utvs.
EDIT: I should add that ARB was great on the customer service side. I sent them videos of the ARB unit and the noise. They paid to have their shop do a swap for a new unit. Still had the same noise and ARB sent me a 3rd new one in a sealed box to swap out for the second one. After back and forth on it - the conclusion was sometime around 2018 IIRC they switched from machined spider gears to forged ones. The forged ones are stronger, but they have rougher surfaces and are not cut the same way to run quietly. With the front ADD open - the driver's side wheel is still driving the driver's side spider gear and the freewheel is done in the spider gear set. So at highway speed you end up with a lot of noise from the forged spider gears. For a dedicated offroad vehicle it's probably not all that noticeable vs louder mud tires. It also would not ever be a concern with any AWD model because you don't have a condition where the front spider gears freewheel at high speed. It's an issue specific to the part time 4x4 models with the diff disconnect.
It could be resolved one of two ways - one is to bypass the ADD system and have it remain engaged. The other is to run an extra heavy weight gear oil to quiet it down. Something like a 140 viscosity gear oil might be enough. Or maybe some sort of additive. I'm thinking maybe adding something like fumed silica could do the trick, but mixing up my own gear oil addatives isn't something I'd usually do. I'm just not knowledgeable enough about the overall changes from doing that.
Last edited:
Rouleur
GOLD Star
Installed some 18x8 5 lug Woodburner Steelies (2.5G Tund) to set off the Hilux Toyotas of War look on the Ltd DC no roof. Took a minute to find this one. Rally Armor flaps and connecting 0E Pro marker lights soon.
And yes, I’m running the “missed leg day” look, and I love it! I appreciate that @js0k approves of my vision and is always willing to go along with my shenanigans.
And yes, I’m running the “missed leg day” look, and I love it! I appreciate that @js0k approves of my vision and is always willing to go along with my shenanigans.
Last edited:
Rouleur
GOLD Star
Howdy that’s a 6x139.7 to 5x150 custom Bora Lenny at Bora is cool!
So +11 offset and that’s the amount of poke I was looking for.
No weight penalty over the factory alloy.
I’m sure the new V6 tundra haters are gonna come out soon lol!
So +11 offset and that’s the amount of poke I was looking for.
No weight penalty over the factory alloy.
I’m sure the new V6 tundra haters are gonna come out soon lol!
So, this is what gears do normally. It will quiet down the road the more you use it. Just keep up with your gear oil changes.
140 vs 90 is a lot of drag, your vehicle becomes a lazy dog, especially in upper north. I won't do this again.
Heil hood glare! =) Mine migrated to the front bumper after two nights.
It was quite a lot different from a typical spider gear set. The gears are still lubricated with some oil film in this video I made of it. Imagine this at 600 rpms and that noise was significant. Not a dealbreaker for a trail rig. But was a dealbreaker for a daily driver. I'd say it was maybe 3-5 times (?) as loud as a needle bearing failure on a clamshell. It was noisy enough that myself and ARB thought at first it was the engagement dog clutch not fully opening. But after disassembly of the first one it looked good. Second one was just as noisy. Conclusion after pulling the second one out and disassembly (by ARB) was that it was the change in spider gear manufacturing process that was causing it. ARB was really helpful in the process. In the end they gave me a third new one in box that I ended up re-selling with full disclosure to someone for a trail rig and just lived with the open front and MTS / ATRAC / Crawl. Traction control was good enough for a few trips through the Rubicon, so it's pretty capable even without a front locker.
It may not be inherent in the method of manufacturing that forged gears are noisy. I think Toyota OEM ones are also forged. But it may be the tooth profiles or something that is noisier. I'd guess that the ARB spider gears are designed for maximum strenght at the expense of additional noise.
Tundra ATRAC is just not very good unfortunately. It's really slow to engage and weak in effect compared to the 4Runner version. I don't know enough about the software in the modules, but if someone could build an MTS/ATRAC module just borrowing the software from the 4Runner or LC200 ATRAC/MTS and make a re-flash or module swap for the Tundra - I'd be buyer #1. I don't really need lockers if I had 4Runner level ATRAC effectiveness.
Last edited:
Yeah, that sounds excessive, pretty much like a failed bearing.
I don't like my Tundra's traction in snow either. It is clearly a software tuning thing, and it makes it useless. Volvo's TRACS is hands down better, it just plows until gets high-centered. It's so good that it often fools owners into thinking that the vehicle is capable of offroading, where they quickly realize you need more sturdy and reliable everything =)
I've heard Subaru's AWD is also tuned very well.
Took it up the mountain for a Christmas tree.
Add rain/fog/snow and you'll see why people move it to the bumper
Ran the Tundra back to TX via a few customer visits in NC and TN...... 1600 miles easily covered..... hit 62k miles on the trip - so 26k in a year....
strangley had the front edge of the gas tank skidplate drop and scuff on the pavement.....had to cut it off ..... ordered up a steel replacement....think it was the speed plus 30+ MPH winds maybe ? SMC wasn't up to the task...
Nice to be back in Houston area for a few days...
strangley had the front edge of the gas tank skidplate drop and scuff on the pavement.....had to cut it off ..... ordered up a steel replacement....think it was the speed plus 30+ MPH winds maybe ? SMC wasn't up to the task...
Nice to be back in Houston area for a few days...
I think I maybe could have quieted it down by disassembly and carefully rounding the corners on the spider gear teath and maybe also polishing a bit. It's just a lot of work and down time to tear it apart. For all I know the e-locker front might be just as noisy too.
Even the base SR5 4Runner ATRAC is just so much better. There's got to be a way to re-flash or swap modules for the Tundra to get the same performance. If I had more free time like i did 10 years ago with my 4Runner - i'd dig into the the system design and try to build a solution.
Subaru and even Honda CUVs work really well for what they are. So do most Toyota 4x4s. The Tundra is IMO the least effective tune of ATRAC I've ever seen.
Ordered a power trax limited slip for the rear today. Deciding if I want to order an e locker for the front. Nitro 5.29s going in soon. Found a guy that used to work for nitro to do it. He’s 10 minutes from me and makes it more convenient for me to drop it off.
Decided against the arb lockers. Didn’t want to fork up for an air compressor.
Decided against the arb lockers. Didn’t want to fork up for an air compressor.
Last edited:
Front Eaton e locker ordered this morning..
Tundra is going to be a beast on 5.29s, power trax rear, and front e locker.
Tundra is going to be a beast on 5.29s, power trax rear, and front e locker.
Drove around my buddy’s land in Oklahoma. My son caught his first bass and this stinker hauls in a 2 pounder!
I already posted over on tundras.com, but adding these helper airbags was one of the best mods I’ve ever done. Also tried E-85 for the first time, and the butt dyno says it definitely adds mucho HP gains. It’s wild how much oomph I got from a couple tanks.
