Truck stuck in 4-low

I buried the front end of my Tacoma in a snow-filled ditch last night. When I went back this morning to extract it (with a boom/tow) I could not get it out of 4-low and had to drive it home that way (only about a mile). I was hoping the actuator might be caked frozen but 4 hours in the garage with a heater blowing on the undercarriage has not reversed the problem, though there still some snow and ice on the truck. Might I have broken something? Any way to easily tell?

 

Vehicle running and in neutral when disengaging? Could also try very slow coast into neutral and switch it.

 

Not even a coast so much as a slight movement. Could even try reversing. I've had experience with them taking a little effort to get the powertrain relaxed for lack of better words to disengage.

 

Drive in reverse for a short distance. Then put it in neutral and try. You might also shut down the engine, but leave the ignition in the on position. Sometimes there are things that need to be energized when shifting in and out of 4WD, depending on the make and model.

 

Sometimes I miss the days of a lever and manual locking hubs.

 

I'm not so sure I miss the manual locking hubs. I had no issue with the levers.

 

Wonder if he got it yet? Been awhile...

 

Thanks to all; going out there tonight and see if I can get it to disengage. Will try running it in reverse and/or coasting.

 

If you can get to a loose surface do figure 8's.

 

Hmmm. I'm game for anything; will give it a try if all else fails.

 

I recall the most difficult time of getting it out of 4lo was a time I had the diff lock engaged as well. That was on the first gen and it still wasn't that difficult, no more than a minute??

 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SMsan3BzZkE&ab_channel=MaxxPowell

This helped me.

 

4-low finally disengaged. Not sure if thawing it out in the garage all day was the key or not. Thanks for the helpful input!

 

Right there with you on that one.