4wd on dry pavement

https://www.tacomaworld.com/threads/damage-highway-in-4h.787975/#post-28205457

 

Your truck will be fine. It’s a Toyota they make noise . Just don’t make it a habit. When you make tight corners locked in 4x4 on dry pavement you will break something expensive.

 

Re: When to use 4WD: I got caught in an ice storm in Central Maine in an '89 S10 Blazer heading north on I-95 one time somewhere near Brunswick heading to the Skowhegan area. Having 4wd kept a 4 hour trip from turning into a 10 hour trip. The road surface was glazed over. Every time I "experimented" and tried switching back to 2H, the rear end would swing right out. I finally saw the light and left it in 4H. Traffic stopped most of the time and way.

I came up to a Maine DPW truck stopped on the median, rolled down the window, and asked him if he or anyone else would object to a U-turn on the median to reverse south and pick up Route 1 North next to us. (which basically didn't have a soul on it) "Nope!" God Bless the State of Maine. Off we went. Made it to the destination in about 5 more hours. 1:00 AM. (original ETA was 8:00 PM) My buddy was up and had the coffee and "other top-shelf selections" waiting. I elected for the "other selections".

 

Interesting phenomenon here in the southern BC Interior is that we have cold winters (down to the minus 20s Celsius, so a bit below 0F) but open rivers and lakes year round. This is partly because the rivers are big and partly because flow is maintained for electric power production. Anyway, what that means is it's common to have moisture from the river condense and freeze on adjacent highways, so roads can be icy in some areas even if it hasn't snowed for a few days. That means switching to and from 4WD on the highway is commonly required, especially if you are going uphill. I haven't tried switching back and forth at the 100 km/h (62 kph) maximum it says in the OM, but have at around 80 (50) and it works fine as long as you take you foot of the accelerator during the switch in either direction.

80 (50) is about as fast as I want to be going in 4WD anyway...its use suggests that road condition is a bit suboptimal so some prudence seems warranted.