Best to Lock diffs or not climbing side hill on ice

Do the locked diffs just make you slide out more? My neighbors driveway is total ice on an uphill and basically he is stuck up there now. Friends jeep had to chain up but it made me wonder if he was making it worse locking his diffs.

 

Depends. Off-camber will sometimes pull you into things while locked.

 

In that situation I don't think it is going to make much difference. Sometimes chains are the only solution. But in most cases a locking diff can cause more problems than they solve on ice/snow.

 

If locking front and rear would mean 4 wheels spinning than don't.

 

Throw some coarse sand on the ice and/or chain up. Locked or unlocked.

 

You get more grip but once it does slip the whole axle may slide off to the side - depending on the situation that could be quiet dangerous. On ice, I personally prefer unlocked with electric control handling traction on a per tire bases.

 

When a locked diff breaks traction it loses lateral stability because both tires are slipping. With an open diff one tire is almost guaranteed to not be slipping when you break traction so the non-slipping tire helps maintain some lateral stability. A locked diff will break traction later than an open diff, but ice offers little to no traction so we can't create something out of nothing. If the slope is steep enough and the ice is slick enough that a static tire slides there's not much of anything that can be done. Start rigging and winching.

 

I've always had it cause me to dig in deeper.

Deflate is first step. I lived on a crazy hill once and had to deflate some days.

 

IMO you definitely do not want a locked diff for ice/snow. I had a S10 with a lunchbox locker and that thing was dangerous in the ice and snow. Start breaking traction and the rear end just goes sideways.

 

Have a Dakota R/T with limited slip, when it was a daily I had to just tap the throttle a few times to get going in snow. Any sustained off idle torque broke traction and the rear would just slide down the road crown.

Super fun when it was play time, not some much trying to make it to a class.

 

It depends on the conditions and the spot.

If you're on an icy slope with the rear locked it's more likely to slide the rear out to the downhill side

 

I never lock on snow and ice. I turn VSC off tóo. Lower pressure in tires to 15 psi. Good luck.