Toshbar

Has anyone successfully modded or looked deeper into making their electric actuated 4x4 truck to have 2wd low range?

Seems to me that all it would take is a switch on the vacuum solenoid for the front hubs. Either a switch to break the circuit, or a switch to jump power to the solenoid.

My biggest concern is if manually controlling/overriding the solenoid will trigger a trouble code in the 4x4 computer that would adversely affect the 4x4 function.

Haerr

I'm a little confused on what exactly you're trying to accomplish with a "2wd low" mod. What is the thought process of what this will accomplish? When in 2wd you have the transmission with 4 speeds sending power to the 2 rear wheels through the transmission and then in 4x4 low you have the low gear selected for the speed of the front wheels and 4x4 high you have the higher ratio to allow the tires to spin faster; this is controlled through the transfer case. Can you please explain what your end goal is for a "2wd low mod"?

Toshbar

End goal is low range without the front wheels pulling.

nrivera04

I suppose it's possible if you really wanted it to be... I used to just not lock the hubs in on my bronco when I didn't want the front to pull. Another route you may look is interrupting the vacuum to the actuators. The system should "think" it completed the shift process if it was going to throw any codes.

lewissa81

I'm sure someone somewhere has done this. Have you googled it, or searched the forum?
The front axle is locked by default. Meaning when there is no power, the front hubs engage. This happens every time you shut the truck off. To unlock them, a signal is sent to the IWE solenoid to allow vacuum to the IWE actuators. In order to have 2wd low, you would need to send the solenoid a signal (power). Seems simple enough, but in reality it may be more difficult. You wouldn't want to accidentally send power to the solenoid, when you are already in 2wd and fry some wires or the solenoid.
I'm just spitballing and could be totally wrong though.

Manuellabour247

The only two ways I can see this happening is--

1. Divorce the transfer case and put a high low output on your transmission. Would probably require lots of R&D as I don't know of any aftermarket systems like this.

2. Put a high/low pinion in the rear end. The old heavy duty trucks (F500+) used to have this as well as school buses. They have gotten away from it as there's a lot that can go wrong with them up to and including detonation of the pinion/ring gear.

I know that there were some suburbans that had a 5 position transfer case, but again, bot sure how much that would take to fab into a Ford truck.

EDIT** The 5 positions on the Chevy were- 4LO, 2LO, N, 2HI, 4HI.

Toshbar

I did search but '2 low' '2wd low' etc. all are too short for the search to work.

If the front hubs are disconnected, it wouldn't matter what the transfer case is doing. When 4 low is selected and engaged and then I manually disconnect the hubs from the front half shafts, it would be 2wd low range. No need for a 5 position TC or shiftable rear diff.

Manuellabour247

So you're perfectly fine with the transfer case turning in 4 Lo while the front hubs are disengaged? That's still wear and tear on internals that you wouldn't need. They make universal bell housing transmissions with manual transfer cases. That would be the easiest and cheapest, unless you're just wanting to grenade your TC through daily use.

Toshbar

Yes, I'm fine with the minuscule amount of additional wear from my front driveshaft spinning and extra 20,000 revolutions per year. Pulling through sand for 500 feet in 4x4 would put more 'wear and tear' on driveline internals than the front driveshafts idling along without any load whatsoever.

Manuellabour247

Ok. Well good luck.