Warn Locking Hub Kits
Located on the front axle of a 4WD vehicle you may find manual locking hubs. Take a look. They will be the small dials located in the center of the front wheels. They look simple enough, but the work they do is immense.
When driving your 4WD vehicle on minimal traction surfaces, it is essential that each tire has power and is fighting for every bit of traction. When four wheel drive is not being used, the front hubs are used to disconnect the front wheels from the front axle drive components. This would include the ring and pinion, axle-shafts, and driveshaft. Unlocking the hubs will allow the axle components to stop spinning, preventing the unwanted wear and tear on those parts. It will also help to improve the vehicle’s fuel economy since there will be less resistance during roll.
Arthur Warn (of the Warn company) invented the locking hub in 1948. Until then, most 4WD vehicles were “full-time” 4WD and suffered from poor street performance, terrible fuel economy, and excess wear and stress on all the drivetrain components.
As years went by, many of the 4WD auto makers have phased out manual hubs and replaced them with automatic ones. SUVs took the American auto marketplace by storm in the late 1980′s and well into the 1990′s and that is likely why automatic hubs were installed on so many 4WD vehicles. The car that everybody wanted to have was an SUV because an SUV meant 4WD. The problem was that most of these SUV drivers wouldn’t know how to put the vehicle into 4WD when the time came. To make the SUV more appealing, manufacturers outfitted them with automatic hubs to eliminate the “complication” of getting out of the vehicle to lock them.
As time has passed, SUV drivers from near and far have learned that these automatic units aren’t as wonderful as the auto manufacturers made them out to be. Sure, they were convenient… when they worked! It’s a well known fact that when you take something simple and begin to complicate it, failure is more prone to happen. The migration from standard hubs to automatic ones was no exception. Auto units have a reputation for their unreliability at critical times and for being weak under stress.
Manual locking hubs are stronger than their auto counterparts. It’s for this reason that off-roaders will always choose manual hubs over automatic ones. Even if an axle with automatic hubs has been routinely maintained, the serious off-roader can not rely on it because there are too many circumstances for which it will fail or just not perform when the moment is critical.
The simplicity, reliability, strength, and low cost of manual locking hubs have made them the ideal replacement for auto hub axles. The off-road marketplace is abundant with replacement kits that allow drivers to replace automatic units for manual ones.
Understanding how they work will help you get the most out of them and can make upgrading or repairing them a breeze.
If you’ve been thinking about converting your auto hub axle to manual hubs, you’re not alone. MY4BY OFF ROAD has the largest online selection of Warn hubs and conversion kits for all 4WD vehicles and has the parts to make your conversion a breeze.