I have a 97 4wd sr5 and I think I may be using the 4wd wrong. My understanding was if you're going to be driving highway speeds and want 4wd, you need to park the truck or be stopped and in neutral and shift it into 4wd high. Then you would just drive 4wd high all day, wether stop and go or highway. 4wd lo you only use if you're stuck or towing. Is this wrong? How come when I'm in 4wd high and say in a parking lot trying to park, it feels like it barely wants to move and you really have to hit the throttle to get it going, and it feels like you're doing something wrong. CAn you please explain to me what I'm doing wrong? And you can never shift from one to another while moving, right?

You dont want to use 4wd on dry pavement. What you feel is the front wheels engaged thru the transfer case. Its easy to break parts when on dry pavement and 4wd is you turn steering wheel too much ect... It also kills your gas mileage. You can put the 4wd in High upto I think like 55mph and does not need to be in park or neutral. 4 Low you have to be stopped and in neutral to do so.

Ok thank you. So driving in 4wd high in the wrong condition, ie dry road, can damage it? So if it's snowing out or raining real bad, is it ok then? We get alot of flooding around here and I was thinking in rain with the possibility of deep puddles or flooding, I should be in 4h. Is that ok or do yiu want to avoid 4wd if you can? I'm surprised that yiu can actually break things if the road conditions aren't right, now I'm scared to use it.

You don't need 4wd for rain either IMO, you should treat 4wd kind of like a spare tire, you don't use it until you need it.

As far as Low or Hi range, you would use Hi range if you are going to be traveling faster than maybe 20mph and Low range for creeping along at 5-10mph. Hope that makes sense

Hate to tell you this but 4wd is not going to do squat for puddles or rain in general. The water doesnt care and 4wd wont help at all unless you know how to use to your advantage but thats a whole nother story and unless you mudrun or play on trails you wont understand. Thats the misconception people have about 4wd....they think its invinsible. Its not....by far. If you dont make the front wheels work for you its pointless anyways in an advanced setting. I hardly ever put it in 4wd even with 10" of snow on the ground. I like the challenge of 2wd.

But for city folk (lol) when you feel uncomfortable put it in 4wd going under 55 mph and you will magically have balls of steel

In realality you should use it for poor traction enviroments. If your experiencing this from rain you have bigger problems to worry about cause your about to float away! Lol.

Use 4 hi for almost everything. 4 lo keeps you in a low gear and revs really high when you go too fast. You can engage 4 hi until like 59 or 55 MPH or something like that by just pressing the button on the side of the 4wd shifter. If you are going too fast the 4wd light indicator will just flash at you and it will not shift into 4wd.

If you are going straight you are fine using 4wd, but do not ever use it to turn on dry pavement. It will cause big problems.

Unless you have a locking front differential, you're not going to hurt anything by driving on dry pavement in 4wd.

You will probably get poor gas milage, and wear your tires more than necessary if you drive in 4wd all the time, but you're certainly not going to break anything.

Think of it this way: Lots of vehicles are front wheel drive, and they work just fine. Simply adding FWD to the already RWD, isn't going to damage anything. (that's what it was designed to do afterall) Other than the possible reduction in fuel economy and tire wear, that's about the worst that will happen driving in 4wd on dry pavement. (and turning shaply won't hurt anything either)

Other than that, I agree... it's really not "necessary" most of the time, unless you encounter lots of mud, snow, and steep grades all the time.

That's totally wrong. If you take turns with 4wd engaged you are going to mess something up.

You can have the best 4wd system and brakes in the world, but without a good set of tires, might as well have the world's best pedal drive system. Yes, 4wd will help better distribute the engine power, but if you dont have any friction with the ground....

Good luck living up North... Then again, sounds like people know how to drive there, rather than down here in ATL where a drop of water hits the pavement and everyone forgets how to drive.

What exactly do you think will get "messed up"?

I'm just curious...

3rd Gens don't have a center differential therefore binding will occur when turning because the wheels don't turn at the same speeds. Binding causes breakage.

Not sure where you are getting your information from, but this has been discussed so many times around here.

When in 4wd, the front and rear tires are locked together by the transfer case. when you make a turn the front and rear tires spin at different rates. if there is no place for the stress to release (ie: tires spinning on slippery or loose surfaces) you can cause problems. same idea as a rear locker ( you will hear tires cherping when you turn because the inside turns slower then the outside. if you have a 99+(i think) 4runner, you can use 4high in any condition because it has a selectable center differential until you lock the center diff, then it becomes true 4wd and you cannot drive on dry pavement. Pre 99 is all true 4wd and cannot be driven on dry pavement. rule of thumb, you dont need 4wd on the street unless you are in deep/slippery snow or off road.

hope that helps

Yes, I understand this. However, my point is that the difference in radius between the front turning circle and the rear is still quite small. (4runners don't exactly turn on a dime) And especially at speed, the difference between the front and rear becomes very small.

I haven't been on the this forum much, so I haven't seen the other discussions. I was just trying to dispell the fear that the transfer case would blow up if you engaged 4wd on pavement. You'll get the tire wear, and perhaps a little extra heat in the t-case, sure. Usually not catastrophic failure.

As we said, it's never really necessary to do that, so it shouldn't really be a problem to begin with. That's all.

Correct. My truck rides happily all day in 4HI (unlocked) on dry pavement without any tire squealing or steering wheel difficulty whatsoever.

I know unsound stupid, but I kinda don't get it. What's the point of 4wd if so many conditions can break expensive components? And how could you possibly be in a situation where u just can't turn? What if you just have to