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Hey guys so just bought myself my first lil zook, and I'm wanting to make her a little more capable off road. I've been looking through the forums for advice about fitting a diff locker to the rear of the car but most of the forums are outdated and the links don't work. So little bit of information, I'm based in Australia so anything that you can only get in the US or UK probably won't be much help. The Jimny is a 2005 vvt M13A manual gen 3 Jimny (in white...). Not sure what diff centres it currnetly has in it but if people need me to check or can't work it out from the model I'm happy to go out and have a look. I've stumbled across a set of automatic "Spartan" diff lockers for it (
www.amazon.com.au/USA-Standard-Gear-D30-...la-384686506301&th=1
). Just wondering everyones thoughts on these, or if anyone has used them before. Also if anyone has other suggestions for australian diff lockers that won't break the bank (looking you ARB lockers) then that would be greatly appreciated. Anyways first post so go easy on me if this question has already been asked hundreds of times.
Cheers Guys
From memory the Sparton is normally fully locked and unlocks when you need to turn on the road. Comments from the past seem to indicate that it can/will be noisy when doing this and you will need to modify your driving technique if you fit one.
Personally I would avoid like the plague/covid 19, save some more pennies and uprate to a better choice. ARB do their ubiquitous air locker but there are many other options.
As to front or back I would go with back and then front. From memory, both Mercedes and Toyota require the back locker to be engaged before the front.
Auto lockers are pretty horrible on the road, especially in wet conditions. I'd only recommend using them if the vast majority of what you do is off road.
I have Chinese HF electric lockers in mine and they do the job pretty well though I haven't had them long enough to say how well they last in the long term. The price isn't bad though they do need a little fettling to install. You can see more on
this thread.
They have quite an impact on the car, the on road manners are very much changed for the better. Off road, whilst not a locker, it still greatly aids progress.
Have a read up on the Quaife site, from what I understand, sand racing is one area where they excel..
