When you put a sammie tranfer case in nutral it locks the front and rear drive line together, so when you tow it down the road with a lifted samurai the front drive line is trying to come off of the t case which in turn telegraphs all of the vibrations right on through the t case and will eventually loosen all the bolts in your drive line and your drive shafts will fall off on the road doing sixty that will probably take out your brake lines and a few other things in the immediat area.

I assume the end closest to the differential?

And what do you mean by u-joints in phase?

When i re-connect it do the bolts have to be torqued on? or can i just tighten them up pretty tight?

I have to laugh every time I see this.....transfer case in 2WD, tranny in neutral

heres the hitch idea

Quote from: rkteckt on February 28, 2006, 05:50:21 PM

heres the hitch idea

If I am viewing this correctly, you are extending the stinger 2' behind the reciever.  Do you still have a typical tow bar behind that or is your pivot point within 12" of the front of the Samurai?

You will have better towing charactereistics if you keep the pivot point as close to the center  of the rear axle (towing vehicle) as possible.  The farther back you go, the more exagerated the "wag" of the pivot point moving the oposite direction of the turn prior to moving in the same direction of the turn.

In this case, if you turn left, the extended stinger will swing to the right, causing the Samurai to move right, then left.  The more exagerated, the greater the forces that try to 1) break things, and 2) push the rear of your tow rig to the side.

This is why commercial trucks have the 5th wheels over the rear axles.

I found a commercially available hitch that gave me enough lift to keep my tow bar flat......

I have magnetic brake lights for the rear of the Toad Trogdor.....
I used little bungees to help keep my lights on the rear of my sami when I used to flat-tow it.  I lost a light one time on a trip home and it was just flappin in the wind...lol  Also, check everything and make sure your trun signals are correct.  It's easy to put those magnetic lights on wrong.

I got a lesson on removing the rear drive shaft......
If it were me, I'd just drop the rear shaft and be done with it.  You'll have a lot less to worry about, and won't have to stop every 200 miles to start your rig and let it run so everything is oiled.  Only thing you'll have turning will be the diffs.  Plus if you have supplies in the rig, and they should happen to hit any of the shift levers while driving, you won't have to worry about anything.

and finally im replacing my bias ply mudders with some more road worthy mud/street tires.....

I took it around the block a couple times today and nothing exploded.... so

Can anyone think of any other handy tips for towing a lifted samurai?
I always left the steering unlocked, but put a bunge on the steering wheel with just enough tension that the wheel would center it's self back up after I turned a corner.  I have swampers on my sami and my front wheels had a bad habbit of NOT tracking correctly



And my final question regards the idling the engine at every 200 miles.....If i am disconnecting the rear drive shaft do i even need to do this? I mean it isnt as if the TC or transmission will even be in motion to need lubricating.....or am i missing something?
If you drop the rear D-shaft, you won't have to do this.

I towed for 4 years like this and only had problems once, and it was minor stuff.

Thanks for the answers, it definently sounds like pulling the driveshaft out is the way to go.
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tack weld the driveshaft bolts to the flange, that speeds up the removal/installation, you just need one hand and one wrench