So I was off roading at Gilmer this weekend when I broke my passenger side axle. (time for an upgrade) Well, I did not want to stop playing, so I pulled the axle and sealed the hole and continued off roading with my 3x4 (front is locked). Anyway, the strangest thing happened while climbing up steep hills. The engine would loose its power and eventually just died. It did this repeatedly everytime I tried to climb a steep hill to where my wheels where slipping. Glad I had my winch.

This is what I new at the time. My oil was a quart low. I had a half a tank of gas. I had no axle shaft on my front passenger axle.

Anyway, went back to camp thinking about the problem. Could two things go wrong in the same trip (duh). I was a quart low, could the angle be sending a signal to the computer to reduce power. Could I be loosing compression. Anyways as you can see, there were many things running through my head.

And then it dawned on me while telling my wife over the phone about my delima. That wheel that does not have an axle was probably screwing with my ESP. (Yeah, easy to identify the problem when you aren't there. ). So, I pushed the ESP button for 10 seconds and tried a hill. Again, still the same problem. Next I yanked out the fuse and low and behold, that fixed the problem.

Also, another observation. While it does not affect the horse power, I did not stall the jeep once the remainder of the day... this is very uncommon for me with the ESP on. It really affect the low rpm fuel rate. There was a huge difference in my jeeps performance at crawl speeds.

You folks should really try it and tell me what you think. The fuse is J7 its a pink 30amp fuse on the right side of the fuse box when looking at it from the pax side of the jeep. From now on, I will always pull that fuse before I go rock crawling. I would not believe what i was missing.

 

very interesting, but you were in 4low right? shouldnt the esp be totally off then?

 

I'm going to have to try that. I know I feel like I loose a lot of power when climbing loose rock. Thought it was just the gearing.

 

Way to think it out. It totally makes sense. The unaxled side is probably spinning like crazy, the BLD is trying to send power to the other side and at that point the computer just says I'm just gonna shut this whole f***er down! I was thinking about picking up one of those axle plugs from Off Road Evolution if they ever come available. This'll be a good thing to keep in mind.

 

Good thought. I had limited slip on the brain.

 

Yes JKDoc you are right in that I do have an auto locker. So when my tires are spinning and one tire is not (the unaxle tire), then the ESP tries to reduce engine power to get the spinning wheels to match the none spinning wheel and continues to drop the power until the engine stalls. The ESP cannot be complete turned off. I know the manual says in 4 low it can, but if that were the case, then why does my power drop when I spin my wheels.

I think an important mod for all stick shift JK's is to build in a switch to override the EPS. you loose your BDL, but you gain control of your engine. Of course if you don't have lockers then the BDL is important.

 

I think it's was the oil. If you go up a steep enough incline and let the RPMs get too low, I know the oil pressure pressure drops and the engine shuts down. You can do this when you have the proper amount of oil, a quart down, I'm sure the pickup tube was just having a hard time sucking up the oil.

 

If it was the oil, then why did the problem go away when I pulled the ESP fuse. I did not have any oil with me at the time.

 

i believe it wasthe ESP. without the axle shaft the front passenger side tire would not spin, correct? On th JK there is a safe mode built into the CPU/ wheel speed sensors, this is why you can not just buy any dana axle and throw it on yuor JK,it must have wheel speed sensors on it.. If 3 tires are spinng and the 4th is not, the CPU may think the wheel speed sensor is damaged. Without the wheel speed sensor the JK WILL NOT RUN!!! It can not be started, or driven. It kills the engine completly.
1 After the JK has shut it self down, on a restsrt the CPU runs its self test,
2 all is good , until you star to climb a hill and get wheel spin.
3 CPU sees 3 wheels spinning tries to correct the 4th,
4 can not correct he 4th, determines wheel speed sensor is damaged,
5 shuts down in safe mode, over and over and over , until the fuse is pulled, and all is good.
This is just a theory....


2007 JK Unlimited X
3 Inch BDS Suspension Lift
35x12.5x16 Yokohama Geolander AT/S
Oil pan/ Tranny skid plate by Skid Row
Rough Country dual steering stabilizer
Skyjacker adj rear track bar
Rock Krawler High Clearence Adjustable Lower Contralo Arms
Rock Krawler dana 30 Control Arm mounting Brackets/SkidPlates
JKS Quicker Disconnects front sway bar links
Warrior products Safari doors
Skyjacker brake line extensions
Custom front winch bumper by RoundStar OffRoad
Mopar offroad rear bumper
Plenty of Rock Rash!!!!!!

 

What I'm curious about is why you would continue to "play" and potentially cause more damage to your internals on the axle? When a shaft goes it usually leaves debris behind metallic in nature.