Hope someone can help me with this.

I recently found out that the passenger side front wheel is the drive wheel for the 2002 TL-S. Not really sure what that means, aside from the obvious.

But hypothetically, if the passenger side was on a sheet of ice, driver side was on dry ground, and the car was parked on an incline without parking breaks on and wheels pointed straight downhill, can the car roll? In other words, when the car is in park is the non-drive wheel locked in place or can it roll?

Curious because that's what happened to my car...took it into the dealer...and they said they could not find anything wrong with it. Hasn't happened since it did, but I found it to be strange. Just trying to figure an explanation for it.

Plus I checked to see if my TL-S had the ingnition key problem that caused a parked car to roll for some of the other models, and it didn't.

 

in a open diff car either wheel can be the drive wheel...power willl go to the wheel that has least resisteance...so say one wheel is on ice...that is the wheel that is going to get all the power...kinda stupid...

when the transmission is in park...it makes it so when one wheel rotates, the other rotates in he opposite direction....therefor it makes it not possible for the car to roll because if one wheel were to start rotatinn the other would rotate the other way....thats my understanding of how park works....dont know if it helps...

 

Wow...thanks for the lesson....never knew that. I always thought that Park just locks the drive shaft...never knew about the wheels rotating in opposite direction. Hmmm....maybe we can test this out by putting the car on a lift and spinning the tires ourselves.

 

I am not 100% sure but I think... When the car is in neutral and on a lift, the tires will rotate in opposite directions because of the differential. Park uses a locking tab to keep it from rotating. Right?

 

http://auto.howstuffworks.com/question528.htm

This link explains "park" in the transmission. It shows a locking tab that fits into notches on output shaft of the transmission.

As for the drive wheel sitting on ice, that is still a good question.

 

I had a limited slip differential in my S2000, and I'm kinda bummed that the TL-s doesn't have one.

 

Yeah, thanks for the information!

If what you said did happen, then it would make sense for the car to roll because if the wheel on dry ground is rolling forward, the opposite wheel on ice will try to turn the other way. But if its on ice and there is no traction...then viola! Bumper into the trailer hitch!