One of my axles just broke a few days ago, so my 6MT couldn't move at all. I was thinking about the limited slip differential last night and wondered why it didn't at least help the car budge a little. Do you have to be going a certain speed before the limited slip functions?

 

This is just a shot in the dark but..
If you jacked up the front of the car while in neutral, and hand spun one of the wheels, the other wheel should move in the same direction. If both wheels move, that means your LSD is working fine. But I don't know if you will be able to preform this with a broken axle

 

^^--what he said..

 

A limited slip differential sends power to the wheel that is slipping. So if you have a broken axle the LSD will send the power to the broken side.

 

nope. LSD's purpose is to send the power to unbroken side (or,,, side with more load, should i say)

afaik it's NOT clutch type. (I think it's torsen/helical?)
any LSD that's not clutch type is just torque multiplying.
which means, if your inner wheel slightly slips in hard turns
slippy gets 90%, outer gets 10%
(just like electricity, it divides itself and flows the path with least resistance)

then it will multiply the torque in other(slower spinning) wheel so you get better pull power. say if it's 5:1 then your outer wheel will get 50% of power, of which 40% is drawn from the inner spinny wheel therefore 50:50 distribution in this case..

(I know what i'm saying isn't entirely mechanically correct. but it's just easier to understand)


BUT if your axle is broken it's like 0(live axle) : 100(broken axle) so
0 times whatever is still 0. therefore no traction.

 

So in order to take advantage of the limited-slip function (in order for it to send power from the slipping side to the non-slipping side), I need to have some traction on the slipping side?

 

um you CAN if you can force the broken axle to have a slight bit of resistance (idk how tho..)

but, it's bad for LSD cz it's gonna work super hard to move the car. I say, $75 calling a self loader flatbed is cheaper than loading the broken axle & risking damaged LSD

 

1. nope. car will slow down as if it were in neutral.

2. your "or does slipping side" is correct. you do need SOME sort of division of traction like even 90:10.. not,,, 100:0 (which is a broken axle, or wheel on ice,, etc)

 

I see. Thanks =) I agree. I wouldn't want to damage the LSD.