| Yeah, I came across that earlier. Definitely impressive!! I completely agree with your general point (articulation matters a ton!) but I have to take a bit of issue with: > "The details of your AWD or 4WD system don't matter as much if you can keep your wheels on the ground." That's where the details of the system matter the most. Getting torque to a single tire is the hard part and the reason folks focus on it so much. A _very good_ AWD system can get enough torque to move the vehicle uphill / out of a tough system to a _single wheel_. Most can't. Most traditional part-time 4WD systems can't either. Open front and rear diffs are the norm in "true 4wd". Locking rear diffs are starting to become commonplace, but only a few stock vehicles come "triple locked" from the factory. I grew up wheeling an old mid 80's S10 Blazer. Fun, small, fit down trails well, had the "holy grail" 100" wheelbase. Solid rear axle + IFS. Manual transmission. Good (enough) articulation. Plenty of clearance. Big enough tires. Crap horsepower. Worse gas milage. "True" part time 4wd with a transfer case (i.e. would 100% meet the NPS's definition in this case). But open front and rear diffs. I got stuck every time I got a tire off the ground. I've taken the little bronco sport plenty of places I tried but could never make it in the Blazer. (And to be fair, vice versa... Big muddy ruts are not something I want to put the sport through for clearance reasons, and that's kinda what the Blazer did best.) At any rate, good modern AWD can often beat traditional part time 4wd with open front/rear diffs when wheel lift comes into play. On the flip side, independent suspension all around means it's going to lift tires _all the time_, so it _has_ to be good at it. Most AWD systems unfortunately aren't, even though some are these days. |