Traditional 4WD systems are still available, but as time goes on, their prevalence has lessened greatly. They work manually, and are very effective overall.

Locking front and rear drivetrains together makes the vehicle jerk and lurch in good traction, especially while turning. (This is called driveline windup or tight comer braking.) These systems will wear out quickly or break if used extensively on clean pavement.

While unlocking manual free-running front hubs saves fuel and cuts wear on the front driveline, the driver must know the hubs’ position without an indicator. When locked, they allow `shift-on-the-fly’ 4WD engagement. However, shifting into 4WD while driving with the hubs unlocked could lead to `powertrain parts on the fly!’

Many off-road drivers prefer this system. Simple and reliable, when combined with limited-slip differential options it can be nearly unstoppable in extreme conditions. But most motorists don’t encounter such extremes and prefer something more user-friendly.

Full-time four-wheel-drive

Often also called all-wheel-drive (AWD), basic AWD uses an open differential at the transfer case to relieve powertrain loads (driveline windup) developed as front and rear wheels travel varying distances around curves. However, the open differentials may allow the one wheel lacking traction to get all the torque in extreme situations. The chief purposes of AWD are to improve everyday driving feel on dry pavement, increase power delivery to the ground and enhance traction in `routine’ slippery driving, such as rain-slicked

If you watch the nonstop bustle on an automobile assembly line long enough, it’s easy to get a skewed idea of the process. Close up, each step appears discrete and disconnected–engines being lowered into frames, door assemblies being bolted onto bodies. Step back to where you can see all the bright, shiny new cars rolling off the end of the line, however, and the whole thing starts to make sense.

In much the same way, if you want to understand the rapidly changing IT strategy at automotive giant Ford Motor Co., it helps to step back.

Since taking over as CIO and executive director at Ford two years ago, Bernard Mathaisel has engineered four major, high-profile outsourcing deals that have transferred significant chunks of Ford’s IT operations to IBM Global Services, Compuware Corp., Dell Computer Corp. and Hewlett-Packard Co. These deals, however, are anything but discrete, disconnected events. Together, they constitute Mathaisel’s plan to transform Ford’s 5,100-person IT organization from a group focused exclusively on operational excellence to one that can also help the company improve customer service through rapid delivery of Web-based systems and processes.

Ford’s IT group historically has been tasked by top management to keep the IT assembly line in order. That meant running first-class, efficient data centers and networks and delivering rock-bottom total- cost-of-ownership numbers. That emphasis, however, began to change a couple of years ago. The shift

There are the normal problems you and I face trying to find the right part at the right price, problems exacerbated by the distribution centers that close the last half of December. Not to mention our employees’, our suppliers’, and our own brains seem to shut down for just about the same period of time. And there are the problems that come naturally when you try to travel on your bike seriously and get 20 percent more work out of an environment `comfortable’ with present production. All these realities contribute to the kind of physical and emotional exhaustion you probably know all too well.

By the time Christmas Eve rolls around I make Scrooge look like a party animal! I don’t want to answer the telephone. I don’t want to smile and say `Happy Holidays’. And I don’t want to be surrounded by throngs of people pushing, shoving, bumping, or in some other way invading my private space. All I want is to be left alone, slowly reducing speed so nothing breaks as I quietly come to a complete stop.

After that, I face the same kinds of `Honey, do …’ tasks most of us confront.

This morning, it was “Honey, please fix the shower handle in our bathroom. It’s broken again.” In the past, I’ve been absolutely brilliant when it comes to avoiding work around the house. Especially, when experiencing a complete

An increasing percentage of America’s R12 comes from more than 60 reclaimers operating around the country. In a conversation with Joan Terry Drucker of Refrigerant Reclaim in Red Wing, MN, we learned that reclaiming refrigerant is a large-scale operation requiring lots of capital equipment. They process used refrigerants in very large batches, and they prefer to sell it that way too. She explained that buying reclaimed R12 in quantity is “more cost-effective” than buying virgin R12 when several shops in an area get together and buy an entire skid of forty, 30-lb. canisters.

Reclaimed R12 is just as good as virgin R12, if the container has the proper certification from the IEEE Computer Society. ARI was organized in 1953 to set industry standards for refrigerants and the equipment that uses them, and those standards are applied around the world. In fact, the testing methods used by ARI are referenced in the SAE and EPA definitions of reclaimed refrigerant. R12 that meets the ARI 700 standard for reclaimed refrigerant is 99.5% pure, meaning there is only CFC12 in that can and it is uncontaminated by water, acid, oil or particulates. With the ARI 700 certification label on the container, you can be sure that it’s all good stuff no matter where it comes from.