Alternative to 4wd

E-Lockers are a good choice. Not sure it is cost effective on a 20 year old vehicle.

Some of y’all need a keyboard timeout!

I have been in a couple of situations where I was very happy to have my 4x4. I retired from a law enforcement job that required me to arrive at work in any weather. I drove through over a foot of snow on more than one occasion because I had four wheel drive.
While camping I needed 4x4 to get out of a campground that had serious water damage to the roads during a storm. I was able to tow several other vehicles out that had 2 wheel drive. I always carry several long tow straps so that I can stay on good ground to get another vehicle out. Yes, we could have all stayed put until the campground got someone to repair their road but I didn't want to wait a couple of days. During that incident where I was helping people get out, two of the vehicles were 2 wheel drive pulling TT's.

Thanks for all the replies and shared experiences. I'll check out the Eaton unit. Might be enough of an improvement over my open diff.

Sjm9911 wrote:
Your from MA , you know that in the snow and such rear wheel drive is the worst.

If you are talking about an empty pickup, it's about a wash with front wheel drive (assuming you know how to drive a RWD). FWD is better until it's not, then you are along for the ride. RWD is more likely to kick the rear axle out but it's easy to control.

Once you load up the rear axle, I'll take RWD over FWD every time. Get 60-70% weight distribution on the rear axle and it will do almost as much a 4x4.