All-wheel drive available on demand

Automatically switched on

 

All-wheel drives are a real advantage in winter or on slippery surfaces. But front-mounted vehicles with an additional front axle drive gain in stability at the loss of fuel efficiency: this is because the rear-axle drive shaft is constantly in use. ZF has now developed a new uncouplable all-wheel drive for this type of vehicle. The all-wheel drive switches on or off within just a few hundred milliseconds depending on the driving conditions. It happens without the drivers noticing a thing; they just benefit from full all-wheel-drive performance when necessary and fuel savings when operating on the efficient two-wheel drive.

The all-wheel-drive system was developed especially for compact vehicles with transversely-mounted front engines – the type of vehicle that is also getting the new 9-speed automatic transmissions. This will result in large CO2 emission savings, as there are a great number of vehicles that have this transmission configuration worldwide.