I got stuck in a quattro w/ a Torsen center diff. Twice.

[dmichael@tdh.qntm.com]

As all (most) of you know, we've been getting lots of snow in the North East.
Twice in the last month, while showing some folks the virtues of the
"well engineered" quattro system in my 90 Coupe Quattro, I got stuck! The 
wierd thing was that, unlike my old 4000 with manually locking diffs, I got 
stuck with ONE front wheel spinning. In my old 4000, you had to get both rear 
wheel and one front spinning before you would stop moving.

The fancy Torsen center diff is SUPPOSED to send power where it can best be 
used. That is not what happed. In each  case, a front wheel (once the left, 
once the right) was spinning uselessly. I could leave the car in gear and let 
the clutch out; the wheel would spin lazily as the engine idled. NEITHER rear 
wheel so much as shuddered. At the point was no better than any two wheel 
drive car with a regular diff.

When I get a chance, I want to get the car up on a lift and aply the hand brake
with the car running. If the center diff works propely, the rear wheel should 
keep spinning (as long as I keep the engine from stalling). If not, the
rear wheels will stop, and front ones will spin.

Any other ideas as to what gives? I want a manually locking center diff!

Dave