I had the rear of my car up on jack stands after I finished my bearing install and started the car to make sure everything was ok. I threw it in drive and everything worked as it should. I hit the gas to watch the speedo move the fastest it's ever going to move and then put it in neutral as my horrible rear disks wont stop the tires from spinning (even though they’re brand freaking new but that's another post). I thought that by putting the trans in neutral, the tires would eventually lose their momentum and spin down. They didn't. I got out of the car and stopped them with my shoe and then grabbed them with my hands and noticed that there was still power being applied to the rear tires despite being in neutral. Is this normal?

 

..... nnnnno...?

Are you sure it was in neutral? Dont have a maladjusted cable or something? Did you get them to almost stop and then have then accelerate again, because if not, you may have been fooled.. the wheels spinning carry an assload of momentum. But think about it, when you're on flat ground on the street, neutral = no power to the wheels. I wouldnt imagine it would be any different in the air, though I sort of have a feeling I am about to be corrected on that one. Partly because I had my rear in the air today as well, and I saw my tansmission doing some pretty funky things, but still.

I still say make sure everything else is ok first though.

 

so basically you stopped the wheels with your feet/hands, but after they were stopped you let go and they started spinning again? If that's the case, most likely this is normal.

Ideally, neutral means no power, but with trannys (I don't know what you have) there is friction even when things don't have solid hookup. On manual trannys, output shaft would typically ride inside a bearing which is inside the input shaft. Because of this even in neutral, some energy will be transfered through that bearing from the input to the output shaft and since your wheels are completely free, they will start turning.

 

er, right. I guess the question is how fast were they spinning? I was assuming they were goin' real fast..

 

Yes, they did start spinning again. While in neutral, they were not spinning as fast as they were in drive, nor did they have as much power behind them, but the kept spinning.

With the car on the ground, I can roll backwards in neutral so I guess things are more or less ok. I just found it weird that the tires would spin when in the air.

VILeninDM, it is a 700r4

 

with rear end raised and trans in nuetral it is normal for wheels to spin