Just put a spool in it. I have driven a car with a spool or back in the old days welded spider gears for 1000's of miles on the street and never had any issue rain or shine.

I'm reminded of a statement made by Buddy Baker about his stock car. He said if he got out of shape in a turn he could hit the gas and the Detroit Locker rear end would lock up and straighten him out.

Detroit Lockers have been used off-road for decades, that's what they do. If given a choice between a spool and a DL on a snowy day I'd pick the Locker. The guy has to learn to drive in snow with it, for sure.

The cornering thing, think about it...when you go around a corner with an open differential the differential action lets the outside tire go faster and the inside tire go slower. So vehicle speed is the average of the two. With a Locker, the inside tire goes the same speed as it was going and the outside unlocks and freewheels. So if you keep the engine speed constant, the car will try to jump ahead. If the inner wheel slips enough, the locker will lock back up momentarily which will try to push the car out of the turn. Then when the front tires regain control over car direction the locker unlocks again. So you get an uneasy feeling in the corner along with some clunks and snaps. This doesn't happen nearly as much if you reduce throttle pressure and let the engine slow down during the turn.

No way would a Soft Locker hold up to the drag racing.

I vote Detroit Locker.

Actually a driver selectable locker would be best. The ARB Air Locker or something like Toyota's electric locker, both are very useful off-road.

R.

I think the newer ones are all 4 or 6 pinion if that matters.

I can't say I agree with you that a Detroit Soft Locker won't hold up. I run one in my Spirit that has went 10.60's - easily has 500+ passes and 40K street miles and it still looks new inside. I pull it apart about every 4-5 years to inspect, and it still looks undamaged.

As to it's "manners" - dead quiet; never makes any clicking or ratcheting noise. As has been said, during and after a curve it will drive off the inside tire until the axles equalize speed and the dogs lock back in, so if you get into the gas too soon, it will try to push the front end - just like a spool will. About 3-4 times (in 20 years) it has popped on the launch - like a dog wasn't fully engaged, and it skipped to the next one - but it has never caused an aborted pass or caused any broken parts. And it has saved my biscuits on a couple of passes where I hit moisture on the track and gotten sideways - the locker simply released when I got out of the throttle and I could steer the car - a spool likely would have pushed it straight into the wall.

This one is only 2 years old.

To get access to the C clips I think it would be hard to put more pinions in there ?

You can get lighter springs for them, to allow them to unlock and ratchet easier, from this guy:
http://shop.ronsuttonracetechnology.com/shopping/productDetails.aspx?i=710937&c=9318
There may be others also.

Called Ron and bought a set of the 40lb springs , we'll see how it goes , going to be a little work getting it back together , the good thing is I was able to put it in the lathe at work and using a live spindle to take it apart without putting my eye out .

please keep us posted, i am thinking of doing the same thing.
did Ron say if it would quiet the clicking during turns down?