Wheel rotation pickups and torsen mechanism

All,

Saw something interesting on my car when it was in for the tire install yesterday. On the axle just inside the rear brake rotors on both wheels, there is what appears to be a series of magnets, and a magnetic pickup hanging over them--some sort of electronic rotation sensor. Possibilities that occurred to me are 1) speedo pickup, but I thought that's usually on the transmission, 2) wheel rotation pickup for the ABS, but they should be on the front wheels too, and I didn't see any similar thing on the front, or, the only other thing I can think of is 3) wheel rotation pickup for the LSD.

This got me to thinking about how the Miata's LSD works. The descriptions I've read about generic torsens is that they work entirely based on an internal mechanism, with no electronic feedback, that uses worm gears instead of hypoid gears so that transmission of force is unidirectional from the differential to the axles, and not from the axles to the differential. Does the Miata torsen actually have axle rotation sensors, with a clutch-type LSD where the clutches are controlled by electronic feedback loops? What gives?

Eric Lucas

Reply to
Eric Lucas
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ABS is correct. There should be similar rotors on the front, pressed onto the back of the hubs. They look like gears with lots of teeth. Brake parts are probably blocking your view.

Reply to
Lanny Chambers

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