A couple of days ago I was driving a 5-speed Manual RHD 2002 Mercedes W168 A-Class CDI 170 Elegance and the offside front CV joint broke. This left me stranded a few miles from home and I have to recover the vehicle.
Whilst at the roadside I noticed that with the engine running, the gearbox in gear and the clutch released, the offside driveshaft was rotating at engine speed. Obviously without any drive being transmitted, the vehicle remained stationary.
In this instance I was fairly close to home and recovery didn't take long. However, whilst at the roadside, I wondered if I'd been able to somehow jam the offside driveshaft to prevent it from turning easily, would a normal, open differential have transmitted drive to the other wheel? Clearly this would provide a strange driving experience as you'd only effectively have one wheel drive plus you'd be putting stresses far beyond the usual onto the nearside shaft and hub but would this have worked strictly on the basis of an emergency measure to limp the vehicle to the next village?