We don’t get snow often here in mild Eugene, but when it does, it transforms the town. As in, the town comes mostly to a standstill, because there are very few city snow plow trucks, salt is NOT used ever here (we need to protect all those CCs, which have been designated protected cultural artifacts), and folks just don’t know how to drive in this weird white stuff. And when they do, it can be come comical, as this video shows.
CC Contributor Ed Snitkoff sent me this video he found on You Tube shot not very far from my house. It’s not exactly heart-stopping, but just the kind of minor carnage that will keep the insurance agents busy for a while. Meanwhile, I have my own little story to tell.
My xB with its Blizzaks does very well in the snow, and the ice that often underlies it here. I was about to cross an arterial, and head a hill, when I saw an Olds Bravada (SUV) with chains only on the front wheels turn in and head up first. Hmm; chains on the front?
Sure enough, his rear wheels started spinning and it got slower and slower…and stopped. I pulled up and around him, and stopped next to him. I waved to him, and we opened our windows. I told him that it would be better to put the chains on the rear axle next time. He said he wrongly assumed it was AWD, and frankly, I did too, but I guess not. In any case, unless it’s FWD, it’s definitely better to be safe and chain up the rear wheels.
And having stopped on the middle of the hill, I did wonder if i was going to make it up without chains and AWD. No problem…the xB just chugged away with a bit of wheelspin. Sadly I couldn’t get a picture or video, as I was too close to him.
I’m totally sold on these Blizzaks; I’ve got at least as much traction as an AWD with all-season tires. My write-up on them from last winter is here. But the real acid test will be the next few hours this morning, as I’m driving Stephanie on her Meals On Wheels route, which is mostly up in the hills. And it’s the first time the route will be attempted since the snow fell. Temperatures have been well below freezing, and there’s a layer of ice under the packed snow. The city has not even pretended to plow and sand anything but the main arterials. If you don’t hear from the rest of the day…
Blizzak’s are the way to go, we have them on all three of our cars, they go on late fall and come off in the spring. I don’t understand people that complain about the expense, while you are using them (in appropriate conditions, not all summer long), you aren’t using the regular tires, thus extending their lifespan.
It’s not just snow, it’s cold temps too that they work great in (better than the regular ones).
Here is a winter tire test (click for link)
I can’t believe those people made multiple attempts to get up that hill after sliding down like that. I’d be thinking “I have to get out of here before someone else loses it and smacks into me” then go have a coffee and wait for the grit truck to show up.
We have winter tires on both our daily drivers, although they are cheaper Canadian Tire Goodyear Nordics. 4WD only helps you go, I like to go, stop and turn when it’s snowing.
Also helps when you have a flat tire just before going somewhere you can pull a full size spare out of the basement instead of using the donut 🙂
I’m sold on winter tires too. I don’t have Blizzaks but factory recommended and sourced winter Goodyears bought as a winter package for my Fusion from the Ford dealership. I believe it’s the soft compound of all M+S tires that really counts, not just the brand itself. Science.
Over priced dealership package? Probably. But they all have the tpms sensors built in, so no yellow light on dash for 4 months while they’re on.
Anyway, caught in the middle of a hill in Vancouver, Canada, I was scared I’d be another victim of gravity in a chain of cars stuck (and a semi(!!?)) when the light turned green. As it turned out, my fwd car (with traction control, granted) just walked and weaved past all the other cars and truck stuck. The poor Mercedes behind me didn’t have a chance and was the next vehicle to completely block the last available open lane. Needless to say, I had an empty mirror in rush hour for the next 10 minutes. God it was wonderful.
Again, well worth the $1200 CDN… which is like, what, 50 bucks, American?
The money could weight differently when excessive salt and potholes are taken into consideration.
Blizzaks are middle of the road and they often aren’t round so you did good to avoid them.
For winter tires I’ve used Kijiji during the summer. When people trade in cars the dealerships won’t take rims and tires so they just want to be rid of them.
It helps to check bolt patterns and offsets from other vehicles to know what’ll fit, and be a bit flexible on tire sizes. A few years ago I got a set of rims & snows for my Dad’s Kia Rondo for $300, which were off a Caravan.
Football players don’t wear ballet shoes for a reason. Appropriate footwear is essential to peak performance. As to the cost of winter tires, a wrecker to pull you back onto the road will run you 100 dollars. It gets a lot more expensive quick if you damaged your car or someone else’s, and when it comes to bodily injury why risk it? Snow tires rule. Besides, football players would look funny in ballet shoes. That silver Hyundai in the video needs his back brakes adjusted.
I kinda felt bad laughing because here it snows all the time, the city uses a metric f-ton of salt, and we don’t have hills. And some people still screw up.
That area does look beautiful with the snow. The video’s author had the right idea watching from his deck instead of behind the wheel.
Studded snows all the way. At least we can use them here, it’s the only thing for icy hardpan.
That’s pretty bad. Salt wise, if an area has several months of winter storm and local people drive cars in different seasons accordingly, it works better ( especially on Interstate. ) but in an area with occasion snow, sand could be better, at least it protects the local environment and buildings/utility equipment ( road signs and street lights just rust away here and fall down from time to time ) doesn’t kill the fish or frogs.
Snow tires could be really good if storage isn’t a problem. For me, all season tired and a winter car is enough though. Even here, when it snowed so suddenly, people don’t drive much better than that, but it gets better one week later.
It was so bad last year I saw a GMC Acadia hit an Acadia, a Buick Enclave hit an Enclave, and an Acadia hit an Enclave on the same interstate at one evening.
It’s my car after one night.
What it really comes down to is that most non-car people don’t understand physics! Nor how their cars work, exactly. Do they think vehicles are magical or something? When it snows here, I stay home. Because I fear the ineptitude of the other drivers.
Here in the flat midwest, all season radials are good for most anywhere I need to go – so long as you have experience driving in the stuff.
I got an experience a few weeks ago when my daughter called. It seems that she and her boyfriend were on their way home and were stuck on glare ice on the street behind me, which had coated everything over the previous hour or so. I walked over carrying a bag of salt (leftover from the last time we made homemade ice cream) and had to spread salt in front of me every time I took a step on pavement to keep from falling down. It took several fistfulls of salt and about a half hour, but we made it. I don’t mind snow, but ice is nasty.
Yeah, I’ve never felt the need for snow tires. I’d say well over 90% of drivers here in Minnesota don’t use them.
That’s not to say they are not useful, but a decently siped tread design and sensible driving go a long ways.
Yes, you guys don’t exactly have a lot of hills and mountains out there 🙂
Not where I am now, no, but where I grew up and in most of the state there are hills.
And lots and lots of salt.
I used to make it through the winter with all seasons or, with trucks, all terrain tires. You can, but its tricky. Proper snow tires are so much better.
The only people who dont use snows are the desperately poor or those who have never used a decent set. Once you do, you won’t be content with just all-seasons again.
I think that’s the key. Once you actually experience the difference you see the value. Until then you can usually “get around” but you’re just putting yourself and everyone else at higher risk.
The extra bonus is if you have a decent performer, then you don’t need to limit yourself to all-seasons and can actually have a set of excellent summer tires for the other part of the year.
“The only people who dont use snows are the desperately poor or those who have never used a decent set.”
There is a third group of us: those old enough to remember how fabulous all season radials were in snow after some years of driving on bias plys (which made snow tires absolutely mandatory.)
There’s a big difference too among all-seasons. Typically OEM tires are chosen for economy. Better quality tires usually have more compliant compounds and better siping. Most modern all-seasons also have embedded silica now.
Again, that’s not to say they match snow tires, but I usually find them to be competent enough.
I live in NE Ohio. Lake affect snow. Snow belt winds and drifting snow. I’m a responsible, mature adult who respects the weather conditions and pride myself in propelling my vehicle in a safe & sane manner. Best cars I’ve owned for bad weather driving include: present 2014 Civic CVT, 2009 Cobalt auto, 1996 Ranger 4cyl/5 speed, 1984 Dodge Aries 2.2/auto. Worst in snow: 1976 LTD, 2011 Kia Soul+, and THE WORST OF THEM ALL 2005 Scion xB. In all my years of driving, the Scion was the only car that had to be towed from (apparently) too deep snow in a flat, open parking lot where I worked. Forget about trying to stop; anti-lock brakes way too sensitive. Traction control useless. Turning TC off likewise useless. In the 4 years I owned it winter driving was an absolute disaster.
Odd. Mine has been terrific in the snow and ice. I feel as confident in it as I did with our previous AWD Subaru.
Reminds me of Atlanta’s Snow Jam ’82. Took me four hours to get home in my Vega, normally a 20-minute drive. http://snowjam82.com/atlanta-stories#snow-lesser-of-two-evils
This reminds me of the snow videos from Seattle and Portland too, lots of people without good tires, or skills. Skills can help a lot, when we lived in Beaverton we once drove our Ford Escort to Mt. Batchelor in a snowstorm on all season tires, without any problems.
Now that we live in Bend we have winter tires on both vehicles. The Toyo studless tires (imitation Blizzaks) on our Mazda5 have been very grippy and undefeated by snow. We did have to take a running start to clear an ice covered speed bump and had a slightly nervous moment at a traffic light but between the tires and the ABS we still stopped safely.
As someone who grew up in MN and thus learned to drive in snow literally the very first day I got behind the wheel (December birthday), this is hard to watch. Never underestimate the stupidity of those behind the wheel who are unfamiliar with driving in these conditions. Back home, all the “lifers” make it a point to avoid hitting the roads at all costs during the first snowfall because of stuff like this. People somehow forget to drive, have never experienced it yet, or go way beyond acceptable tread wear for the incoming season and it’s always predictably bad. Like magic, when the next batch comes, people all of a sudden use caution and relative safety ensues.
I will never forget, for as long as I live, the woman who lived across the street from me in the second rental I had. Our street was a fairly steep hill, and unbeknownst to me, she had never driven in winter conditions before. It’s our first snowfall of the season. I’m inside, and begin to hear this god awful screeching sound from outside. I get to my window to see her Grand Caravan parked in the street, and she is literally giving full throttle to try and move up the hill. I run outside to try and suggest to her to head down the hill, but she isn’t hearing any of it and continues to do this full throttle routine for the next twenty minutes while I watch in shock on the porch. All you can smell is burning rubber everywhere. Eventually the obvious happens, and the sound of one of the tires blowing out is heard. When I got to see the part of the street where the van was parked a day or two later, she had literally burned craters into the actual pavement nearly an inch deep!
Years ago in high school a girl drove moms Olds 98 wagon to school. One wheel was on ice going up a small hill. It started to spin and the car stopped. She kept on spinning it until the diff started howling/shreiking. I think the spinning spider gears ran out of lube and welded themselves to their shaft. When this happened the open diff essentially became a limited slip and the car started to move.
During a mild SoCal shower, my pal and I once watched a girl spin out a ’67 Mustang while performing a left turn in front of our high school. That did it; she went full gas instead of brakes ( or hands-off ) and proceeded to 180 in the next street, curb-carom twice, and finally come to rest over/under a chained-off driveway with both right-side wheels broken out at the centers, a pole dent in the front end, and chain marks all along hood and roof. Ta-da!
Ice polishers. Once your tires start to spin, they are just ice polishers.
But out here we drive in the rain like it was a sunny day, tailgating all the way, so we have no room to complain…
One of the greatest things about being retired is that if the weather is bad, I don’t have to get out in it and go to work. This corner of southwestern Indiana doesn’t get that much snow but when it does, or even if snow is suspected, the highway departments liberally coat the major routes with salt or beet juice. We had about an inch of snow yesterday and, of course, the whole place was in a tizzy. The TV stations went all out, driving around the area and showing vehicles that had slid off the road. I was amused to notice that many of the slide offs were AWD vehicles; apparently having four wheel drive makes people think that the laws of physics don’t apply to them.
4WD just means you need a longer rope…
“All-wheel-drive helps you go; it doesn’t help you stop,” as the old saying goes.
“You may have 4-wheel-drive, but everyone has 4-wheel brakes.”
With the incoming snow here they’ve been brining the hell out of the major roads in preparation (though I personally think locally we won’t get much). We only have one or two snows of any substance per season, so it’s not worthwhile to get snow/winter tires, but I try to minimize my driving. I don’t have a lot of experience with it but I had good instruction and can usually get around if need be, despite RWD–it’s everyone else I’m worried about!
During the unusually heavy snowfall of last winter, I watched a fellow in an unladen 2WD Ranger get stuck in front of my neighbor’s house (I don’t live on a hill but we do have highly crowned roads). Not surprising. He walked away and came back with a buddy with a 4WD Silverado. Who also got stuck. Much yelling of profanity back and forth ensued (coming mostly from Ranger Man, who perhaps shouldn’t have been barking out orders when he was the first one to get stuck.) They drafted a neighbor to help push and eventually got the Silverado free, but the Ranger remained marooned halfway around a corner until the ice started to melt the next day. Typical…
2WD truck is a big trap in winter. A guy I know saw a low mileage, rust free 2WD Silverado for sale cheap, and he bought it. Later he figured why it’s rust free despite the excessive road salt in Michigan: that truck is not drivable in winter with an empty bed.
He quickly sold it and the next time I saw it on street, it has heavy weight mounted back in truck bed.
Back in the day when 99% of all pickups were 2WD it was standard procedure to put several hundred pounds of something in the bed, over the rear wheels. In an emergency I’ve seen people fill the bed up with snow for the additional weight.
Gearing and tires is also a factor. My old ’87 Dodge 3/4 ton was geared quite low. Between that and some gumbo tires I got a the salvage yard it would almost idle through a snow drift and rarely lost any traction.
I’ve never experienced another 2wd pickup like that and, yes, my current pickup is four-wheel drive.
Yep, weight in the back is standard operating procedure for a 2wd pickup. In high school I worked at a mom-and-pop grocery store that also sold things like water softener salt in 50-pound bags. At the beginning of winter we literally kept pallets of it at the front of the store, and we usually sold a couple pallets’ worth per day. People would buy five to ten 50-pound bags and promptly leave them in their trucks for the winter.
Also, it’s great if you get stuck, way better than kitty litter or sand!
As noted above, the key to success in this type of driving is the proper tires, as well as the proper driving skills. Another excellent winter tire is the Nokian Hakkapeliitta, I actually prefer them to Blizzaks. Blizzaks are amazing when new but seem to lose some of thier “bite” when you get down to the last half of the tread, while Haks will wear to about 15% before they need to go. Either is a lot better than “all season” tires of any type. Here in the BC Rockies we get lots of winter driving practice and I’ll take proper winter tires over AWD any day of the week if I had to choose.
They may use chlorides of some type in Eugene, those are liquid pre-wet tanks on the sides of the hopper shown in the video.
One nice thing about winter in places like Eugene, it’ll probably be a memory by next week.
Every year the tv news does a segment on winter driving, usually done by a parrot who has been told what to say. They always tell you to keep kitty litter in your trunk in case you get stuck. You might get lucky and have it work, but kitty litter is made of clay and wet clay becomes grease when it’s under your tires. Keep a bag of SAND in your trunk. Save the kitty litter for your kitty.
Say Paul, we are going to have to keep an eye on that incoming ice storm that is coming to the Willamette Valley.
It is so funny to watch people driving in a little bit of snow where snow is an uncommon thing. We live just outside Toronto and snow is a harsh reality. In my town, side roads are plowed but rarely sanded or salted. Driving in these conditions is second nature. I drive an E150 and use the gas as often as the brake to go around corners in the winter! It is a special time of year. Ebrake maneuvers and doughnuts in the parking lots after business hours!
Sorry, you all need to learn how to drive. I grew up in western Massachusetts and the only way to run that road is on a gentle throttle downhill, speeding up to 45-50 mph then stay on the throttle lightly and semi-coast up the other side. If you’re doing 15-20 mph at the top of the hill you did it properly. No sudden moves with the steering wheel, either. Doesn’t matter what kind of vehicle. Except for a Corvair, snow tires help greatly. (Corvairs could do this on bald tires, I swear.)
?!? 45 mph on an icy incline? Don’t forget to warn folks your insurance needs to be paid up with that advice…
I last drove in the snow in my 1982 Mexican VW Beetle with the wrong tires of course, the i5 ‘ Grapevine ‘ was closed but a big rig and I discovered an unmanned barricade and drove around it & headed North .
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It scared me witless, the truck slowly pulled away from us and disappeared into the snowstorm .
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I trundled along @ 10 ~ 15 MPH glad there was no other traffic, we never slid off the road , whew .
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THANK YOU for this fun and (?) educational video ! .
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-Nate
I always got a kick out of driving my ’64 Beetle around Atlanta, GA during ice or snow storms. Solid sheet ice on the road didn’t phase it a bit (just accelerate and brake a bit more gently).
I’d always wave real big to the guys in Jeeps and 4×4 pickups stuck in the ditches as I passed.
“dadadadadadada… and we get a hundred miles to the gallon, too!” (Bill Cosby, “200 MPH”)
Yeah well ;
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I grew up in New England in various old Air Cooled VW’s and no one ever seemed to have any problems but when _I_ tried driving my old 1960 36HP Beetle, it simply lost traction going up slight inclines .
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I truly feel one needs practice to do it safely .
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-Nate
In 1981 my wife and I went to Atlanta to visit her father and brother over the Christmas holiday. We’d had a dry but cold (single digit temps frequently) that year. I remember Atlanta being rainy that Christmas, but no unusual weather. On the way back up I-75 in Kentucky, we ran into snow in the Appalachians. The higher we went, the worse it got. Ice came first, then snow. One by one, my fellow motorists fell off the road.
One of my everlasting memories of that drive is our 1977 Delta 88 which had Positraction keeping us pointed in the right direction. That night, at the summit of one of the mountains, the snow was so thick the only thing I could see was the tail lights of a tractor trailer ahead of us. We were both going 20 MPH and even that felt reckless. I was never so glad to get out of the hills of Kentucky and back to the plains of Ohio…
tires are a fine thing to pay attention to along with driver skill.
Then there is the infamous wheel alignment. bad toe = bad traction in the slippery stuff. One wheel will break early, then the other.
Get a good 4 wheel alignment if you are serious about optimizing snow driving. It feels better in the warm dry too.
Another shout-out for Blizzaks! I have them on the Fiesta ST, and despite it being a little car it’s an absolute beast in the winter-probably the best car I’ve had for winter, honestly. A couple years ago, we were having a snowstorm and had already gotten about three inches, and of course I was on the freeway. On the Lodge Freeway, there’s a rise where it passes over the Davison Freeway-a pretty gentle freeway slope, but a slope all the same. I passed a TrailBlazer, obviously in four-wheel-drive, that was struggling to get up the hill at 25 miles per hour. Every time they’d touch the gas, all four wheels would start spinning and the thing would start to go sideways. Meanwhile, I safely and easily passed them in my little Fiesta with Blizzaks.
I honestly never understood the winter tire thing until I had to get them for the Fiesta (came with summer tires on it instead of all-seasons). There’s honestly such a difference! Now that I’ve done it, I won’t go back to all-seasons for my daily driver. Even in slush the thing doesn’t struggle much, whereas even my heavy Buicks with good all-seasons would be almost incapacitated by slush!
Pacific Northwest drivers may legitimately lack snow skills, so somehow it’s reassuring to know that even in wintry Montreal drivers can sometimes get into trouble.
About a half mile from that video my wife did a slow motion slide into a Jeep Cherokee parked while the owner was putting on chains. She called me all freaked out (she grew up in Portland and doesn’t know snow) so I walked over to help her. As soon as I got there a pickup slid into the rear end of our F-150. Once we exchanged info and extracted the cars from each other I confidently got ready to expertly drive away (I grew up driving in Detroit in the snow). Driving in snow is like riding a bicycle, but Detroit is mostly flat and I was in the South Hills of Eugene. Trying to go up a steep hill I immediately started to slide backwards, so I did a 180, stopped and drove uphill in reverse using the 4WD’s weight over the front axle.(Who NEEDS snow tires?!?!) I tried to act like this was planned out, fortunately it was dumb luck. Just like in 1973 when I did a 360 on I-94 outside of Detroit traveling about 35 mph on ice in a 1966 Volvo 122s. Once I straightened out I kept right on going like it was something I did all the time.
Growing up in Connecticut I am used to snow, hills, and hairpin turns, but I still avoid driving in it if I can. I am generally slow and cautious, but am truly more worried about other people, especially fools who think their SUVs or Outbacks are invincible in the snow from too many TV and radio commercials. I have a set of chains for the Oldsmobile if it is ever absolutely necessary for me to venture out and I don’t hesitate to use them. For the most part, in its limited snow time, it is solid. Usually I am in Manhattan, do not have the car, and do not need it. Bad enough watching people here drive in the snow from the sidewalk.
A question for the experts here : Is “rocking” your car (through rapid shifts from Drive to Reverse) to get out of a snow drift bad for the transmission? I see people do it all the time, but I would think it would lead to expensive transmission repairs in the future?
I’m certainly no ‘expert’ but as long as you’re not doing tranny slams when going from drive to reverse then back again, not it shouldn’t hurt the slush box .
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The idea is to create increasing momentum, _not_ blast your way free with spinning tires .
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If you’re ATF isn’t translucent red or smells burnt, the tranny isn’t in good shape anyway .
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I have many memories of Rural New England snow driving on Bias-Ply snow tires, it was do-able but took practice and caution .
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-Nate
This is absolutely one instance where the old Chrysler push button automatic was better than the floppy lever found in GM and Ford products. It was much easier to push the appropriate button when trying to rock the car back and forth than hunt for the correct gear with a lever.
With an automatic my method of rocking was by leaving the car either in reverse or drive and just getting on and off the throttle. Not too much throttle. I think this is easier on the transmission.
With a manual you can have it in either 1st or reverse and get on and off the clutch. Again not too much throttle. At low speeds this never did hurt the clutch.
Either way make sure the front wheels are straight, not turned.
Bob
I live on a hill similar to the one in this video. On the day after Christmas our road was glare ice and it was raining. On top of that, my township didn’t send out the sander trucks because it was a holiday. Our road was so bad, I couldn’t even cross on foot. Within a few hours we had 5 cars go off the road in the ditch (it’s not a busy road). Luckily the snow banks were decently sized so they absorbed the impacts and nobody got damaged. With the help of neighbours, a shovels and brute force we got all the vehicles out. We had someone stopping traffic to prevent further accidents. Three of the five were pickup trucks with 4WD but bad tires. One guy’s truck had almost bald mud tires and he slide sideways down the hill until we were able to straighten him out on level ground. Luckily the police were able to get a sander truck to come out to sand the hill.
Our daily drivers are a Subaru and a 4WD pickup. Both have winter tires. Neither are very good at stopping or turning with all season tires in comparison to the winters. After running a 4WD and AWD with winter tires, I’d never go without. There are many people in this area who run 4×4 pickups with just “all terrain” but once you try winter tires the difference is amazing. I live in a rural area, and my township only sands, and isn’t great at plowing. With these vehicles we can tackle the worst mother nature can throw at us. Even the nearby city while they salt like crazy has cut way back on snow removal from 10-15 years ago. I have used Michelin X-Ice winter tires on several vehicles and they have been excellent, while lasting relatively long for a winter tire. I am probably going to try Blizzack DM-V2s on my truck next winter as my current Yokohama’s are about half worn, which is as far as I let a winter tire wear before I replace them,
January, 1961. Wisconsin. The night before I went for my drivers license it snowed
9 inches. My dad’s reaction was lets go son. Hey, ya know what, those fools at the
MDV were open. Did the written and waited. When my name was called the officer
and I headed out. No mention of the snow. I had the heat cranked up to 11 and
when he got in the car there was a huge smile on his face. He said, “Drive, I’ll tell
you when to turn.” I drove, I turned. A few roads were plowed but most were not.
Got back to the MDV, parked, the Man said, “Congratulations” and shook my hand.
Those were the days my friends.
Christmas day here were started out with freezing rain. I went out to see how bad it was but my driveway was very slick, so I went back indoors and stayed home.
While Blizzacks are supposed to be good, I think Nokians are even better. But on freezing rain nothing is going to work although chains may if they are on all four wheels.
I am thinking that I might replace the Pirelli’s with all weather (not all season) Nokian’s. So far the Pirelli’s are not bad, even with 35,000 miles on them. They don’t like the slush that the city streets turn into when it is cold (near zero) and the deicer and snow mix. Last spring (I think) I had not problems going up a long hill that was icy, past a Suburban that had slid off the road into the ditch. Then later on, a 4 wheel drive was in the median on its side.
I live on the sunny (well not this week, does Bridgestone make a “Rainak” tire?) Central Coast of California, but for many years we had a house high in the Sierra Nevada mountains and I drove in a lot of snow. Never with snow tires and really never felt the need, though to be fair, locals who absolutely had to get through, and all the cops, used studs. Did have 4wd and that was mandatory … most 2wds, at least passnger cars, would high center and get stuck even with chains. And we certainly had hills and curves … the last mile to our house was a “2nd gear hill” in the summer. It seems like the real issue here is the icy pavement under the snow. I’m driving up to Oregon this week but it’s supposed to warm up … but thanks for posting this as a reminder to be careful! And I’ll have chains and 4wd.
Things weren’t too bad up on River Road in north Eugene, but I mostly stayed where I was.
The AWD system on the Bravada was a slip then grip 4wd system and it was prone to failure so the guy was probably right in his assumption that it was AWD but it just wasn’t working. If it was working then the front wheels would be the preferred place for the chains for a couple of reasons. First it will give you better steering and stopping. Second on a slip then grip system that primarily powers the rear wheels with the chains on the front then slippage of the rear wheels are more likely to occur and thus engage the system. Having the power split between both ends will improve the cornering tracking of the vehicle significantly. Contrary to popular belief 4wd does improve your ability to corner. That is one of the reasons that the first Audi Quattro vehicles did so well in various on road racing that it was banned.
I too am a firm believer in true winter tires in the winter. Note I said winter tires and not snow or mud and snow tires. You can call a tire a snow or mud and snow based purely on the geometry of the tread while a true winter tire carries the snow flake on the mountain symbol and are optimized for low temp grip. That means that they will remain soft in cold temps and provide better traction in the dry and rain than an all season tire in the same temps. They will also have much better performance on icy roads.
For those that swear by Blizzaks check the tests there are better performing tires. If you look at the link that was posted above they came in 4th out of 6 behind the Nokian, Michelin and Continental and they even noted that is was a big gap between 4th and 3rd place.
I do have to laugh at those people who after failing going down, the F150, then decided that they could get up the hill. The second year after moving into our current house we had a number of snow days. The road leading out of our neighborhood forms a T with the main road. On 3 separate occasions I saw the same lady in her Range Rover in the ditch on the opposite side across the road because she was going so fast that she couldn’t stop at the stop sign.