Driving in snow

[TnT]

People in Oregon don't know how to drive in the snow. Check out this video that some guy took off the balcony of his apartment:

kgw.com

On the right side Video Center. Select "15 car collisions caught on tape by KGW viewer"

[Elie]

I don't think snow tires were invented in that part of town!

[ND66]

Holy crap!


Is this one of the times when "first you say it, then you do it" like Doc mentioned?!


.

[gt40]

The only thing that would help on sheer ice like that would be studded tires.

[TnT]

My favorite part is when the mini-van slides down the hill, runs into those other stuck/parked cars and then they start all sliding again.

[Dr Mordrid]

Years ago I was visiting a friend at Lackland AFB (San Antonio, Texas) during January. One day about 2" of snow fell overnight, so my buddy woke me early to "go watch the freak show". We walked to a nearby overpass and watched everyone play bumper cars for almost 2 hours.

"Freak show" doesn't begin to discribe what went on that day as half the cars on the freeway were trying to navigate snow at 60 mph

[rylan]

Yup, its amazing how bad people drive snow or anything they aren't used to. Even up here, people are morons on the first snow/ice day... its like they forgot how to drive in it after the summer.

[Jessterw]

I'm actually proud of my fellow Oklahomans after our three day ice storm and still remaining thick layer of ice covering everything - they've managed to not drive like idiots for once.

Of course we're supposed to get some snow this weekend, at which point the idiots will forget that there's a layer of slippery ice underneath and cause all sorts of havoc.

[Brian Ellis]

Having lived in Switzerland for 35 years, I can empathise. As gt40 said, studs are the only hope on thick ice and, actually, well-treaded summer tyres are better on ice like that than snow tyres, especially if you over-inflate them by an extra 0.5 bars, as this deforms the tread pattern to provide a little cogging on the edges of the blocks of tread. However, snow tyres are much better than summer ones for ordinary snow/ice conditions. In those 35 winters, I lost control and did an uncontrolled slide through 180° just once, no damage. And where I lived was hilly terrain, with over 400 m altitude difference across a small town, gradients >10% in places. But everyone there had properly equipped cars and they learnt how to drive in bad conditions as part of their driving test requirements. OK, there were times that I had to take a detour as some hills were simply unclimbable or undescendable safely.

What scared me the most was driving in the UK under snowy conditions; 1 cm and the place became paralysed with cars all over the place. I don't think they know what snow tyres are there.

You can see in the video that many of the drivers lost control simply because they slammed on their brakes, which is the last thing you need to do. You should keep your foot off the brake and try to synchronise your wheel rotation to the road in as high a gear as possible to your motion.

[Fluff]

What are snow tyres? Are they the same as chains? We have problems when there are too many leaves too

[Dr Mordrid]

Studded tires are illegal in Michigan (road damage), but chains are OK if a storm has hit. A lot of people here have 2 sets of tires; swapping in the snows in early November and back to the normals ~March.

Popular options: anti-lock brakes and traction control.

@Fluff

Snow tire: (the aggressive tread improves traction in snow, slush & mud)

[cjolley]

I'm actually proud of my fellow Oklahomans after our three day ice storm and still remaining thick layer of ice covering everything - they've managed to not drive like idiots for once.

...

Seems like that was yesterday.
The road were worse for me this morning, and the average driver LESS careful.

It was a odd storm here.
Three inches of sleet.
Then several hours of light freezing drizzle.
It looks pretty like a soft blanket of snow.
But it's as hard as concrete.
Our Lexus at 3,500 lb does not leave tire tracks driving up our driveway and I had to use a hammer and chisel to clear a path up our front steps.

BTW Jessie, the computer models are saying one foot for this weekend now.
This set of storms is so not normal for Oklahoma.

[Tjalfe]

my winter tires look way different than that
the Michelin Artic Alpine has lots of little flaps, which dig into the snow when trying to accelerate or break

[Brian Ellis]

Snow tyres also have a very different rubber mix from summer tyres. They are unsuitable for summer use because the wear increases exponentially above 20°C on ordinary roads and they are not so good on wet roads because the chunky pattern has less rubber in contact with the road. They also tend to be noisier.

Studded tyres were popular in Switzerland, despite the cost and the noise, in the 1970s, until they found that the highways were wearing at the rate of 6-8 cm/season, in two "ditches" in each lane. These were ideal for promoting aquaplaning when it was wet. They were then forbidden, but this raised a hoo-haa amongst the mountain dwellers that the ban was rescinded on condition that the cars wearing such tyres were limited to 80 km/h, had a special sticker on the back and were forbidden on highways. I think this is still valid, but you never see them now.

Chains are very useful in snow but are useless on ice or on dry roads. I always carried chains in winter. They are sheer hell to put on and take off in a blizzard, even the quick-fit types! If a chain breaks and wraps itself round the axle, it is double-fun!

Gritting the roads is very useful: salt is used much less now, except in critical regions, such as on bridges.