Quote:
Originally Posted by immaculate
It's certainly passable during winter with snow tires but by no means is it great. I bought brand new Blizzaks this winter for my BRZ and was disappointed. In light snow it did fine, but if the plows didn't get out fast enough and the roads/tire tracks started to get icy, it became scary.
The car struggled mightily on any kind of incline. During one of the worst storms I was on the highway approaching a hilly section where cars were slowing to a stop. Once I was forced to stop and restart I could not get traction, spent about a full mile opposite-lock.
My advice would be this, if you need the approval of your parents to buy the car, I'm guessing you're fairly young, which I would then assume means you probably don't have a ton of winter driving experience. This is not a good winter car, and if you don't know what your doing, you can easily get in trouble.
|
Pretty good advice. Regardless of what car you end up getting, do get some snow driving experience under your belt (go to a deserted parking lot, frozen lake if you have those around in mid-winter, or other safe place and practice driving the car with low grip). Winter tyres help
a lot but there are still plenty of conditions under which you'll have little to no grip (unless you have studs, I guess), and all cars are a little tricky to drive when that happens. Do get a good winter tyre. I drove my old car on Blizzaks (LM-60's I think) and they were pretty good. On actual ice you'd still slip and slide quite a bit, but for the most part they made the car pretty grippy. I've heard good things about Hakkapeliittas as well (
http://www.nokiantires.com/tyre?id=1...kkapeliitta+R2) but didn't get the chance to try them before moving back to southern California.
Other than tyres the best thing you can do is just be mindful of the conditions and treat them with respect. It sounds totally obvious, but if you're anything like me the hardest thing is to just force yourself to drive slower than it feels like you need to. Leave more room around your car, pay close attention to what you're doing, try and keep an eye on what's happening a good long way down the road, etc. Leave early so you don't put yourself in the position of being in a hurry. You'll minimize nasty surprises this way.
The good thing about winter driving is that you can reward yourself for all your safe daily driving by finding a snowy, empty parking lot. Snow can be dangerous, but it can also be a playground! If I could get my GTI to oversteer on snow, anything is possible on snow :P
Oh, and-- maybe this goes without saying-- in addition to the shovel that people are recommending that you carry, carry a full set of winter clothes in the back (a warm-ass jacket, warm hat, and gloves). If you get stuck for any period of time you'll be super glad you brought them. I used to carry an MRE too (you can buy them at surplus stores) just for kicks. Never did end up using it, but what could be more awesome than a packet of hot food while you're stuck on the side of the road? And they're small-- I used to carry mine in the glove box.