Advantages of 4WD on ordinary saloons?

[Roger Irrelevant]

I've got a Subaru with winter tyres on it and I don't know what to think any more.

[RobM77]

300bhp/ton said:

RobM77 said:

It In most RWD cars of normal power, the opposite happens, so it's possible to get full throttle in 1st gear without wheelspin, even in the wet.

My daily driver is circa 1400kg, 161bhp and 380Nm of torque, and you can get full throttle in 1st if you want to, even on a wet road.

I suspect TCS is likely still kicking in, even if you aren't aware of it. And most car makers restrict torque (and thus HP) in low gears anyway. So you can't actually get full power, even if it is full throttle.

A 161hp 1400kg car should easily be able to break traction.

No TC - there's a light, plus it allows a bit of slip, which you'd feel. For sure, if you're rough or if you have steering lock on you will have problems, but smoothly in a straight line isn't an issue.

Edited by RobM77 on Tuesday 16th October 15:45

[300bhp/ton]

RobM77 said:

No TC - there's a light, plus it allows a bit of slip, which you'd feel. For sure, if you're rough or if you have steering lock on you will have problems, but smoothly in a straight line isn't an issue.

Edited by RobM77 on Tuesday 16th October 15:45

with the short amount of time you have in 1st gear, I'm not sure you can be anything other than fairly brutal to be able to actually attain full throttle. Are you meaning from a stop or a roll?

[RobM77]

300bhp/ton said:

RobM77 said:

No TC - there's a light, plus it allows a bit of slip, which you'd feel. For sure, if you're rough or if you have steering lock on you will have problems, but smoothly in a straight line isn't an issue.

Edited by RobM77 on Tuesday 16th October 15:45

with the short amount of time you have in 1st gear, I'm not sure you can be anything other than fairly brutal to be able to actually attain full throttle. Are you meaning from a stop or a roll?

This is either from rest or rolling. It's a fairly slow car with a very long first gear, so the time spent in 1st isn't too short.

[gizlaroc]

blade7 said:

RobM77 said:

blade7 said:

RobM77 said:

It's also worth pointing out that many people citing traction as a requirement for 4WD are coming from FWD, where the front wheels get lifted off the ground

I'll have a pint of what you've been drinking.

Sorry, that was my attempt at simplifying the physics. As I'm sure you know, when any vehicle accelerates, the force down through the rear tyres increases, and the force on the fronts decreases (known as 'weight' transfer). The more you accelerate, the more this happens. FWD cars therefore get less traction the more they accelerate, and RWD cars get more.

Yes I do know that, but as this thread is going around in circles I attempted to inject some humour .

It is true though, well it is with Audis, just trying to get out of a fast junction in a FWD Audi if it looks like it might rain is enough to get it scrabbling around.
I had a FWD 2.0T A4 avant that was only 230hp and the torque steer on that was laughable.

I can see why many FWD owners decide AWD would be a good buy.

I love an AWD on proper winters, but would last year when the snow really hit my ML was on summers, so I left it in the garage and took the 300hp RWD E Class estate instead, that was on winters.

Hey Eric, this wasn't you who I pulled out of the snow was it?



I thought it might have been as the owner seemed genuinely dumbfounded that his AWD Subaru had got stuck, even more so that a RWD Merc pulled him out.

Followed him back to the main road in case he struggled further.

[Kuji]

InitialDave said:

Kuji said:

Some people are arguing about how much better their own choice of vehicle is over an AWD car.

They may have to insist that they are the only ones allowed to have winter tyres to achieve their goal, but it keeps them happy and off the street corners.

Don't try and paint it as confirmation bias in favour of what people already own. Eric is the only one demonstrating that.

And plenty of people are pointing out AWD with winter tyres is an excellent combination.

Yet, many 'other' people are doing just that.
Whether ít is being done consciously or subconsciously, is probably a good question.

[Hol]

gizlaroc said:

blade7 said:

RobM77 said:

blade7 said:

RobM77 said:

It's also worth pointing out that many people citing traction as a requirement for 4WD are coming from FWD, where the front wheels get lifted off the ground

I'll have a pint of what you've been drinking.

Sorry, that was my attempt at simplifying the physics. As I'm sure you know, when any vehicle accelerates, the force down through the rear tyres increases, and the force on the fronts decreases (known as 'weight' transfer). The more you accelerate, the more this happens. FWD cars therefore get less traction the more they accelerate, and RWD cars get more.

Yes I do know that, but as this thread is going around in circles I attempted to inject some humour .

It is true though, well it is with Audis, just trying to get out of a fast junction in a FWD Audi if it looks like it might rain is enough to get it scrabbling around.
I had a FWD 2.0T A4 avant that was only 230hp and the torque steer on that was laughable.

I can see why many FWD owners decide AWD would be a good buy.

I love an AWD on proper winters, but would last year when the snow really hit my ML was on summers, so I left it in the garage and took the 300hp RWD E Class estate instead, that was on winters.

Hey Eric, this wasn't you who I pulled out of the snow was it?



I thought it might have been as the owner seemed genuinely dumbfounded that his AWD Subaru had got stuck, even more so that a RWD Merc pulled him out.

Followed him back to the main road in case he struggled further.

That’s the best snow picture yet.

[TheDrBrian]

TooMany2cvs said:

RobM77 said:

It's also worth pointing out that many people citing traction as a requirement for 4WD are coming from FWD, where the front wheels get lifted off the ground giving you less traction when you accelerate, and the more you accelerate, the less traction you get. In most RWD cars of normal power, the opposite happens, so it's possible to get full throttle in 1st gear without wheelspin, even in the wet.

If you're giving it THAT much clog in poor weather/road conditions, then traction is not your biggest problem.

Do you know where you are?
This is the place where you drive at 11/10ths especially in the wind and rain and snow

[CABC]

let's swap snow pics.
driveway was full when we arrived last December.
Rav4 w/winters. BMW w/winters. Passat w/winters
Passat no winters (big fail)
no scooby in sight. though they are popular around here.

[ericmcn]

InitialDave said:

I'm going to assume that, as with you not having used winter tyres, you lack anything to back this up. How many different AWD systems have you tried?

If you drive a Subaru the history and quality they have speaks for itself as well as general consensus from others - the manual Legacy Spec B has centre diff and 50:50 split which is best (the Audi quattro is closest to this in terms of true AWD handling) from my list of cars in my garage this handles far better than any.

https://www.torquenews.com/1084/subaru-history-how...

[InitialDave]

I owned one. I disagree.

[ericmcn]

TooMany2cvs said:

And that's the entirety of what we need to know to put Eric's opinions into context.

Ive driven a Subaru in snowy / icy conditions and found myself not needing winter tyres? the overwhelming support of German RDW/FWD marques clear to see on pH

[DoubleD]

I like you Eric, you make me smile.

[ericmcn]

Flibble said:

Don't think so. Probably the AWD sucking up all the power.

are you sure? lets gather up all the 116d's and have a meet up guys? anyone?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NCgwYXvXBAk

[ericmcn]

nickfrog said:

As clearly demonstrated by several people including an automotive engineer using your own example of the fallen tree, it's quite litteraly the opposite. 4wd will blunt the handling.

I call that bks, type in BMW accident into google and see what props up, sure some could be due to '116d' idiots pelting 100mph towards an inner city roundabout but more could be due to the RWD nature of the car and handling, I also posted a link that shows BMW cars are most accident prone in the USA.

Subaru crashes in retrospect are probably due to WRX STi speed freaks;)

[ericmcn]

TooMany2cvs said:

Not much of an "advantage" if it can be bettered by changing a cheap consumable, without all the weight, mechanical drag and complication penalties.

so you say a FWD/RWD with winter tyres is better than an AWD car with winters? no one in countries with snow and ice terrain would listen to you i dont think.

[ericmcn]

jagnet said:

Given that in snow a 2WD car on winter tyres can out accelerate, out brake and out corner a 4WD vehicle on summers

you are basing this from experience? I guess no one in Southampton last March had winter tyres so? because i found it very tedious trying to avoid basically everyone.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=X8RQ_p4veis&t=...

[ericmcn]

80quattro said:

After reading some earlier posts, I pondered purchasing a set of winter tyres for my BMW 530i, as 265/35x18's summer tyres were not the best for removing said BMW from my driveway last winter.

After looking into prices, I opted for an entire car instead, for slightly lower outlay.

[gizlaroc]

ericmcn said:

TooMany2cvs said:

Not much of an "advantage" if it can be bettered by changing a cheap consumable, without all the weight, mechanical drag and complication penalties.

so you say a FWD/RWD with winter tyres is better than an AWD car with winters? no one in countries with snow and ice terrain would listen to you i dont think.

How the fk did you deduce that from that??!!


To me it reads, AWD adds wright, mechanical drag and complication penalties. You could get better results than those that AWD offers by simply putting a set of winter tyres on your 2WD car.

[jagnet]

ericmcn said:

jagnet said:

Given that in snow a 2WD car on winter tyres can out accelerate, out brake and out corner a 4WD vehicle on summers

you are basing this from experience? I guess no one in Southampton last March had winter tyres so? because i found it very tedious trying to avoid basically everyone.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=X8RQ_p4veis&t=...

Did we not do this several pages ago?

jagnet said:

Equalish performance? Not . even . close.

Compare and contrast:

Your video: https://youtu.be/X8RQ_p4veis where you finally manage to achieve a heady 25mph on a briefly empty bit of dual carriageway in 10mm of light snow and slush.

Not your video: https://youtu.be/_DnB_TmhsPY where relatively normal road speeds are maintained.

I doubt many people in Southampton use winter tyres and I think it's safe to say that no one in your video had them fitted.

You have finally admitted that you have no experience of winter tyres, so why do you persist in arguing that an AWD on summer tyres can perform in snow just as well as a car that is fitted with them, despite everyone that does have experience pointing out that that it can't.

You've got to be trolling.