Is 21st Century Snow Different To How It Used To Be ?

[Jon951]

Honestly what is it with all these questions as to whether its possible to drive without the threat of imminent death every time there's a dusting of snow around the place ? Threads about autos in the snow, rear wheel drive in the snow, LSD's in the snow even whether it is possible to drive a 911 in the snow ?? Wtf ??

We seemed to manage quite well back in the last millenia dealing with different weather and road conditions without mass hysteria breaking out. Back in 1993 (seemingly the last time we had such "heavy" early snow fall) I was running an Opel Monza which was rear wheel drive, an automatic and had a LSD and had quite a few snowy journies in it. From what I recall I didn't once get stuck, meet any kind of icey doom nor crash and explode in a ball of flame. Quite how I managed it with three such deadly weaknesses on my car I can't begin to imagine...

Can people really not cope ?

Edited by Jon951 on Friday 26th November 12:45

[Mannginger]

It's the age of the internet - mass communications etc mean more people are asking more questions because it's easy. Why not arm yourself with information and ask questions and be exposed to the people who have tried these things?

Also 24 hour news channels have insufficient things to focus on so inclement weather gets more airtime and can increase people's anxiety. Finally there are more products out now then there were before which gives people more options (for example I've bought some snow socks - just in case.)

/2p

[LuS1fer]

Two suggestions:
(1) narrower and taller tyres - best car I ever had in the snow wore 145R13s and was RWD (A40)
(2) I suspect a greater divergence in this century between winter tyres and summer tyres as handling has become more important. Crap old hard "universal" tyres were acceptable in the past, not so much now. In the US, you seem to get all-weather tyres or summer tyres dependent on what state the car is being sold in.

[y2blade]

21st century drivers are more the problem

[Fittster]

You are a driving god, it's the only explanation.

[LuS1fer]

Oh and just to underline the point, I never had any problems in the snow in the past but I have a pair of Kumhos on the Golf which were fairly poor in the snow albeit I need to qualify that by saying I live on the side of a mountain and it defeated most 2WD cars (though not all).

[Fittster]

LuS1fer said:

(2) I suspect a greater divergence in this century between winter tyres and summer tyres as handling has become more important. Crap old hard "universal" tyres were acceptable in the past, not so much now.

Most people in the UK simply expect tyres to be round, black and hopefully cheap. The average motorist (even an RWD German saloon) doesn't get his knickers in a twist about what rubber his car is using.

I'd be interested to know what percentage of the public regularly check their tyre pressure.

[thinfourth2]

Blame the stopwatch

Every new car must go faster then the one before hence we have shopping cars with massive tyres

[Trevelyan]

I'd say that the main difference is the number of other vehicles on the road at the same time. I'd be quite happy attempting to drive anywhere if I could be reasonably sure that I'd have a bit of space to make small mistakes (not having someone six feet from my rear bumper for example) and the liklehood of having a numpty sliding into me was lower. Also the amount of traffic means that snow = gridlock rather than just a slower journey. With all that in mind I tend to leave the car at home if possible and have a much more relaxing journey on the train.

[Jon951]

Fittster said:

You are a driving god, it's the only explanation.

Thankyou you're too kind

I realise that there are issues raised by poor weather/road conditions and thanks to karma I will probably now come a cropper on the way home tonight, but its just the levels of angst over mundane and perfectly normal things that bemuses me somewhat.

[LuS1fer]

21st century snow fell tonight. I live on a large series of hills and as far as I could see after 4 hours of gridlock, it didn't really matter whether you had winter tyres or not, everyone slid on the compressed slush.

[PLamborghini]

Fittster said:

You are a driving god, it's the only explanation.

[EDLT]

A warning for the OP: Last year a member of this forum started a similar thread about how he and his Subaru never have any problems. Approximately one month later he almost smashed a corner off his car on sheet ice, which was the council's fault according to him. Naturally there was 30 odd pages of "discussion".

But that won't happen to you, because you are so much better than everyone else.

[J4CKO]

My Saab is rubbish in snow, so am I, we stay at home as the broadband is unaffected !

[MGB Boy]

Probably because 95% of people are no longer armed with common sense.

That and I blame all this modern electrical ste (because I can)

[Who me ?]

LuS1fer said:

Two suggestions:
(1) narrower and taller tyres - best car I ever had in the snow wore 145R13s and was RWD (A40)
.

Looking at your list - A40 Farina MK2- not too bad in snow .Mine had radials on front and T& C radials on rear .Better than that was an old FD Victor - once the rear wings filled up with snow -the 2 L engine was more like something out of a tractor . But best of bunch -1750 maxi .But ,in those days ,the roads treated were rare ,so we learned how to drive on snow .

[henrycrun]

Todays solution - just fit spacesaver wheels all round

[Negative Creep]

Don't be daft, everyone knows that anything that doesn't have an NCAP rating is a deathtrap. Before modern cars every journey involved navigating your way through the mangled wreckage and bodies than lined every street