Snow experiences ?

[Browny]

Incoraging to read people’s exeriance with FWD and winter tyres. I’m considering replacing my 4x4 SE L (with winter tyres) with a vRS 245 (with winter tyres). Sounds like I’d be ok for the average dusting. If it’s really bad I can use the Scout! 

[Prezafab]

56 minutes ago, Browny said:

Incoraging to read people’s exeriance with FWD and winter tyres. I’m considering replacing my 4x4 SE L (with winter tyres) with a vRS 245 (with winter tyres). Sounds like I’d be ok for the average dusting. If it’s really bad I can use the Scout! 

Millions manage with normal tyres and 2wd so I'm sure you'll cope !

 

You could always swap the 4x4 SEL for a Golf R DSG estate with winter tyres. Identical boot space and hilariously fast.

[brettikivi]

after the lack of stability at higher speeds on unexpected crappy snow cover - so you hit a patch of slush which wasn't absolutely foreseeable - there's no way I'd mix tyres. I've seen it before, felt it elsewhere - if you're doing something approaching 50mph / 80 km/h on gravel or snow and you lift off, the back end will probably wag and pushing the brake won't make it better. Since you can't always anticipate perfectly the next set of road conditions - then I'd personally see a limitation exercise for the risk as reasonable. This is the same in all of our current cars.... it's not just an Octavia thing. 

 

Where to put a pair of winters anyway? On the front axle so you can confuse ESP as much as possible? 

 

We've essentially had the full on UK experience here the last few days, it's wet snow and 0C. It's bloody awful for grip, the dry stuff is much nicer. This just squishes. ESP has been working overtime at moments where I'm not expecting it to and I've been driving here for 13 winters. Not much you can do about that one, crawling everywhere without other traffic isn't an option.

 

If you're going to put winters on, put a full set on. And then go practice and understand their limits. The swing of the rear and then the brake of the ESP is interesting if you've already corrected, it takes a little practice and understanding to work with the car not against it. You can't accurately read what's underneath a patch of snow, it's simply not possible.

 

 - Bret

[KevC_Derby]

9 hours ago, flybynite said:

The problem with winters on one axle is not really to do with AWD RWD or FWD it is to do with braking. 

 

Less grip on the back when you brake hard you are likely swap ends. More grip on the back when you brake hard probably less overall braking but in a straight line. The rears may not do much braking but it is enough that there are effects when you have all but none compared to the front.

 

I mixed tyres in slippy weather once when I had two tyres go bang in as many days. Personally I won't do that again. I either change all 4 or put the grip on the back even if it is FWD

 

So you and I are both wrong even though we witnessed it. 

[Rooted]

You are both right, if people need to brake hard in emergency situations even with ESP ? ABS / TC / ASR what ever there can be issues.

 

So most that are experienced drivers drive accordingly and so has no braking hard, or maybe even lightly and use the gears and brakes sparingly, 

because even on wet roads / black ice snow etc then things can go t!ts up.

 

But then you get to know that when you do go practice some in snow and ice and that might need to be other than just some nice horizontal car park.

 

But then obviously everyone can drive in adverse weather, do Scandinavian Flicks, J turns, 360 / Doughnuts etc where there is space.

 

Not that many driving Gravel Roads in the UK at speed.

Edited 16 December, 2017 by AwaoffSki

[brettikivi]

last week when the first real icy set turned up I took the wife's car to Biltema car park after closing time. I saw I wasn't the only one  Cue lots of hooning by a 3-series driver and then a 240 joined....I just wanted to see when more than a quarter turn of lock was going to trigger ESP (answer: essentially never if there's zero rotation).

Many, many drivers will fishtail here through whatever - I've seen an older E-Class do a perfect set on four - five roundabouts in succession. It's the road to the Airport in Oulu and it's straight but with lots of roundabouts. At every single one, the setup was great for a "dab of oppo" and so that's exactly what he did. Amusing to watch... Just a little, no massive swings, just a little too much power. If you want to slide, then the video with Captain slow and the scandinavian flick is excellent learning material. It's just counterintuitive to flick "the other way" but you're destabilising the car and it will respond. Roundabouts do just this, of course... 

 

My A2's front brakes lasted 130000km. Because there's no point using them for half the year - they just lock up, you might as well use the gears and anticipate.

 

 - Bret

[Rooted]

My favourites to show someone how you need to be gentle on ice, is put them in a no ABS / no Traction Control Auto Jimny just in rear wheel drive,

then see how quickly thiings go wrong if you get things out of line, they just go round in circles.

[scottyc]

Wow you guys have had some snow. Barely anything up in the North East.

[VWD]

pist0nbroke- might even help get you there

 

Best laugh I've had in years. We needed a few things, so it was down to Sainsbury with Furby doing what Furby does best - get you there with minimal fuss. Road out of the store is on an incline and I watched a bloke in a Volvo have three attempts and fail. Each time he had to reverse, and after the last attempt, I got out before he ended up crashing. and blocking the road. One of the "max throttle means max grip brigade".

 

[brettikivi]

we currently have around 20cm, I had to clear one of the paths yesterday. But then I am quite a bit further north than most  I expect more this week.

 

A quick tale from last-but-one Icetrack: someone watered the tracks we'd been using overnight, without telling the track users. So we try it and realise it's completely, totally and utterly unusable. Even with spikes (not road-legal studs), it wasn't possible to do much more than 30 km/h round the track. On the non-watered stuff, 100+ was no problem. Those tyres give a hell of a lot of grip, and the legal and / or studless aren't that far behind. I took the A2 out with traction control turned off. 1st gear - red line. 2nd - red line, change to third. By this point I was doing maybe 30-40km/h... on the way back, I realised about 200m out I was still doing 60 or so and there was a barrier. ABS was minimal help, changing down the box didn't help much either... that was way too close for comfort. Foot hard on the brake and changing down as possible and hoping isn't an experience I want to have on the road. On a closed track I have no real issues with it. I have studded tyres, but still - even 75bhp can easily overwhelm what little grip there is.

 

There was also a moment last year when I took the Octy out on the latest track. It was a tick above zero, so there was a thin coat of water on the ice. The track had a ca. 180 degree bend at the back. Approaching that at *walking speed* was still too fast. I saw it coming... I knew it was slippery, I knew the corner was evil, but... What options? Straight on is snow. Brakes won't do much. Steering doesn't really help. Ah: Handbrake. Pull, let the back swing around... taking what felt like an age... and then press the loud pedal. 

The only reason I'd got an understanding of that situation was experience, experience and experience. Go play, work out what happens. 

 

- Bret

 

[Rooted]

scottyc,  Multiple crashes in the North East of Scotland on seriously icy and poorly treated roads. Sadly a School Bus driver killed in one accident.

Snow Gates closed over night and even during the day.

  No idea about the North East of England if that is where you are.

 

A thaw on now as rain comes in and temps rises, but not much fun where rain is falling on still frozen roads.

http://trafficscotland.org/weatherstations 

 

http://lecht.co.uk

http://ski-glenshee.co.uk 

The Cairngorms / Grampians are in the North East of the UK.

Ski Centres open and these are on through routes A939 & A93 for people going South to North or North to the South.

Edited 17 December, 2017 by AwaoffSki

[MattChr]

Mixing winter and summer tyres is similar to mixing crossply and radial. They will grip differently at various temperatures and lose grip differently in all conditions.

I appreciate the theory that you place winters on the least grippy/"most important" axle, but braking and going around an off-camber icy corner may cause the summer axle to lose grip. 

Example: going around an icy, off camber corner with winters on the front, may cause the rear to slide out.

Example 2: rwd car could go in a straight line on an icy corner.

With summers all round, you'll notice the loss of grip earlier with lots of little slides, but will be more predictable and probably earlier in your journey so ready to compensate.

With mixed axles, I'd anticipate a less predictable, more violent loss of grip with overconfidence from the winter axle. 

Little vid comparing 2 winter and 4 winter tyres on a Golf: 

 

 

[chrisski]

On 19/12/2017 at 16:22, MattChr said:

Mixing winter and summer tyres is similar to mixing crossply and radial. They will grip differently at various temperatures and lose grip differently in all conditions.

I appreciate the theory that you place winters on the least grippy/"most important" axle, but braking and going around an off-camber icy corner may cause the summer axle to lose grip. 

Example: going around an icy, off camber corner with winters on the front, may cause the rear to slide out.

Example 2: rwd car could go in a straight line on an icy corner.

With summers all round, you'll notice the loss of grip earlier with lots of little slides, but will be more predictable and probably earlier in your journey so ready to compensate.

With mixed axles, I'd anticipate a less predictable, more violent loss of grip with overconfidence from the winter axle. 

Little vid comparing 2 winter and 4 winter tyres on a Golf: 

 

 

interesting video however im glad we dont really domt get that much snow on the roads here however they want ypu to buy 4 tyres rather than 2 so its in their interest to make a video like this

[brettikivi]

that's a lake, probably northern Sweden somewhere. And there's not *that* much snow around. 

 

Of course it's in their interest. But then again, how could I fake that lack-of-rear-axle grip? It's really, really obvious at 1:54. You can't fake that. Compare with 0:56 ... the difference is huge. 

 

If you're going to do it, do yourself and other road users the favour of doing it properly, and get all four.

 

 - Bret

[Rooted]

This is very different from someone that just wants to get from their home to the shops or maybe back and fore to their work when a few days a year the traffic might crawl at 15-25 mph and cars and vans and lorries all around have All Season / Summer / ECO tyres on.

 

No driving like a rally driver on a video with tail out even on the snow tyres, and not even really on snow, just dirty wet slushy stuff unless breaking away from their drive or kerb side to go at 10 mph until they get to the main road.

 

Those that are going to be going at 40-50-60 mph or more really should seriously consider buying the 4 best tyres for winter they can, 

if last week for 2 days of snow the car never moved and it might only see another few days of snow all winter, then 2 snow winter tyres might be all that is needed so the car is not 'house bound'.

Edited 22 December, 2017 by AwaoffSki

[T00mm]

So I was one of the unlucky ones working for the emergency services over the busy heavy snow period in the West Midlands.

I have a 2.0 TDI DSG Octavia VRS with Summer Tyres.

 

I had to power through at 5am on fresh snow and compacted ice along some A roads for a 48 mile A road Trip. Up to 15 inches in places.

 

I felt the traction control was limiting at times and the reluctancy of the DSG not wanting to change up in gears a tad difficult.  Overall the car was very well balanced, not a touch of understeer, very controllable around bends. There were a few occasions where traction control killed all throttle pedal response and left me stranded on an incline, with gentle persuasion and patience I was able to get the car moving again.

No ability to push the car if I did get stuck as I am a wheelchair user.

 

If I was caught in that situation again the only thing I'd change would be some winter tyres. The Summer tyres really didn't help my situation but with slow and gradual movements and acceleration a 2wd tackled it fine.

 

 

  

Edited 22 December, 2017 by T00mm

[Jaco2k]

Inspires by this thread and cause se got a lot of snow today, i decided to go out and make a drive video

 

Hope you enjoy!

 

Edited 26 December, 2017 by Jaco2k

[gregoir]

What tyres do you have fitted? The speeds also looked scarily high to me or is that just the effect of a wide angle lens? 

[brettikivi]

the bit at around 19:12 with the tunnel - IIRC that's limited to 60. Doesn't seem that fast to me?

 

 - Bret

 

[Jaco2k]

4 hours ago, gregoir said:

What tyres do you have fitted? The speeds also looked scarily high to me or is that just the effect of a wide angle lens? 

 

Tyres are Nokian Hakkapelitta R2, not your regular winter friction tire - they are real snow tires, but without spikes.

 

Speeds look higher, as you guessed, due to the wide angle effect.

...and maybe I am more used to drive faster on snow than you are, since the grip on these tires is also higher

 

--edit--

These are the tires:

https://www.nokiantyres.com/winter-tyres/nokian-hakkapeliitta-r2/

Edited 26 December, 2017 by Jaco2k

[Jaco2k]

2 hours ago, brettikivi said:

the bit at around 19:12 with the tunnel - IIRC that's limited to 60. Doesn't seem that fast to me?

 

 - Bret

 

 

Since you are also a "local" you might enjoy the curiosity that that is the longest tunnel in Finland

[gregoir]

Wow, those look a very interesting specification. I seem to remember remould winter tyres in the 1970s with sawdust impregnated tread to give added grip in snow. Things have really moved on.

[Jaco2k]

7 minutes ago, gregoir said:

Wow, those look a very interesting specification. I seem to remember remould winter tyres in the 1970s with sawdust impregnated tread to give added grip in snow. Things have really moved on.

 

They define it as a "Nordics market" model - they come alive when the weather is really cold and there is lots of ice and snow.

 

They are great on deep snow, OK on ice (not as good as studded tires), fairly OK with rain and adequate on the dry.

As soon as temperatures go to positive, they start to become too soft and lose a tad bit of grip.

 

Unless you live in a country that really has snow through a substantial amount of time in the year, these are not the tires for you...

[Jaco2k]

BTW, had forgotten about this video I done a while earlier - right after I got the Octavia

 

 

[Petunet]

21 hours ago, Jaco2k said:

 

Tyres are Nokian Hakkapelitta R2, not your regular winter friction tire - they are real snow tires, but without spikes.

 

 

I like spikes: