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From time to time in this life you may need to take evasive action to avoid a "hazard". You are stopped near a serious motor vehicle accident. Fuel is slowly flowing down hill toward you. It has been raining. The fuel ignites. You did leave room in front of you when you stopped, right? You have options. You can drive off the road and up a slope, even if you are on wet grass, if you have an AWD vehicle. It can save your life on a summer afternoon.
Think of as many situations you can dream up when you have the ability to go where a 2 WD cannot go. Your life can depend on it.
One also needs to factor in terrain. We live in the mountains of Eastern CA. Mrs5150 and I are employed and our commute is eight miles with an elevation gain of 2000' with plenty of curves. Three season tires on our Subarus would not work or be safe December thru March.
We are both skilled with driving in snow. We got a late season snow storm a month ago after I swapped out our winter tires. The last two miles coming home (or first two in the morning) has a 500' elevation gain. I got home with no trouble, but it was just starting to snow. Mrs5150 left work an hour and a half after I did and got stuck a quarter mile from home. She said she was having problems all the way up that last hill. Her tires are Mich Pilot Sport AS3 with over 50% of tread left.
fwiw when I'm in Lake Tahoe I generally take the mountain roads (old logging roads) during winter and have no problem with stability/traction using General Grabber HTS tires on a Suby. Most cars I've seen off the main road have usually been driving at the wrong speed/gear for the conditions.
You did catch that the OP was talking about cars, right?
I'm not understanding why you keep bringing up pickups and SUVs...
I bring them up, as they become the vehicle of choice when you get to real snow conditions, especially when there are driving conditions away from flat in city driving.
Driving a 2 wheel drive auto without suitable studded snow tires on snow and icy conditions, has been proven to a lot of us to be insane. You get away with it for a while, but it will catch up with you sooner or later. I have pulled a lot of those that think they do not need suitable tires out of snow banks and back onto the road to really understand this.
There are tires made to travel in snow, and those that are not. Too many people try to get by on inadequate tires for snow and ice conditions and end up in serious trouble. Example: I had a doctors appointment in Billings 2 years ago which is 50 miles away. Dry pavement going to Billings. Came out of the Doctors office and found there had been a lot of snow fall in the hour I was inside. Got to the Interstate highway, where traffic was moving at under 15 miles an hour, due to roads turned to snow and ice. There was a 50 mile an hour cross wind. There were cars off the road on both sides for the next 15 plus miles before there was a lull. There were about 5 or 6 cars every 100 feet on both sides of the road. It was the worst I have ever seen. Cars were off the road, because the people did not have the right kind of tires for the driving conditions. Some had slid off and were not damaged too much. Some had slid into other cars, and had serious body damage. Those of us that were driving vehicles and using tires that were designed to handle such conditions, get through all right. A big percentage of those that were not suitably equipped were off the road.
And if real snow conditions, high clearance ( pickups and SUVs ) are needed to get through. I have seen a lot of small cars that just high center and cannot move due to the snow no matter what type of tires they have. Every year, there are people that are traveling through this part of the world, that take a road that is rarely used except in summer, and get stuck. Some walk out, and some simply freeze to death. Driving cars with low clearance, and regular traction summer tires as we call them. Don't think they should have had cell phones and call for help. Impossible. Unless you are near a city/town or along an Interstate, there is no cell phone service.
"Why would you be unable to drive off the road, in wet grass OR dry, in FWD? I do it on a fairly regular basis..."
Sure, you can often do it with FWD, but you can go further, faster and on steeper ground with AWD than you can with FWD. It can save your life or just make things more efficient and convenient.
FWD is definitely better than my old 1970 Chevy Vega RWD. That said, you can get a Subaru Forester with better ground clearance than a Jeep for less money than most of the FWDs on the road today.
Sure.
And given my druthers, a brand-new crew-cab Powerstroke will give me a physics advantage in almost any collision, as well as the 4WD to let me climb the nearly vertical hill behind my house...
And since I've talked myself into needing a new pickup, I clearly can't be pulling that ratty old horse trailer anymore so I should probably upgrade to a new Featherlite, with living quarters. I mean, we do camp at the Fair...
I could talk myself into "needing" lots of stuff!
Last edited by itsMeFred; 05-09-2015 at 10:33 PM..
Sure, you can often do it with FWD, but you can go further, faster and on steeper ground with AWD than you can with FWD. It can save your life or just make things more efficient and convenient.
FWD is definitely better than my old 1970 Chevy Vega RWD. That said, you can get a Subaru Forester with better ground clearance than a Jeep for less money than most of the FWDs on the road today.
You mean FT AWD cars like in Subys and Lex and not PT AWD like in GM vehicles.
Threads like this make me glad I live in a mild winter area.
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I do it on a fairly regular basis...
