Driving in snow

[Crankarm]

or not as the case maybe. There are some seriously bad drivers either crawling along at literally a snail's pace eg 10mph on a dead flat straight road with about 1 cm of snow and slush mixed in with grit to negotiate or total prats hooning it around car parks narrowly missing unattended parked cars. This is what I saw this evening on my way home from work. I watched the chavs in lowered Corsas, Astra van and lowered VW Golf career around the car park of the GBW at St Ives as I put my bike into the boot of my car and then waited for the car to warm up preying they would smack into one of the big islands and not my car with me in it. Then once out of there got stuck behind 2 cars literally doing 10mph which was ridiculous. People just cannot drive in snow. I over took them and then was subjected to road rage by them trying to speed up, flashing main beam lights for ages from behind, sounding their horns. The cars were a Vauxhall MPV Meriva terrible driver and a Ford Mundano Estate not dissimilar to the one that ran me off the road back in september last year the kept flashing main beam lights as I pulled away even ignoring dazzling oncoming traffic. Some people are just morons.

 

[Kies]

They probably thought you the moron for going so fast (from there point of view)

Both my cars are rear wheel drive and are hopeless in the snow .... I wouldn't want to try and go fast in either one of them. On Friday night i picked up kid 2 from college .... Praying we make it home without drama .... Havn't driven since.

Kids in car parks ..... Well yes, ok .... But you were young once and surely did stuff that others at the time wouldn't have approved of?

 

[TheDoctor]

I wondered about that.
Did these 'total prats' and chavs hit anything?
Or is it that they were driving too fast for your liking, whereas the person on the road was driving too slow?
Some people could stand to be a bit less condemnatory...

 

[swee'pea99]

I did encounter, on a three mile drive this afternoon, two drivers going at absurdly slow speeds for the conditions (very thin spread of mushy snow, on big main roads). One was doing barely above walking pace, for half a mile. 20mph would have been sensibly cautious. Anyone from Scandinavia or Switzerland would have been just baffled...

 

[Crankarm]

They probably thought you the moron for going so fast (from there point of view)

Both my cars are rear wheel drive and are hopeless in the snow .... I wouldn't want to try and go fast in either one of them. On Friday night i picked up kid 2 from college .... Praying we make it home without drama .... Havn't driven since.

Kids in car parks ..... Well yes, ok .... But you were young once and surely did stuff that others at the time wouldn't have approved of?

I wasn't driving fast, just faster than these numptees I encountered who were literally driving aburdly slow at 10 mph. There was absolutely no need for it. There was a real possibilty that because they were driving so slowly ahead, that hitching a ride on a snail would have been quicker, we weren't going to get up the hill in the distance. Most people just cannot drive in snow and there are several generations that have no idea whatsoever having had no training driving in ice or snow.

I didn't drive dangerously in car parks on snow and ice where there was a fairly likely possibility that I would crash into other peoples' unattended vehicles if that's what you mean. Bit stupid as the car park is monitored by CCTV.

Two wheel drive cars are ok in snow. Most cars are if you know what you are doing, even four wheel drive vehicles.

 

[Crankarm]

I wondered about that.
Did these 'total prats' and chavs hit anything?
Or is it that they were driving too fast for your liking, whereas the person on the road was driving too slow?
Some people could stand to be a bit less condemnatory...

Almost, when I was there although I can't vouch for what happened after I left.

Do you take pleasure in being argumentative just for the sake of it?

 

[TheDoctor]

So, that's a 'No'?
I don't take pleasure in it, as such. It's more of a civic duty.

 

[MrJamie]

The extremes do seem quite noticeable, I was running down the side of a fully gritted snow/ice free road on Friday not far off keeping up with a girl in a Corsa crawling along and have seen a few people stall their engines from driving so cautiously. Maybe it was just a bad time and I've hardly been on the roads, but it seemed a lot of the slow cautious drivers leaving lots of braking distance to the car infront were being rewarded by someone tailgaiting them and beeping horns. Last year in the snow, in just a 4 mile round cycle trip to Tesco I saw 2 minor car crashes and a couple of close calls. All the roundabouts here seem quite difficult in snow, it seems people don't bother leaving much of a gap following people onto a roundabout and end up shunting eachother

Both my cars are rear wheel drive and are hopeless in the snow ....

Apparently the usual reason for the typical German RWD having problems is big wide tyres with no engine weight above them, giving too low pressure over the rear tyres for decent traction. Apparently adding significant weight in the boot - bags of sand, paving slabs, someone rolled up in a carpet etc. will give you a huge improvement, although I've not seen it tried first hand.

 

[Black Country Ste]

Driving in snow is so simple that I'm amazed that most appear to be clueless. Accelerate slowly and only in a straight line, drive a gear higher than you usually would. Make progress: don't drive too slowly as you need the momentum to keep you going, especially up hills. Slow down well in advance under engine braking, use the brake pedal only to come to a stop. If you start to slide, do not countersteer or brake, just come right off the gas and traction will instantly return. Leave plenty of space between you and the vehicle in front.

Take care at mini roundabouts as using them as intended will only cause you problems. I don't care if you're in a queue, phone away.

Watch out for pedestrians who are likely to walk in the carriageway. And remember the licence numbers of minicab drivers who tailgate you.

 

[Pale Rider]

The only person who knows the correct speed to drive in snow is me.

Anyone driving faster than me is being careless, and anyone driving slower than me is being overly cautious.

 

[biggs682]

as Pale Rider says drive according to conditions .

 

[vernon]

Apparently the usual reason for the typical German RWD having problems is big wide tyres with no engine weight above them, giving too low pressure over the rear tyres for decent traction. Apparently adding significant weight in the boot - bags of sand, paving slabs, someone rolled up in a carpet etc. will give you a huge improvement, although I've not seen it tried first hand.

Apparently the usual reason for the typical German RWD having problems in the snow is because their owners have not swapped over to winter tyres which offer superior grip.

Winter tyres transform the handling of such cars in the snow. All cars benefit from being shod with winter tyres and some european countries insist that they are fitted to all cars for the winter.

 

[beanzontoast]

Some problems are avoidable. It would help things out there if drivers cleared the snow off windows and lights before setting off - unlike many of the cars I saw this morning. IMHO just using the wipers front and back isn't enough to give all round visibility. One guy's brake lights were so covered they could barely be seen in the dark.

Not clearing snow off the top of vehicles can lead to problems too. Over the weekend, Mrs B and I saw a van slow down suddenly on the approach to traffic lights and a whole sheet of thick snow slid off the van's roof and onto the windscreen completely obscuring it. For several seconds that driver - in a moving vehicle - couldn't see a thing.

 

[Alex H]

Most people just cannot drive in snow and there are several generations that have no idea whatsoever having had no training driving in ice or snow.

How would you propose to rectify that? Use indoor ski slopes perhaps ? Trips to foreign parts that have LOTS of snow? Could get a bit expensive for the sake of a few days a year

 

[ArDee]

I did encounter, on a three mile drive this afternoon, two drivers going at absurdly slow speeds for the conditions (very thin spread of mushy snow, on big main roads). One was doing barely above walking pace, for half a mile. 20mph would have been sensibly cautious. Anyone from Scandinavia or Switzerland would have been just baffled...

And as Vernon says "would have winter tyres fitted that grip the snow better". I visit south west Germany quite often and pick up a car at Basel airport (Swiss side); some colleagues visiting at the same time picked up their car from the French side of the airport. At the German boarder where you normally just drive across the German police were stopping all cars and checking what tyres were fitted. I had winter tyres as I'd picked the car up in Switzerland and was allowed on my way. My colleagues were turned back at the boarder as their car didn't have winter tyres. They had to go back to the airport and change cars to one fitted with winter tyres.