The best Vehicles to Drive in the Snow
Most people will say drive a front wheel drive car or rather all wheel drive, this is a very vague and wrong answer.
Yes, all wheel drive cars are better, but, not all of them are prime candidates. Control and handling come down to three major factors a good differential, a good snow tire, and the weight of the car. Focusing on these points can find most people the right car to handle the streets.
1. Differential
What is a differential? A differential is a component located on your axel and down the drive shaft coming from the transmission, its job is to spin the outside wheels faster when turning. The reason why a differential is an important component to the car when slipping and sliding is how it applies power to the wheels. Here are a few examples:
A. Open/ Standard Carrier Differential; This is the standard of all differentials referred to as an open carrier. This design works great for most cars and trucks on the road today but it has limited traction. Due to the design it delivers power to the path of least resistance, so thusly the wheel that is slipping.
B. Limited slip differential/ Posi-traction; The idea of Limited slip or Positraction, or "posi" for short, is to limit the tendency of the open differential to travel down the path of least resistance. It uses various mechanisms such as gear cones, clutches, brakes and other methods to achieve this ideal. Its weakness is it cannot deliver 100% to one wheel or another such as situations when one wheel looses traction all together.
C. Lockers or locking differentials; A locking differential uses a mechanism that lock both wheels relative to each other to spin at the same speed regardless of which axle as traction or wheel. Using this sort of differential the axle acts as a spool so that traction can be sent to a wheel that is planted firmly on the ground while the other wheel is completely off the ground.
D. Automatic lockers; They lock both wheels of an axle automatically when torque is applied that way both wheels are sending out power and when torque isn't applied such as when the clutch is pressed down they become unlocked permitting a variance in wheel speed when turning.
E. On- command lockers; This is the best locker it uses a electric motor, vacuum diaphragm, or a cable/level to engage or disengage the locker. Allowing you to have the befits of a locking and open differential.
Keeping this in mind pay attention to what kind of differential system the vehicle has installed. Some using a series of electrical and mechanical advantages can supply up to 100% power to one wheel or another like Audi's Quattro featuring their Crown Differential, they can power through snow with ease.
2. Snow tires
There are a few major differences between normal all year round tires and snow tires. First off you have the amount of groves, these groves are engineered to the last ten-hundredths of an inch to provide optimum traction "biting" in to snow and ice. Occasionally they even have metal spikes to drive down in the snow to prove more traction, these are more adapt to people who drive mostly on country roads or live in the more very snowy parts of the world. The standard user though should only need your standard winter snow tire. Secondly they are different at a chemical microscopic level, most all year round or summer tires are designed to melt a small amount of rubber when they reach a certain temperature. Meanwhile, the snow tires utilize another rubber compound formulated to produce grip at lower temperatures. And for another added reason why most people should use winter tires, on average it takes 24 percent longer to stop while on all-season tires compared to winter tires.
3. Weight
The base weight of the car is only important if when living in very snowy parts of the world. But for those of us who live elsewhere you can modify the weight of the vehicle using things such as:
Keeping your tank full Putting bags of kitty litter in your trunk (This can also be used to pour on a tire that has become stuck and immobilized the vehicle) Car pooling And adding various other things to your trunk.
These three things will make a current vehicle or future purchased vehicle perfect for the snow covered roads ahead.
