Any comments on experiences driving in snow ?

Have only had mine out once on unplowed roads, other than the fact the stock tires are TOTALLY wrong for snow, it handled well, and the AWD was able to get me out of some deep snow in a parking lot.

Curious about how well the car would do in snow that is deeper than the car's stated ground clearance of 5.7".
My MDX (which I traded in on the RL) had no problem plowing through snow that was a couple inches higher than its ground clearance of 8".
Hell, it was fun running that beast through the 3 ft. snow bank at the end of the driveway that the snow plow would leave behind. (180 foot long driveway, momentum is everything.)

No plans on using my new RL as a battering ram or taking it out when the snow is 12" deep, just curious if anyone out there has driven in very deep snow conditions yet.

thnx

 

https://acurazine.com/forums/showpos...14&postcount=1

 

car handles alright in the snow but the stires are crap. Next winter I will prolyl get a set of good winter tires and see how this baby handles then.

 

I compared the Michellin tires on its website, and the ones on the RL is actually a reasonable choice if one was to make a choice within this brand.

Is it likely that some of our impressions of the tires are based on the ratings on tirerack.com? I can't tell that the tires are bad. Overall, the feel of the car is great.

 

My comments are based on the fact the car started to slip on some slushy snow one day that I didn't see any other cars sliding on. There was one street I was driving down and was going in a basically straight line and the car's ass kicked out on me a little bit. Without AWD I'm sure I'd have slid out and been t-boned by the oncoming car. Wasn't even driving fast or anything.

To me, the OEM michelins aren't all that hot for snow driving. I've driven FWD cars with all seasons that have had better snow traction than these tires.

 

Thanks for all of the reports of how the car handles in the snow.

I live in Southern Calif so I don't often need to worry about snow driving except when I go skiing.

I am going up to the mountains in a few weeks and am wondering about tire chains. Many of the mountain areas require tire chains in bad weather, whether or not you have AWD or snow tires. Has anyone used chains on an RL? Which wheels would you put them on???

 

You need to put the chains on ALL wheels with a AWD. The owners manual (Canadian version at least) lists the recommended chain manfacturer. Let me know if you can't find that info in your manual.

 

Has anyone changed the stock tires and has had experiences with both the stock tires and the after market tires on snow? I am not sure how else we could determine how good tires are on the RL other than comparing them on the car. Is there a published comparison report out there?

 

had a great snow experience tonight. On my way home and was turning into a side road that thought was just wet but I guess there was some light snow/slush on it. So I go to to turn and kept going...striaght towards the curb. Wasn't hard to bring her back but my goodness...I didn't think I was going that fast to cause this. Thank goodness no oncoming cars but then again I would have taken the turn super slow if there was an oncoming car since it would have had to be a tight turn. Still, this is more the tires sucking than me just going to fast. I do like with AWD it was easy to get the car fixed. with a RWD car I'd have probably kept going straight or in trying to get the car to turn would have spun out.

Damn tires. Winter tires for me next season....I'll drive the shit out of these guys for the rest of the year until we start getting snow and then get some winters and then get some summer tires/rims in may 2006.

 

FYI- Besides the usual info @ Tirerack, I've found this website to be useful:
Snow Tire FAQ
And their most recent review

BTW- I've tried the Nokian's on my previous car and was very impressed.

 

cool!-thanks for the link

 

yeah man thanks for the link.

I had some blizzaks on my previous IS300.