Finally a disappointment

<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(Houston @ Dec 3 2006, 03:27 PM) [snapback]357064[/snapback]</div>

Well you might want to reduce your tire pressure closer to the recommended values for the winter months. That would probably give you significantly better grip in icy and snowy conditions.

 

I wish the car allowed a little more spin, but in winter I have a hill near me I can drive up when it is icy that I never could go up in my last car, wheel spin and all.

 

I've complained about the idiotic "traction control" from the first time I tried driving in "real" winter conditions. Most "real" traction control systems apply a brake to the spinning wheel, which the Prius does not do. I used to be helpless at intersections with one wheel on bare pavement and the other wheel on ice.

BTW: "real" winter conditions can last 4-5 months here. Salt doesn't work very well much below -15 C, so icy intersections and icy stretches of road stay that way.

You might get a chuckle out of this comment I made:

http://priuschat.com/index.php?showtopic=13140

I've tried various "studless" winter traction tires but still had difficulties on polished ice. I've always believed in studded tires but the condo I live in refused to allow them in the heated underground parking. So I got involved in a "debate" with them.

After half a year of "debate" - including the ok from the chemical company that made the floor coating - the condo association where I live finally allowed us to use studded snow tires in the underground heated parking, so I went with the new Goodyear Nordic from Canadian Tire. Studded, balanced, and installed on my winter rims for $120 a tire. I sold my previous winter tire - Yokohama Ice Guard 10 - to a coworker.

The Goodyear Nordic is based on the Goodyear UltraGrip 500 sold in Europe:

http://eu.goodyear.com/home_en/tires/repos...p?page=benefits

On snow and especially ice, I really have to floor it to get the "traction control" to kick in. No problem plowing through snow drifts up to the front bumper. And they seem to work well during the brief rain we had three weeks ago.

The biggest downside: these are VERY noisy tires on dry pavement. Depending on speed they make a loud hum or loud roar, just like the old bias-ply truck tires used to. But they're every bit as good as the pricier Nokian studded tires on ice.

For a car with almost everything else done right, the "traction control" is a joke. No there is no "defeat" button but there is a very involved procedure to temporarily disable it - at your risk if you happen to grenade the PSD or snap the chain.

 

that wasn't you stuck on the Alex Fraser Bridge by any chance?

 

Jon I notice that the last flash made a difference in the sensitivity of the TRAC a little bit of slip before it cuts. I'd love to know the software version of this last one, best of the bunch so far and didn't get the ECU murdered in the process.

Sunny Saltspring shouldn't have had any snow! :lol:

 

that'd be the one as I didn't take her car in for the flash till the steering shaft recall. Since then I get the feeling driving it that it's a bit less sensitive.

 

We got a bit of snow here last night (and can i say, OMG you'd think people around here had never seen snow, they were driving so slowly this morning!), and i have to say the traction control worked decently well. There were several times it cut power to the wheels, and then restored power a second or two later, which worked just fine.

There was one instance where it cut power briefly, and then seemed to let me spin the wheels a little bit until the tires actually dug in and got traction.

 

The increased "tolerance" may very well stem from the DRIVER learning
to be more gentle off the line. Light accelerator-pedal demand will
allow the trac to do its job much better than if you try to ream it.
Plan your traffic environment accordingly. Go practice in a snowy
parking lot and get a feel for what the car will or won't do -- just
like everyone should with any other car they own.
.
"... assume an ideal point-mass Prius on a frictionless surface ..."
.
_H*

 

All I can add is that I've only had 1 issue with the car getting stuck going up a hill. And it was my fault.

The lesson I learned - let the car do its thing. 2nd attempt up the hill (A very long hill BTW covered in ice) and I just kept it floored. I made it up - it got very slow towards the top, but I made it.

Just give it gas - don't try to ease off if you slip - that will definetely get you stuck.

 

<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(Maytrix @ Dec 4 2006, 11:27 AM) [snapback]357364[/snapback]</div>

I think this is a good approach. I have an '04, and am on my 3rd winter in Denver. I live in the foothills at the bottom of a long steep hill. We get a lot of snow, 15 inches last week and the plows nver came. Its all packed down and icy now, but I have no problems. I have learned to drive fairly rapidly in cases where I might encounter slipping, and I never have any issues getting around. The only time I have noticed a problem is if I try to drive R E A L S L O W. Then I can get stuck.

 

<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(Tideland Prius @ Dec 3 2006, 08:56 PM) [snapback]357171[/snapback]</div>

Jon

Not all "snowflake" tires are created equal. Some shift the balance towards dry road handling, others towards maximum snow/ice traction (But lousy dry road handling). Then you have studded snow tires, which are great on glare ice, but tiresome on dry roads.

I've had Dunlop Graspic DS-2, Yokohama Ice Guard 10, and now Goodyear Nordic aka Goodyear UltraGrip 500 in EU, on my Prius. All the tires had very distinctive differences in dry road, wet road, snow, and especially ice traction.

If your priority is highway driving, there are some "performance" winter tires that still have the Snowflake, but don't work as well on ice. Or if your priority is ice traction during a long, bitterly cold winter, the tire best suited for that condition will probably be noisy, handle sloppily, and suck up the fuel economy on dry warm roads.

jay

<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(hobbit @ Dec 4 2006, 10:16 AM) [snapback]357356[/snapback]</div>

H

I've tried every trick I know. I'm old enough to have been taught to pretend there was an egg between the gas pedal and my foot, to drive on snow/ice. For every other vehicle, with the proper winter tires, that has worked just fine.

You can imagine my disappointment when the Prius would barely move, especially if every other car around me didn't appear to have any trouble. The absolute worst was at an intersection with one wheel on pavement and one wheel on ice, the "traction control" was brain dead in that scenario. When cars behind you start honking, that's crap.

With most winter tires, especially studded ones, a slight amount of wheel slip is desirable. It helps the tire "dig" in to get traction. I'm not talking about flooring it, but just very minor slip say an indicated 3-5 mph.

However, with the new studded tires on, everything is fine. I've learned to put up with how noisy the new tires are too, beats not moving.

j