I rented a brand new 2008 Prius. The car had 400 miles on it and I decided to take it on a thousand mile trip. I loved the car and averaged about 46 mpg at 75 mph. I was ready to place my order until we hit a snow storm in New Mexico and Colorado. The car was all over the road and not nearly as good as our other front wheel drive car. The car would not go up a small incline with 2 inches of snow to get into our hotel. The traction control would cut out and go on and off and did not help us make any progress. An older Ford Focus made it with ease. I have been driving FWD cars for the last 15 years and this car is just dangerous in the snow. I was rather disappointed that the car was so terrible. I guess I will wait for the new model to see if they improve the way it handles in snow. Thank goodness it snowed while I had the rental or else would be stuck with the Prius as my only car in bad weather.
Funny, I thought the newer models were supposed to be much better in the snow. I have a 2004 without VSC or snow tires, and it gets the day off whenever it snows. Fortunately, that doesn't happen very often where I live, and I walk to work anyway. Others have reported that properly equipped with good snow tires, the Prius is great in snow.
The problem is with the OEM tires. They suck in snow and ice. I just ran my 2007 Prius with Blizzaks at a local ice-autocross and won the FWD bare tire class.
I know snow tires would help, but this car was terrible. We have never had to but snow tires on any of our other FWD cars. The Prius was plain scary to drive.
Some of the shortcomings mentioned, particulary the Integrity Tires, are real, but are easily overcome such that if you liked eveything else about the car, you should move forward. I took off my integrity Tires and looking at the tread pattern, I don't understand how they can be called All Season. I replaced with Nokian WR and when it snowed, I would characterize that combination as the Best FWD car I had ever driven on snow. An argument could be made that the traction control is too sensitive, but this is easily overcome with the tire upgrade, and you can tell the dealer you will only buy the car if they put the tires you want and give you a credit for the ones from the factory. Beyond that, less than $500 in BT Tech frame upgrades will solve any remaining handling issues.
Well if it didnt have VSC than theres your issue. I'm not sure how a base line prius acts in the snow, but my '05 with VSC is amazing. I always drive fwd manual coupes in the snow because of the control factor, but I also have no hesitation in the snow with the prius now. The VSC is something else. I always test it just for the fun of it. I like to drive on the back sides of unplowed parking lots, go like 30-50 mph, just slam on the brakes and rip the wheel to the left. Usually with any car, you would 180 it and just start rolling to the right in reverse. In the prius, nothing. Absolutly nothing. VSC just starts beeping, you slow down to a stop going in a straight line. Its so fun lol. You can not possibly lose control in the prius with VSC, even on ice. The only way to spin the car is to give it a good scandinavian flick while cranking down on the foot ebrake. I've 360ed it doing that, but VSC goes nuts trying to correct on the back end of the last 180 degrees of the turn. As for the traction control cutting out, just give it a lot less gas keeping it on the electric motor. Trust me, that electric motor has more torque than any car you've ever owned, and at 100% of the rpms. You can climb any hill at like 2 mph if you wanted. Once you learn how to drive the prius, you'll learn how to love the prius.
The Integrity tires have NO Integrity, not even in the summer on a little loose sand. They are CR@P. Is that clear enough I barely made it up a hill taking my kids to Humane Society camp 3 months after I got the car. I had to do it from a dead stop and with foot to the floor, it would go up a bit, have no grip and SLIDE down (wheels not turning, foot still fully on the accelerator) a few feet, get a little traction and do it again. And the road had been plowed, there wasn't 1/2" of snow on it. I replaced them with Goodyear TripleTreds (High end all seasons) the next week. I ran them that winter ('05) then put the Integrities back on for summer. Since there was no perceivable difference in MPGs, I ran the TTs full time until this past fall when at 45K miles on them, I decided the tread capacity for snow might not be up to snuff for another winter and mounted Nokian RSi on dedicated rims and saved the TTs on the stock rims for summer. If you think the Prius can't handle snow, I can tell you I made it a LOT farther Feb 14, 2007 on my TTs with 40K miles on them in a foot + of snow all driven through but not plowed than a lot of bigger, heavier cars with full blown snow tires. 28" of snow in 12 hours, the plows couldn't even keep the main roads clean. Don't dump your plan to get a Prius based on your experience. Maybe you can even get the dealer to put real tires on the one you buy. Maybe not, but it doesn't hurt to try.
While I know that the infamous Integrities get a bad rap on snow/ice, I can relate a very different experience from yours. I bought my '08 in late December just before a planned 3000 mile round trip between western MT and eastern Minnesota which took place in the first week of January. I hit all sorts of ugly weather, white-out/blizzard conditions for hundreds of miles on the way out, and 200 miles of sheer ice on the way home. Prior to the trip I'd tried to find some Blizzaks or similar snow-tires for the car, but none were available locally in the correct size, so I decided to go on the Integrities. My verdict? No problemo. At no point was I "all over the road" despite some nasty winds thrown in on top of the snow/ice. I did slow down, however, pretended that I was back in the era of the much hated (and probably maligned) "double-nickel" and slowed down to 55-60mph, but had no trouble with handling, skidding, etc. I have thus kept the Intengrities on the car all winter here in the frozen north. Your post causes me to wonder whether you insisted on driving at high speeds on icy roads? Or left the cruise control engaged? Neither is a good idea. All vehicles turn into a skate on ice when you have to hit the brakes! I do agree that a combo of the OEM tires and the VSC system makes going up steeper inclines on ice problematic.
vsc is for skidding.. not for traction.. that's what trac is for.. which is standard. vsc = vehicle skid control... works well if you're trying to turn while on ice.. or hitting large amount of snow or water. (helps you steer) trac is a pain with stock tires. i have really large tires that grip just about everything i throw at it.. no matter how fast. if i need to go off roading, I'll defeat trac and run the car in maintenance mode.
Hi Bnacs, As others have indicated the stock tires are inappropriate for a car with as much torque as the Prius has in snow. Think about driving a Ford Focus in snow at slow speed, with an instant throttle and with literally twice the torque at the same wheel load pressures. That is what happened to you. Tire technology has come a long way, and a light foot in the winter will help a great deal. The Prius has very very light feeling peddles. Its easy for an unfamiliar driver to press the brake or accellerator too hard. If you are pressing on the Prius accellerator so much you can feel it push back through boots (or even leather soled shoes), your pushing too hard for snow-covered road driving. My first drive in a Prius, I squeeled the tires (apparently they turned off the traction control) of an '05 out of the dealership, and my first brake depression threw the poor salesmen into the dash board. He put his belt on after that. The brakes have a rate sensor, and if the rate is beyond a certain value it goes automatically into emergency boosted braking.
i like what you said.. keep in mind how much torque the prius tries to deliver. a really good example: my parents have an rx400h. If you take that vehicle off roading, it's amazing... but it's all trac control. the other day i turned trac on on that vehicle to find out it's an insane powerhouse. it couldn't keep traction on the dirt road.. simply too much spin.. so i started the car into normal mode.. wonderful traction again. this is why i keep a light constant feed. when i was in colorado.. i learned to just hold down the accelerator.. let the car figure out how to hold traction and get up to speed. it's like a ship... full speed ahead! you have to call for full speed in order to get a fast takeoff sometimes.. if you're too easy on it, it will be easy on the traction control and let it slip because it feels you're not trying to get the car to go too much faster.
My upgraded tires (HydroEdges) are at the end of their life now. With 77,000 miles of wear on them, I can definitely see a change in traction. That once amazing grip has faded away, nothing like it used to be. So I can relate... a reminder of what encouraged me to upgrade in the first place. .
I myself havent have no fear of driving my 06 prius in snow.I do put good snow tires on for the winter months though.I have heard many say that the tires that come with the prius are not very good with snow!thats why i went with snow tires.In many cases its the tires not the car that causes all the winter headachs.I have a friend who bought a 2007 scion and found it terrible in the snow.He bought 4 new all weather tires (better tires) and its been it has been a night and day change!His car preforms well now in the snow.
That is why I run very aggressive Goodyear Nordic studded snow tires on my Prius. They're at Canadian Tire, exactly the same as this tire sold in Europe Goodyear Eur-Winter Tire-UltraGrip 500 I have always run studded snow tires on every car I have ever owned. I refuse to put my life at risk to save a few buck, around 1/35 the cost of the car. But if I had to run "all season" tires on my Prius, there is no way in hell I would drive it in winter. Our winters are long and very cold, icy intersections can stay icy for weeks. Or, living in CO or a similar area with chain laws or winter tire laws, then it's a no brainer: run winter tires in winter. I even run winter tires on my FJ Cruiser, Toyo Open Country G-02 Plus. They claim the special tread compound offers close to studded traction on glare ice. Um, no, not quite Toyo Tire Canada Inc. Tires - Pneus When I compare my FJ 16 inch winter tires to my 17 inch "all season" tires, there is a night and day difference in snow/ice traction. I dumped the crap Dunlop Grandtrek the FJ came with - hydroplanes on one drop of rain - and put on Goodyear Fortera TripleTred. The Fortera TripleTred actually meets the Severe Winter Service requirements and is branded with the Snowflake symbol. However, there is a very clear difference in snow and especially ice traction comparing the two tires. Folks won't understand this unless they actually swap out tires in the middle of a blizzard, or then drive on glare ice I was going to run the factory studded Nokian Hakkapeliitta Sport Utility 5. The price made my jaw drop. I may still get this tire, a co-worker has them on his Range Rover HSE and they are amazing on ice and snow Nokian Tires Interesting about your experience though. My 2004 has the rare hyper-aggressive Trac. I thought that issue was fixed for 2006 and newer?
Allow me to add my affirmation that the stock tires are too "mushy" for snow or even moderate curves at highway speed. When I first drove my 2002 I felt like I was in a motorboat, and drove accordingly. (Understeer?) In any case, once the tires wore out and I upgraded, driving was much better. When I traded for my 2005 Prius, I did so in the spring. By winter, the tires were worn enough that I replaced them. My Prius does fine in snow here in Colorado. When driving back from Vail just after a 4"-6" snow, the Prius got up a hill that BMW's and Audi's could not. Additionally, going down an icy hill in "B" allowed me to avoid braking entirely, while other vehicles slid off to the side of the road. Not too smug, me! :cheer2:
Thanks for all of the replies! I just have never had any trouble driving a FWD car in the snow. I was going very slow and the car did not feel stable at all. My wife even commented about how she did not feel safe. We have a very steep driveway and the car would not make it up even with a running start. Our old Saturn does much better.
If nothing else, it is posible that the alignment was way off on a rental. THe last renter could have smashed a curb.
The stock tires aren't so great IMO in the snow. That said, the snow tires I bought sucked at everything, except the snow. Considering that where I live, most of the roads are free of snow most of the winter, I ended up just selling my snow tires. I'll just buy better all season radials when my current tires wear out. As for snow handling in general... I find the Prius isn't necessarily the best. It's just average IMO. It is better than my mom's Saturn though. However, I don't know what tires she has.
