Rear wheel drive.

>>>> wrote
>>>>> This morning I happened to click on the weather channel.I almost never
>>>>> click on that channel.That guy said, If your car is rear wheel drive,
>>>>> stay home!

>>> Tegger wrote:
>>>> No way. RWD is way more fun that FWD on snowy roads. Just remember to
>>>> take
>>>> a case of beer to help pass the time once you land in the ditch.

>> Nate Nagel wrote:
>>> So much misinformation out there. best snow car I ever had was my
>>> Porsche 944 with Dunlop Winter Sports. Now that may not be the best car
>>> overall in snow but tires make more difference than what end's wheels
>>> are driven; and given decent weight dist and high polar moment I'd
>>> prefer RWD thanks.

> AMuzi > wrote:
>> A Corvair with winter tires will just keep going. Around the
>> wrecked super duper automatic this and electronic that.


m6onz5a wrote:
> Yeah the Corvair is great in the snow but the heater sucks unless you
> have a gas heater.

I do have the 'instant heat and lots of it' units installed.

Nice in the cold, but more importantly your engine runs much
cooler on hot days or at speed without all the lower baffles.

--
Andrew Muzi
<www.yellowjersey.org/>
Open every day since 1 April, 1971

There is, or used to be available accesory gas heaters for aircooled
VWs.

On paydays, people doing donuts in the parking lots, getting out of
Dodge.
cuhulin

On Mon, 10 Jan 2011 17:55:21 -0500, Nate Nagel wrote:

> On 01/10/2011 05:53 PM, Tegger wrote:
>> wrote in news:6076-4D2B8861-617@storefull-
>> 3172.bay.webtv.net:
>>
>>> This morning I happened to click on the weather channel.I almost never
>>> click on that channel.That guy said, If your car is rear wheel drive,
>>> stay home!
>>
>>
>>
>> No way. RWD is way more fun that FWD on snowy roads. Just remember to
>> take a case of beer to help pass the time once you land in the ditch.
>>
>>
>>
> So much misinformation out there. best snow car I ever had was my Porsche
> 944 with Dunlop Winter Sports. Now that may not be the best car overall
> in snow but tires make more difference than what end's wheels are driven;
> and given decent weight dist and high polar moment I'd prefer RWD thanks.
>
> nate


Best one I ever had was a '72 Toyota Corona with plain old standard (non
snow) Bias Ply tires on it. Thing was a tank.

Oh, and RWD, too.

On Mon, 10 Jan 2011 23:59:07 +0000, Tegger wrote:

> Nate Nagel > wrote in
> :
>
>> On 01/10/2011 05:53 PM, Tegger wrote:
>>> wrote in news:6076-4D2B8861-617@storefull-
>>> 3172.bay.webtv.net:
>>>
>>>> This morning I happened to click on the weather channel.I almost never
>>>> click on that channel.That guy said, If your car is rear wheel drive,
>>>> stay home!
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> No way. RWD is way more fun that FWD on snowy roads. Just remember to
>>> take a case of beer to help pass the time once you land in the ditch.
>>>
>>>
>>>
>> So much misinformation out there.
>
>
>
> Not when you're having fun doing donuts and let it get away from you.
> Thats when you learn there is such a thing as too-much fun.
>
>
>
>> best snow car I ever had was my
>> Porsche 944 with Dunlop Winter Sports. Now that may not be the best car
>> overall in snow but tires make more difference than what end's wheels
>> are driven;
>
>
>
> Yeah, but you can't do donuts or slide the ass-end out in a FWD car, which
> is what I meant in my original reply.

Sure you can! As long as you don't have a SAAB with the e brake on the
front wheels (Actually, you CAN, but it ain't easy)

Just get up some steam, turn the wheel, hit the e brake until you start
the spin, let off and hit the gas! Simple!

>
>
>> and given decent weight dist and high polar moment I'd prefer RWD
>> thanks.
>>
>>
>>
> Me too.

On Mon, 10 Jan 2011 17:33:34 -0600, AMuzi wrote:

> Nate Nagel wrote:
>> On 01/10/2011 05:53 PM, Tegger wrote:
>>> wrote in news:6076-4D2B8861-617@storefull-
>>> 3172.bay.webtv.net:
>>>
>>>> This morning I happened to click on the weather channel.I almost never
>>>> click on that channel.That guy said, If your car is rear wheel drive,
>>>> stay home!
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> No way. RWD is way more fun that FWD on snowy roads. Just remember to
>>> take
>>> a case of beer to help pass the time once you land in the ditch.
>>>
>>>
>>>
>> So much misinformation out there. best snow car I ever had was my
>> Porsche 944 with Dunlop Winter Sports. Now that may not be the best car
>> overall in snow but tires make more difference than what end's wheels
>> are driven; and given decent weight dist and high polar moment I'd
>> prefer RWD thanks.
>
>
> A Corvair with winter tires will just keep going. Around the wrecked super
> duper automatic this and electronic that.


There's a reason Subaru named the 360 the 360...

=?iso-2022-jp?q?Hachiroku_=1B$B%O%A%m%=2F=1B=28B?= >
wrote in :

> On Mon, 10 Jan 2011 23:59:07 +0000, Tegger wrote:
>

>>
>> Yeah, but you can't do donuts or slide the ass-end out in a FWD car,
>> which is what I meant in my original reply.
>
> Sure you can! As long as you don't have a SAAB with the e brake on the
> front wheels (Actually, you CAN, but it ain't easy)
>
> Just get up some steam, turn the wheel, hit the e brake until you
> start the spin, let off and hit the gas! Simple!




Now, in your FWD car, do this for minutes on end, without pausing unless
you stall the engine or end up in the ditch...




--
Tegger

On Tue, 11 Jan 2011 12:10:21 +0000, Tegger wrote:

> =?iso-2022-jp?q?Hachiroku_=1B$B%O%A%m%=2F=1B=28B?= > wrote
> in :
>
>> On Mon, 10 Jan 2011 23:59:07 +0000, Tegger wrote:
>>
>>
>
>>> Yeah, but you can't do donuts or slide the ass-end out in a FWD car,
>>> which is what I meant in my original reply.
>>
>> Sure you can! As long as you don't have a SAAB with the e brake on the
>> front wheels (Actually, you CAN, but it ain't easy)
>>
>> Just get up some steam, turn the wheel, hit the e brake until you start
>> the spin, let off and hit the gas! Simple!
>
>
>
>
> Now, in your FWD car, do this for minutes on end, without pausing unless
> you stall the engine or end up in the ditch...


Oh, that's much different. Never mind...

In my observation, FWD has a traction advantage as long as you:

1) go in a straight line
2) start off slowly
3) don't abruptly change speed
4) don't encounter changes in traction (like, traversing ruts in the
snow)

In my observation, FWD loses the advantage as soon as:

A) you turn the wheel while moving - Toe-out on turns makes the wheels
fight each other. In slippery conditions this means breaking
traction. Also, a wheel only has so much "traction". Instead of
using 100% traction for one purpose (driving or turning) you're
splitting it between the two. Something's going to give. It doesn't
mean understeer every time, but it makes it more likely. This is
further compounded by combining the driving axle, steering axle and
most effective braking axle.

B) take off too hard and shift the weight to the rear axle. Not
exactly game over, but this is why you see people at stoplights
spinning their wheels so much. They seem to think that more gas will
make them go faster, when the opposite is true.

C) fail to match wheel speed to road speed, which is something that
takes skill, and even skilled drivers have minimal feedback to tell
how well they are doing. This means you may need to accelerate down a
snowy hill with a curve in it. In RWD you can let the foot off the
gas, and your rear tires may slide a little, but they'll also slow you
down. Any oversteer you get out of it will likely be slow and easily
correctable. This will be very different if engine braking breaks
traction on your steering wheels.

D) have the road surface change under one drive wheel only- this can
cause torque steer, disrupt your momentum or even yank the wheel out
of your hands. If you are also turning, you could have sudden and
violent shifts between understeer and oversteer. Probably not
complete doom and gloom at 25mph, but for the paranoid drivers that
freak out at the smallest thing, this could mean them going up on the
sidewalk and ruining a pedestrian's day.


But I'm not an engineer. I could be smoking goodyear freckles in a
water bong filled with burnt Type F.

-J

On Mon, 10 Jan 2011 16:29:53 -0600, wrote:

>This morning I happened to click on the weather channel.I almost never
>click on that channel.That guy said, If your car is rear wheel drive,
>stay home!

It snows a fair amount here (Syracuse), though not as much as people
claim. I've been driving 40 years. (That may just mean I'm old.) At
least for the conditions here (and driving Cavaliers with not-so-great
tires, memory impairment, etc), I feel like I've had much more trouble
with FWD. If the road is greasy with salt & slush, and there's much of
a crown, FWD seems prone to pulling down the crown.

And, going around a corner on that grease, if the front loses traction,
you're SOL. With RWD (and bigger cars, I suppose), the front was
relatively lighter, and it seems like I could corner better, using
steering plus varying power to the back.

YMMV.

On Tue, 11 Jan 2011 19:44:38 -0800, phaeton wrote:

> In my observation, FWD has a traction advantage as long as you:
>
> 1) go in a straight line
> 2) start off slowly
> 3) don't abruptly change speed
> 4) don't encounter changes in traction (like, traversing ruts in the snow)
>
> In my observation, FWD loses the advantage as soon as:
>
> A) you turn the wheel while moving - Toe-out on turns makes the wheels
> fight each other. In slippery conditions this means breaking traction.
> Also, a wheel only has so much "traction". Instead of using 100% traction
> for one purpose (driving or turning) you're splitting it between the two.
> Something's going to give. It doesn't mean understeer every time, but it
> makes it more likely. This is further compounded by combining the driving
> axle, steering axle and most effective braking axle.
>
> B) take off too hard and shift the weight to the rear axle. Not exactly
> game over, but this is why you see people at stoplights spinning their
> wheels so much. They seem to think that more gas will make them go
> faster, when the opposite is true.
>
> C) fail to match wheel speed to road speed, which is something that takes
> skill, and even skilled drivers have minimal feedback to tell how well
> they are doing. This means you may need to accelerate down a snowy hill
> with a curve in it. In RWD you can let the foot off the gas, and your
> rear tires may slide a little, but they'll also slow you down. Any
> oversteer you get out of it will likely be slow and easily correctable.
> This will be very different if engine braking breaks traction on your
> steering wheels.
>
> D) have the road surface change under one drive wheel only- this can cause
> torque steer, disrupt your momentum or even yank the wheel out of your
> hands. If you are also turning, you could have sudden and violent shifts
> between understeer and oversteer. Probably not complete doom and gloom at
> 25mph, but for the paranoid drivers that freak out at the smallest thing,
> this could mean them going up on the sidewalk and ruining a pedestrian's
> day.
>
>
> But I'm not an engineer. I could be smoking goodyear freckles in a water
> bong filled with burnt Type F.
>
> -J


You're not too far off, and mentioned a lot of mistakes all the Marios
make in the first snow storm.