Upstate New York winters vs. Smart

[Laurie]

Hi All- My first post to the forum... I drove a Passion this week, am considering ordering one. I live in Upstate NY and I'm wondering about my smart in the snow. Can anyone give me advice on driving a smart in an Upstate NY winter?

[scdaf]

Originally Posted by Laurie

Hi All- My first post to the forum... I drove a Passion this week, am considering ordering one. I live in Upstate NY and I'm wondering about my smart in the snow. Can anyone give me advice on driving a smart in an Upstate NY winter?

Point it south, stop when you encounter salt water.

[blackbeagle]

Originally Posted by Laurie

Hi All- My first post to the forum... I drove a Passion this week, am considering ordering one. I live in Upstate NY and I'm wondering about my smart in the snow. Can anyone give me advice on driving a smart in an Upstate NY winter?

There are a few posts on here about how the Smart handles in snow, whether it be Europe, MN, or Buffalo. You might want to do a search and find out.

good luck-

[hsterk]

Originally Posted by Laurie

Hi All- My first post to the forum... I drove a Passion this week, am considering ordering one. I live in Upstate NY and I'm wondering about my smart in the snow. Can anyone give me advice on driving a smart in an Upstate NY winter?

Although I do not live there, I've been to Buffalo during and after many of it's winter snows. I would be sure to use a set of 4 Winter tires, and look carefully into the ground clearance issue(s) with the Smart car.

[unicycle]

Hi, naber. I wonder how far upstate you are; I'm in New Paltz.

This will be the first winter for my smart, too, and I'm apprehensive. I've called my service center (in Manhattan), and my dealer told me that she thought the all-year tires would be fine, but I somehow doubt it and will ask a few more ppl there when I take the car in for service in a week or so.

I have a feeling that, at least in my case, the snow won't be a big issue after it's cleared, but there may be a few weeks when I'll be glad I kept my older car (Aztek), which handles great in the snow and is a lot heavier and better equipped to handle the icy uphill of my road/driveway.

I'll be sure to keep everyone apprised as soon as the snow hits.

[a2jack]

Laurie. Got our car in Feb. It's so-so in the snow. We too get lake affect on the west side of the state, and had to leave the car at home a couple of days and drive the Subi (much to the chagrin of my wife).

Snow tires are such a hassle, and I doubt if we will get them. But we are coming up on a dilemma ,as our Subi is being run out at 190 k miles. We work our cars and have 14k on our Smartie.

It's a great little Microcar !

A2Jack

[robotbill]

Cleveland here, I don't plan on selling my Expedition or F-150 anytime soon. I will drive the smartcar on those days when the roads are absolutely clear. Not worth the hassle.

[jonnysan]

Originally Posted by robotbill

Cleveland here, I don't plan on selling my Expedition or F-150 anytime soon. I will drive the smartcar on those days when the roads are absolutely clear. Not worth the hassle.

I got my car in early February and had the opportunity to drive it in some 6 inch snowfalls, some ice and some mixed sleet, snow and ice. Did not get to drive it in any snow deeper than 6 inches and around here you just don't have to worry too much about ever having to as they keep the roads pretty well plowed where one would NEVER need to drive in anything more than 4-6 inches.
Now to the experience....in all of those conditions stated above, I found my car to drive and handle just fine. Using Winter driving techniques learned thru the decades of living in the mountains of Central Upstate NY (50 miles west of Albany between the Catskills and Adirondacks) you tend to develop techniques that will get you home on those nites when you don't want to sleep in your car. Slow accels and decels and minimal braking under any circumstance is the first rule. I was in the process of breaking the engine in so I was using the manual mode exclusively thru the Winter and will next Winter as well. Being able to control the car when it shifts up or down is important when traction is not so good.
I was indeed surprised at how well the smartie handled with the Conti ASR's and never once got into any nasty skids or 360's or 180's or any of that. In fact, I was passing many other cars that were not going so well on the slippery stuff.
Do not be apprehensive about how the smartcar will handle in Winter UNLESS you are one of those crazy ...tards that HAS to go out in the worst snowstorm of the season to see how the roads are and the snow is 8-12 inches deep. You probably will have trouble in that kind of snow with the smartie...no experience there and won't have any either. Been there and done that enough to know just when to stay home and wait for the plows to clear the roads...... It is not a 4 X 4 and never will be...nor will the gas mileage ever be what it is with a 4 X 4!!

[Da and Linda]

We live in Up State NY and we are looking forward to seeing how our little Bee works out in this Winter. To be fair, Our neighbors north of us have worse Winters than we do and they have had the Smart three years longer than we have. I have not heard anything bad about the Smart yet. but then most of us are always bragging, very few complain much here.

[robotbill]

Lake effect snowstorms and school starts at 8:00am, yea I do have to go out in that stuff that's why 4x4's were invented. I don't mind driving in the stuff, but use the right tool for the job that must get done!