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Happy Holidays!!!!!!!!!!

2K views 12 replies 12 participants last post by  James Hart 
We got a once-in-a-decade White Christmas here in the Seattle area, and I learned very quickly that the stock tires just don't make for much of a snow car. The traction control kicked in immediately and I was barely able to get the car going on flat ground.

Fortunately our marina parking lot was mostly vacant and I was able to plug in the L1 charger and let the car get a nice long 24 hour low-power charge while I drove my wife's Toyota RAV4 with its brand new all-weather tires.

I love my Smart ED for commuting, but on the rare occasions I have to climb a snowy hill, an SUV can't be beat. Or, just boots.

Merry Christmas, recent Hanukkah, and emergent Kwanzaa !
Funny! We also have a Rav4 - a third gen - and we have winter tires on it. It's an absolute tank in this white stuff - we had about four inches in the Redmond area and it froze hard overnight into this morning. No stopping the Rav. It goes anywhere no matter how steep or slick.

I drove the smart around when it first started snowing and the Kumho Solus KH16's we have are hopelessly bad even though we only have 5k miles on them. I did go find an empty parking lot to test the winter handling but there's so little grip from the stock sized fronts that once it gets sideways, it's very difficult to regain grip on the front. It is, however, possible to hold long, lurid drifts. With an open diff, it's much easier to slide it with the passenger side forward than the driver side forward though.

I talked about it with the missus and we just don't feel any need to get winter tires. We have the Rav and it doesn't get driven much now anyway so we'll just use it and park the smart whenever it's snowy or icy.
 
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