Snow Driving

We got pounded with snow here in NJ and I got a chance (not by choice) to
do some real driving in it. I had to do a 60 mile round-trip drive to pick
up my son. The trip to get him was in blizzard conditions. It was snowing
at least 2" per hour the entire time. The roads had been plowed of the
heavy stuff, but still had at least 6" on them. Visibility was near zero.

It's a 2006 Sonata GLS V6. I could have honestly guessed that I was
driving an all-wheel drive car. In fact, earlier in the morning I did
drive a 4x4 pickup on a drive to my work and home, and it was not much
better, although this was mostly back roads and were not plowed.

This is by far the best car I have owned for a snow event. And driving no
more than about 30 MPH gave me 28 MPG for this trip!

Eric

P.S. - We got 25" of snow with 5-6' drifts!! Everything around here is
still closed today.

 

I live in North NJ. I went out driving sunday 10 am. The roads had been
plowed once recently but snow was still accumulating. Generally, the
car behaved well, but....in all my years of driving, I never got stuck,
in the snow..ever..until about 11 am. I pulled over to go to a store
and tried to drive away after i returned. I turned off the ESC and
tried to rock back and forth but to no avail. Had to spend 10 minutes
to dig the car out. First time in my life (driving geo prism, toyota
corrola, dodge van, datsun 200 sx). I did not park in a drift; there
was some lose snow but I used the same amount of caution as I always
have.

Maybe it was just my time. But I woul not compare to a 4wd.

 

wrote in @g44g2000cwa.googlegroups.com:

Well, I certainly can't argue about what happened to you. The only time in
my life I ever got stuck was trying to climb a mountain in a 4x4 truck in
the blizzard of 1996. I needed a track-hoe to come get me outta that one.

I've had a Dodge Colt, Honda Civic, Nissan Sentra, GMC 4x4 pickup, Chevy
4x2 pickup, Ford F-150 4x2 pickup, Dodge Neon, '97, '02 and '03 Elantra's
and now the '06 Sonata. Other than the 4x4, this is the best car I've ever
driven in the snow. And other than the Dodge Colt, I never had snow tires
on any vehicle.

Eric

 

What tires are on it? My '04 came with Michelin MXV4's, they were suicide
tires. I put on a set of Goodyear triple treads this past fall. Now I too
can say that it's the best car I've driven in the snow.

 

Stock Michilin's here. I believe they are the MXV4's also. I've had
these same tires on my Elantra's too and they are great until just about
1/2 the tread is gone. Then they turn in grease.

Eric

 

Same experience here. Our '04 Sonata came with Michelins on it when we
bought it used last fall. The tires were new and they've performed
flawlessly this winter, though we really haven't had that many normal storms
this year. Time will tell how they perform as they wear.

 

The Mike Marlow entity posted thusly:

I replaced the Michelins on my wife's '04 Elantra at about 13,000 km.
It now sports Nokeans (Spelling?). Best all-purpose tires we've ever
had.

 

Same here. I've been quite impressed with the snow performance of the
MXV4's.


Matt