Why is it that in Minnesota there are so many people that feel winter tires are not required? I was in Quebec last week and there were even a large number of SUV's and trucks that had dedicated winter tires. It was simply a thing of beauty to see all of the steel wheels with winter rubber. Those Canadians sure drove fast and well, averaging 10 to 20 over the speed limit. It seems to me that most people here in MN try to buy the least expensive rubber that is available without condsidering the cost of even a minor offroad excursion. am I wrong?
Might have something to do with the poor economy and people always trying to find the bare minimum to get by while spending the least amount.
I recently found out that Germany has similar laws regarding winter tyres. It even goes so far as to invalidate your insurance if you aren't in compliance, making you liable for all the costs in the event of an accident involving your vehicle.
Even if it was a law here, nobody (ie the cops) would do anything about it. I can see 50+ people a day texting and driving, so that was a well thought out law. Besides it is always easier to blame someone else (MNDot) for you sliding off the road. Russ
Wow, I had no idea that it was a law, and I was almost sure that the rental that I had was equiped with all season tires. I am more upset with the lack of knowlege/understanding that people have related to tires and the road. it seems that there are a large amount of people who get on the road and just want to travel from point A to point B without any thought of what is required for that. Even worse than that these people have no idea or care if they are poor or good drivers. Stop signs, turn signals, lane usage and courtesy are not even something considered.
$h!t, people here can't even clear snow from all of their windows, turn on their lights so OTHER people can see THEM, make sure their brake lights work, and cannot figure out why the inside of their windows are completely covered with frost (when 99% of the other cars on the road are not), and you want them to buy and use phucking snow tires?!? You are obviously still young and have yet to abandon all hope that you share this planet with other forms of intelligent life. Next pipe dream please!
Ask cops how they feel about making the texting while driving thing stick... Proving someone was or wasn't on winter tires is a good deal easier. Besides, winter tires means better responsiveness from your car under braking. This means you have an extra few fractions of a second to hit the send button before the next unscheduled tour of the inside of the trunk of the car in front of you.
Do I think that winter-specific tires should be required by law in Minnesota in winter? No... Do I think that there should be some kind of standards set as to what makes a car legal to drive in a given season in a given state? Yes, absolutely. My wife's Forester, for example, has all-season tires of some sort, and makes beautiful work of terrible roads. As far as I know, it is perfectly legal to drive a fwd or even rwd car here with bald tires, in the winter, in a blizzard, with an infant in the back, while talking on your cellphone and smoking. This makes me ill. There is so much bs going on with the goverment right now, that it seems as if nothing important/effective ever gets done on any level
Agreed. I don't think that having winter tires required is a good idea (I am in Houghton, MI now, and drive in the snow pretty much all of the time). My subaru just has all seasons that work perfectly fine for the driving that I do (My fiance's focus got the set of snow tires that we have, as that's what happens when we have the same size tires apparently). I almost never leave town, which means almost all of my driving is less than 30mph, and if the roads are too bad for me to go somewhere safely I simply stay home. However, such decisions require common sense, which is generally lacking. I think the system used in some western states, which require 4wd, winter tires, or chains to access some roads at certain times is a good idea, but enforcement and actual implementation would be difficult.
Enforcement is not difficult, just expensive. Even then that's only in the short term when you consider the resources required to respond to collisions and other assorted shenanigans. It's easy to forget that laws are written for the general public, not you. The general public would cause a lot fewer shenanigans on reasonable tires. I don't know that I like the idea of mandating everyone buy a second set of tires. However, I have a very difficult time faulting the logic that the average joe probably doesn't know wtf they're doing in the winter and has a much greater of chance of killing me and my family when they're in an ill-equipped vehicle. Living in Minnesota, where we have the highest per-capita percentage of Somalian refugees in the country combined with very high immigration rates from various other countries that have NEVER seen snow... well... let's just say it's a bit unrealistic to expect everyone to know wtf, assuming they cared.
Agreed Surly (I have nothing against somalians) a friend and I were hit by a Somalian driver a few years back and just the other day one was exiting the gas station driving on the incoming traffic side almost hitting me, then proceeds to shake his head like it was my fault.....
I always get "it must be nice..." type comments when I mention winter tires to my customers at work (O'Reilly), to which my response is usually something to the effect of safe and controllable vehicles being great. Usually I just get unamused looks in response. But I guess I can't expect much from the people who walk in with 3 kids in tow and buy the cheapest brake pads they possibly can.
I think we need to reopen the inspection stations that were once set up for emissions testing so you could get license tabs (I am NOT suggesting emissions testing BTW). Instead, the vehicle gets a thorough going over to make sure it is roadworthy...everything safety related works and it will not start shedding parts as soon as it hits the freeway. The heaps I see rolling our highways makes me cringe.
This is the old lame argument of everyone with 4WD. You can go just fine, but it is the turning and stopping thing that people with all season or all terrain tires struggle with. 30% more traction from winter tires is still 30% more traction, in all directions. Never mind the fact that today's all season tires are much more biased towards low noise and better fuel economy, which makes their effectiveness in low traction suffer. Ever notice what vehicles are more commonly found in the ditch? Trucks and SUV's. Anyone who does not recognize the safety benefits of winter tires has never driven on a set.
^^^Agreed. AWD helps you go forward and helps a little in corners, but does not help you stop at all. An AWD vehicle with all season tires stops just the same as any other vehicle with all season tires, perhaps a tiny bit worse due to increased weight.While the small increase in cornering traction helps with safety the increase in acceleration does nothing but make driving in winter more convenient. The main safety concerns: Stopping and panic maneuvering are essentially the same no matter the drive system. If you want to be safer in the winter, use winter tires. There is no way around the necessity. Also, the people who think 4WD trucks are great winter vehicles crack me up. 4WD is good for getting you out of the ditch after the rear drive, front biased weight distribution, open diff and wide tires put you in it. I pulled a lifted 4WD out of a snow bank the other day with my Camry. Backwards logic to most...
For a fwd or rwd vehicle, I would absolutley feel the need for dedicated snow tires in Minnesota. For awd all seasons are just fine, 99.99% of the time. I would be far more concerned that some other moron might kill me than I would be about that .01% chance that I would have needed to spend an extra $300 on a set of tires...plus another set of wheels, or mounting/dismounting twice a year. I would guess that most trucks and SUV's that are found in the ditch are driven by your typical distracted motorist that is given a false sense of security since they are in a "truck". I am in no way saying that winter tires are not super awesome, but I have owned and driven on both, and I just don't think they are needed for awd people
Increased weight would, in theory, HELP you stop. If you are driving fast enough that you can't stop/maneuver in a reasonable distance, you are driving too fast for conditions. Maybe I should get some winter tires so I can go fast in the snow and get stuck behind every single idiot with bald tires on their 2wd S-10 with no weight in the bed???
Unexpected things happen, particularly on winter roads. People pull out in front of you when they can't see around snow banks, for instance. It happens. Sometimes there is no such thing as slow enough for that unanticipated random chunk of black ice. How many accidents do you suppose occur under acceleration vs deceleration conditions? I don't have any figures in front of me. My hunch (and personal experience) makes me think most folks get caught out when they can't stop, not when they can't go. Also, how does increased weight help you stop? I can see where it helps you go in a low traction scenario, but the effect of mass on inertia is hard to overcome even with the somewhat enhanced traction of weight. I don't get your logic. You might want to consider snow tires so you can avoid the single idiot with bald tires on their 2wd S-10 that just flipped and jumped the median into oncoming traffic, say, on north bound cedar just across the bridge. Laugh at that if you want, it ****ing sucks when it happens to you. Edit: Also, got any chx wild rice left?
Percentage wise, mass has equal and opposite effects on frictional force and momentum. If you put together an equation relating mass and friction to give you a stopping distance, the mass terms would cancel. Therefore stopping distance is a function of velocity and coeff. of friction. Mass need not apply.
No kidding? So you're telling me I can take the exact same car, add an arbitrary amount of equally distributed ballast, and both will stop in roughly the same distance?
That is in theory. There are a lot of other variaibles, including the possibility of your coefficient of friction changing depending on the pressure your tires exert on the surface. Added mass could possibly make your tires dig through snow to a harder, grippier surface. On ice, this effect shouldn't happen. I'm merely speculating at this point though. The only way to really know is to do some testing.
I say lets go head to head. Semi vs Smart car. Same speed both start stopping at the same point. How ever going at each other so measure out the distance it takes for the smart car to stop going 50mph. Then take that measurement and apply it to the other side. If your theory is correct they should both stop a hairline in front of each other
My 4wd 4runner on all-season tires does just as well as my RS with winterforces and our lgt with revo-1's. Ground clearance, sidewall, rear locker, and non-peaky torque curve help a TON! The RS is absolutely the most nimble, but if we're expecting over 4" I'll take the toyota every single time. Then again, I'm not brodawging it around on public streets so I'm sure I could make my 2 mile daily commute on city streets just fine on a bicycle too.
I'm still lost. I'm not a math guy. I don't want to make it look like I'm pretending to be one. k, with that out of the way... Does the equal and opposite theoretical effect even come in to play? I can see if the argument was more mass requires more energy to keep it moving, but you have more traction as well. However, in a deceleration scenario isn't that irrelevant? Braking is about dissipating kinetic energy. More mass requires more energy to move, causing the mass to hold more kinetic energy. More kinetic energy to dissipate requires greater opposing force. It seems like common sense that two objects of equal velocity but VASTLY unequal mass are going to have decidedly different requirements to bring them to a rest, therefore requiring more or less available friction for equal performance. I don't think the equation you're talking about applies to that difference in friction. If you're describing the current state of an object in motion then sure, I'll buy that. But to apply that to the force required to bring an object in motion to rest? I need convincing on that one....
Ground clearance is an issue aside. Clearly trucks have that, but it makes no difference in traction. Sidewall may help a tiny bit assuming it has a little give. Not sure how much of a help this could afford. Non peaky torque curve will help with acceleration and smooth throttle modulation in turns, but doesn't help with safety/real grip much. Rear locker helps accelerate, but again, does not help grip or safety. 4WD and rear lockers do not allow torque transfer. This is why they are good for ripping through stuff (or getting out of ditches), but they can actually hinder stability on uneven or unpredictable road surfaces. All of that adds up to potential straight line acceleration gains and the ability to drive through deeper snow, but does not mean it is safer in any way. Test them back to back in braking distance and lateral acceleration and you will get a clearer picture of which one is actually safer/better handling vs which one is more convenient/confidence inspiring.
F=?N F= force due to friction ?= coefficient of friction (CoF) N= Normal force (force perpendicular to the ground plane) The more you increase the Normal force (weight of the vehicle), the more frictional force you develop. For example, take something rubber and lightly drag it along the table. Then press down hard while you drag it. The stapler with a rubber base I have next to me works well. You should notice a significant difference in how much grip said object has. Twice the normal force equals twice the frictional force. Now, take something slippery and do the same thing. Pressing down harder when you slide it doesn't really do much. Since your coefficient of friction is almost nothing, the increase of force due to friction is double of almost nothing. Not much of an improvement. However, that in mass increase will still be a direct multiplier to the force due to friction. Momentum is the same. p=Mv p= momentum M=mass v=velocity Since mass and normal force are direct multipliers, their effect on the results are the same. This illustrates why the coefficient of friction is such a huge factor. What I said before is still valid with a constant CoF. Whether the CoF stays constant in the real world is another story. In the end, the most effective way to stop and turn faster is to increase your CoF. Whether it be on ice and snow, or dry pavement, tires are the most effective way to increase your level of grip. All other modifications (reducing weight, suspension, etc) have smaller and smaller gains as you go down the line. A lot of it is in the name of control vs. grip itself.
2 things. that other moron would be less likely to kill you if they had a set of winter tires on. second, awd, rwd, fwd is all irrelevant in the most important thing winter tires offer to the general public... improved braking distances. I don't really care if you don't have enough traction to accelerate quickly away from a stop light in snow. I care more that your car stops as quickly as possible. http://www.tirerack.com/tires/tests/testDisplay.jsp?ttid=116 from this test: at 10mph it took the bmw equipped with all seasons stopped in 39' 10". equipped with winter tires it stopped in 21' 2". That's a 59% decrease in stopping distance. having awd by itself won't really change stopping distance.
oh yea, I should add I'm driving around on all-seasons too. yes, they sort of work but the point is regardless of # of drive wheels, winter tires make a difference.
I really worry more abaout dynamic stability than stopping distance myself, funny thing though that my Grand Cherokee accelerates faster, goes through more snow, is more stable down the road, and stops more quickly. I blame the last one on the crappy ABS that they saddled subaru's with. Down the road stability seems to be heavily affected by the AWD system.
Ok, that much makes sense. I still can't connect the dots on the relationship between momentum and friction though. p and F may see an equal effect based on M/N, but if the relationship between p and F isn't linear than that's just an interesting observation... Now you've piqued my interest. Time to go get mah' maths on.
Again, in real life situations... i.e driving 30mph top speed... it makes negligible difference. That said, I'm still getting winter wheels and tires for the 4runner, I just don't think they're mandatory.
I normally tell people..... you spend $500 on good tires and drive safely through winter, or you spend $500 in damage deductible and a car that probably never be the same anymore. I've driven with almost bald all-seasons and with careful driving, i made it through two winters. However traction when turning, braking/accelerating was bad. You're driving on the edge.
Sounds like a date with a white-board as a third wheel. Errrr, I mean a greasy piece of scratch paper on my work bench with Mr. Sierra Nevada as a supervisor.....
When the moron pulls out past the snow bank and in 10' front of you, you are f'ed in the A...no matter what tires either of you have. I, for the record, never said that snow tires were not awesome I just think that, in the grand scheme of things, we would all just be better off if people would just hang up, drive defensively, and keep their cars in a decent state of repair. If I were driving the STI this winter, I would be rockin' snow tires for sure, especially since the summer 255 RE01-R's would be suicide . On the Forester though, I am fine with the all-seasons all year. I certainly wish that everyone in MN drove an AWD car with snow tires in the winter, but we all know that is just a pipe dream
Imagine all the people in an AWD car with snow tires. Isn't that a line in the Lennon song called Imagine?
Not true. I'm at 2 so far this year on hair-of-my-ass collision avoidance in that scenario. Given the margin I was working with to pull it off, I'm pretty sure I would have ate it without the ability to maneuver.
Do you realize that the road conditions especially with black ice/slush forces people to drive at way below reasonable speeds? Try driving any of those cars and see if you will be able to go faster. It is the lack of traction that forces most drivers to slow down because traction gets minimal and thats why you see them scared. And it is much better if they drive slow than go fast and have less control when it comes to braking- hence avoiding spin outs and ect.
I think his complaint was that, given these awful conditions, people could drive faster if they were properly equipped to do so.
Yes that is my point, while in Quebec this is what I saw people consistantly traveling 10 to 20 KPM over the speedlimit in poor conditions where people here woudl drive 10 to 15 under the speedlimit
hahahahaha it's damn scary I tell you that. Everything comes up so much faster. Gotta react quick and MUST have plan B or C
