We had a perfect storm of sillyness around my house this morning because my wife needed to get to work early, daycare is on shortened 'winter camp' hours, Saab has magical 'turn signals no work' issue, and the weather outside is frightful.
Easy answer was to have my wife drive the XJR to work which she often does, leaving me to take the kids in later with the minivan. Minivan and Saab have excellent snow tires, XJR has pilot sport cups (255). We have not had to drive the XJR in the snow yet, I guess because we have been lucky this winter. Other easy answer is for me to walk the kids to school, but at about a 15-20 minute walk in 10 degree weather with 3 and 18 month old kids, my wife was uncomfortable with that.
This morning in the snow, I started up the XJR for wifey and backed it out of garage. About halfway out (rear tires on snowy, flat driveway, in reverse but using no throttle), I notice a funny noise, and THEN TRACTION CONTROL kicks on. Yes, I was spinning in reverse using zero throttle on a flat surface with less than an inch of fresh snow. Stopped, let foot off brake again, spinning issue returned.
Um, sorry. No one is driving this thing on the highway in the snow with these tires if it slips that easy. I was hoping to be able to get by without the Jag during the snowy months, but the Saab is making that hard with its issues. Time to buy some snows. Craigslist looks to have come through, however, just need to find time to pick them up.
Those look like straight up summer tires. Yeah. those will be super E36 M3ty in the snow, and probably unpredictable in the dry in cold temperatures.
Seeing as how you are in Illinois snow tires are probably the answer. We just run all seasons here because theres less than a handful of days when the roads arent actually cleared of snow. No way to justify that expense for me.
The good news is if you put snow tires on the stockers, you have a reason (excuse) to buy a set of sweet aftermarket's for the sport cups. Win/win.
Yeah you just learned what summer tires are like in the winter. It has nothing to do with the car. It's like wearing Birkenstocks in the snow and being surprised your feet are cold! :-)
Yeah, I knew they'd be awful, and I have driven summer tires through the wrong conditions before, probably too often to be proud of. Never driven any combination this bad however.
I almost got out of the car to take a video when I was parking it back in the garage because the 1 inch concrete lip was enough to keep the car stationary while idling in drive with the rears spinning, but I didn't have the stomach to tempt fate like that.
"So, tell me again how you crashed your jag into the garage AND broke your leg?" "I was tweeting a sweet video..."
Pilot Sport Cups in the snow? I would think not!
I have driven Falken Azenis RT615K in the snow multiple times before but a Honda Civic is a little different from a XJR.
dculberson said:
Yeah you just learned what summer tires are like in the winter. It has nothing to do with the car. It's like wearing Birkenstocks in the snow and being surprised your feet are cold! :-)
Growing up in Colorado I learned Birkenstocks are not even abnormal in the snow. They're actually a perfect skiing footwear option, because you can wear thick socks and transfer from birk to boot and back easily while changing into your snow pants in a ski area parking lot. But cold feet you will have.
Me being a cheap bastard, I usually wore off-brand knockoffs, or the handmade leather moccasins I made for the leather working merit badge.
yea, I drove a couple of years on star specs in the snow on my BMW, but I had the factory LSD on it which made a world of difference. It was fun to go down the road at a 45 degree angle while trying to accelerate, people gave me LOTS of room
I drove my 01 XJR for one winter in Detroit on Continental all season tires (I forget what they were exactly) and it's not bad once you're moving, but getting going from a stop can be an exercise in futility. With that much torque going through an open rear end in a fairly heavy car you're likely to just sit there if the snow is more than a few inches deep or if there's any hint of ice.
The defroster in the windshield made up for it though. I never had to scrape my windshield, I'd just press a button and a minute later the windshield was clear, or the snow and ice had melted enough that the windshield wiper could clear it. Why don't more cars have this option?
The traction control in our XJR's are pretty sensitive from a stop. Tried curing the tc off?
