Safe Speed Forums

Yes again!
About 1 month after passing my test I was faced with my first snow drive, which was to work (about 7 miles), in a fairly responsive RWD car (Opel Manta).
The first thing I did was test the available grip: a simple exercise of dropping the clutch followed full braking - that genuinely shocked me, but from then on I knew something critically important: my envelope.
Not only did I not have an uncontrolled/unexpected moment during the commute, it transpired I was the only one in the department (which included several BMW drivers) who didn't get intimate with a kerb.
Did I feel smug that day

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Views expressed are personal opinions and are not necessarily shared by the Safe Speed campaign

Not really mentioned but I always have kitchen roll to hand in the car to clean the wipers and screen (inside and outside) and for all other useful jobs. Of course some have sworn using newspaper to clean glass ....

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Safe Speed for Intelligent Road Safety through proper research, experience & guidance.

When driving in snow I always try to drive so that I do not have to brake by leaving a good distance between me and the vehicle in front, double declutching and using the gearbox so the engine slows the car down. Try not to stop, steer and accelerate gently.

Whynot

Not really in-keeping with the title of the thread as such but for completeness - Is the journey absolutely necessary?


Keep your battery well charged. Winter = light's on, rear screen heater and internal heater on, wipers on, slower speeds or on tickover doesn't charge the battery as well as moving along.

Next morning, no surprise, the car won't start

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The views expressed in this post are personal opinions and do not necessarily represent the views of Safe Speed.
You will be branded a threat to society by going over a speed limit where it is safe to do so, and suffer the consequences of your actions in a way criminals do not, more so than someone who is a real threat to our society.

Winter is the time when a SAFESPEED is most beneficial-not too fast that you have problems stopping,yet not too slow that an incline is too much for the impetus of the car to overcome .Judging gearchanges is essential ,to prevent any sudden acceleration when it's least beneficial.Get down the box on the flat, not when the engine is struggling .Something that looking well ahead does ( In fact ,thinking on - perhaps the principles of COAST apply more in winter conditions than at any other time ).
In the middle of nowhere ,especially at night - sometimes a good idea to try and "straightline " corners -or at least minimise the centrufugal force element .Smoothness of control (and operation of controls) is the byword - and I always try and avoid ABS coming in ,or if it does cadence brake .To many people ,getting into a skid means you have failed ,but if you don't know the vehicle limits -how can you know -so an empty space -have a little one or four -correcting them certainly helps boost the confidence ,and more importantly lets you know what's going to happen ,and the danger signs.Biggest danger (IMHO) IS power steering ,not the power assisted type ,which changes as the front wheel grip changes ,but the total control power steering ,which gives no feedback as to road conditions .
As for parking( as in putting the car to bed at night ) - help the car help you -I park mine on the drive ( posh way of saying on the garden ).Most of the year ,I reverse in -makes for a safer exit ,but when the temperature drops ,I drive in -the windscreen does not get a badly frozen ,so the front of thecar must be warmer than the rear , leaving the glowplugs less work to do,so the battery has also less to do.
Please forgive the ravings of an ancient motorist -but if anything helps a newbie -it'l be worth it .
I ALWAYS try to be courteous to learner drivers - hoping that in todays cut and thrust motoring world ,a glimmer of hope might just spring up .Perhaps that's the duty of the elder motorist

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lets bring sanity back to speed limits.
Drivers are like donkeys -they respond best to a carrot, not a stick .Road safety experts are like Asses - best kept covered up ,or sat on

I agree wholeheartedly with your sentiments on pushing the limits (gently) in a controlled way, where conditions allow. I think that a lot of problems these days stem from the amazing competence of modern cars. in normal driving, most people never get anywhere near the car's limits, so when they do, it all comes as a bit of a shock! Knowing where the limits are, and what happens when you go beyond them has to be (IMO) one of the most important skills to acquire - especially in slippy conditions.

Not sure I'd agree entirely about the ABS though - I tend to make a point of giving mine a good workout in conditions like these - make sure the pump and all its valves are working properly and circulating fluid as they should. The poor thing lies dormant for 50+ weeks a year, so I like to give it a good test in conditions where the tyres and running gear won't get particularly stressed when it cuts in.

Broadening the topic a little - how do you thaw out your car on a cold morning. Those aerosol deicers seem about as much use as chocolate teapot and scraping is very tedious; so I use hot water which works very well provided you dry off the glass before it refreezes. People continually warn me that there is a great danger of cracking the glass but that hasn't happened to me in thirty odd winters.

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When I see an adult on a bicycle, I do not despair for the future of the human race. H.G. Wells
When I see a youth in a motor car I do d.c.brown

I was always told those aerosols degrade the window seals over time so have avoided them, but I also agree with you that they're crappie anyway. Don't know what they cost these days but even if they're pretty cheap that's another drawback.

I usually put the front blower on Hi and the rear windscreen heater on and get busy scraping the sides. By the time I get to scrap the rear window it's a doddle and then the front has usually started to defrost at the bottom which helps with the final scraping.

Wishful thinking on my part but I wish all cars were fitted with the Ford wire mesh thing in the front window. The first time I saw that used I was amazed.

One thing I wish I had is a fast tickover switch or lever so I can keep the revs up while all the power drain is sucking the life out of the battey. I used to have this feature 20/30 years ago when my cars had a carburetter, it was called a choke, but not anymore. I guess that's what they call progress

You could still have that on modern cars I think, if they bothered. I had a motorbike once which effectively just raised the throttle a fraction before the messing with the mixture. These days I would have thought they would do the same electronically, using a PIC to tell the magic box what to do, but it doesn't. (At least not on my car it doesn't).

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The views expressed in this post are personal opinions and do not necessarily represent the views of Safe Speed.
You will be branded a threat to society by going over a speed limit where it is safe to do so, and suffer the consequences of your actions in a way criminals do not, more so than someone who is a real threat to our society.

I just scrape, to be honest. A decent scraper rather than those freebie jobbies that you get with car magazines makes a big difference.

Tone, I'm not sure what a fast idle would do to a cat, but there's a danger it might cook it, I guess. Not sure why they don;t do it. As you say, it would just be another few lines of code in the ECU!

I have got the fine wire heating in the windscreen of one of my cars and, as you imply, it works very well. There is only one drawback and that is the slight reflection you get from the wires from approaching headlights at night. It's not too bad though.

My other car has parked car heating which IMO is the best ever car option. A bit of frost? Just click the remote as you get out of the shower in the morning and by the time you are dressed the car is defrosted and ready to go. (You can groan now!)

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Malcolm W.
The views expressed in this post are personal opinions and do not represent the views of Safespeed.

Although, and please correct me if I'm wrong Mole, don't 'cats' thrive on cooking in order to work propery? &

Ah! You have me at an advantage there Malcolm. I only saw the effect and result in daytime, so heard the drawback here, from you, for the first time.

Groan!

Not many vehicles do that but I know of two. TOTR RR for one, if that makes sense?

Ok - Top of the range Range Rover for one

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The views expressed in this post are personal opinions and do not necessarily represent the views of Safe Speed.
You will be branded a threat to society by going over a speed limit where it is safe to do so, and suffer the consequences of your actions in a way criminals do not, more so than someone who is a real threat to our society.

They do like a bit of heat, it's true, but running at a fast idle under no load would make the mixture pretty weak. Up to a point, as you say, that would promote a fast "light-up" for the cat, a good thing, but I don't know how easy it would be to "overdo" it. Not something I'd be dead keen to try on my own car (if it had a cat!), put it that way!

It doesn't get frosted up in the garage.

dcbwhaley wrote"
:Broadening the topic a little - how do you thaw out your car on a cold morning."

I'm a big fan of luke warm water too, never caused me any problems, cheap and ....on tap....

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My views do not represent Safespeed but those of a driver who has driven for 39 yrs, in all conditions, at all times of the day & night on every type of road and covered well over a million miles, so knows a bit about what makes for safety on the road,what is really dangerous and needs to be observed when driving and quite frankly, the speedo is way down on my list of things to observe to negotiate Britain's roads safely, but I don't expect some fool who sits behind a desk all day to appreciate that.

+1 .
On the outside -the sprays tend to ice up more quickly,and leave a deposit ,meaning use of the windscreen washer,which may or may not cause more ice .
I use water straight from the hot tap -using a jug -pour a fine stream down window -never had a screen go in all my long driving days -only problem I ever had was with a Victor FD ,the locking mech froze up as the window seals were poor .

As fro the engine -get it moving as soon as possible -it's a diesel .Remember many a time getting to work ,starting up the Transit in the yard ,having a cuppa ,then going out to find the engine still cold .

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lets bring sanity back to speed limits.
Drivers are like donkeys -they respond best to a carrot, not a stick .Road safety experts are like Asses - best kept covered up ,or sat on

Where would I stand if I had a frozen windscreen and piddled on it? (And I don't mean between the headlamps at 45 degrees).

"Well officer, it's the only option I had and the safest thing to do..." "You're concerned about safety - right?"

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The views expressed in this post are personal opinions and do not necessarily represent the views of Safe Speed.
You will be branded a threat to society by going over a speed limit where it is safe to do so, and suffer the consequences of your actions in a way criminals do not, more so than someone who is a real threat to our society.

I remember my old dad having to do that on the frozen car door lock back in the 60s when we used to have some cracking winters ....

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My views do not represent Safespeed but those of a driver who has driven for 39 yrs, in all conditions, at all times of the day & night on every type of road and covered well over a million miles, so knows a bit about what makes for safety on the road,what is really dangerous and needs to be observed when driving and quite frankly, the speedo is way down on my list of things to observe to negotiate Britain's roads safely, but I don't expect some fool who sits behind a desk all day to appreciate that.

Here's one tip for winter driving....don't believe the weatherman....we were "predicted" between 2 and 4 inches of snow when we awoke this morning......nothing!.....perhaps I should have awoke later....

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My views do not represent Safespeed but those of a driver who has driven for 39 yrs, in all conditions, at all times of the day & night on every type of road and covered well over a million miles, so knows a bit about what makes for safety on the road,what is really dangerous and needs to be observed when driving and quite frankly, the speedo is way down on my list of things to observe to negotiate Britain's roads safely, but I don't expect some fool who sits behind a desk all day to appreciate that.

I find that the deice spray that use a hand pump rather than aerosol work much better (am assuming that the propellant can't get a decent gas pressure up when cold), from home I use hot water - never any problems but always make sure it's hot not boiling, a neighbour did use boiling and it made a helluva bang when it cracked !

Screen wash I normally use screenwash concentrate and a quick squirt of w/u liquid in winter I'll add a little meths to the mix to stop freezing - works wonderfully. I've been told that the meths isn't great for car paint but it's sucha small amount I'd trade the paint against non frozen bottle wash.

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Gordon Brown saying I got the country into it's current economic mess so I'll get us out of it is the same as Bomber Harris nipping over to Dresden and offering to repair a few windows.

Chaos, panic and disorder - my work here is done.

http://www.wildcrafts.co.uk

Just remembered, I also used to have a soft bristle broom that I used to clear snow of the car, used to get some strange looks but was always the first in my street to have the car clear witout an armfull of snow.

9 months without a car and boy am I missing it, especially in this weather !

Doesw anyone still put something (usually cardboard or hardboard) down the grill to block off half the radiator to help the car warm up quicker, used to do it on my first car (Vauxhall Nova) and a company car (Mk1 Mondeo) as both had a helluva time with warming up.

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Gordon Brown saying I got the country into it's current economic mess so I'll get us out of it is the same as Bomber Harris nipping over to Dresden and offering to repair a few windows.

Chaos, panic and disorder - my work here is done.

http://www.wildcrafts.co.uk