Snow driving

We live in Maine. Our township does not use salt. We pack the snow/ice into a hard layer and the plow scrapes it smooth. When we drive on the road, during winter, we normally drive on packed snow/ice. Summer driving here has a lot of potholes, winter driving the roads are smooth.

Our rivers, lakes and ponds freeze every winter. Many of us drag ice-shacks out onto the rivers behind our cars, for all-winter fishing.

As a result some of us tend to drive on snow or ice a great deal, in winter.

My wife and I love how well our Prius handles on ice.

We use winter tires with studs all winter, and summer tires every summer.

At about 8 inches of fresh loose snow, the Prius will high-center. The snow will hold the weight of the undercarriage, with little to no weight left for the tires to dig-in with. At that point, a Prius will become immobilized. However 8 inches is normally about how much most vehicles can take, so it is not at all like the Prius is alone in this respect.

 

If you are a slow & easy, no-spin winter driver, you'll find the Prius is well-suited to your driving style. If you are a spin-the-tires-to-find-grip-underneath style of driver, you'll be very frustrated with the Prius as the car won't allow any real tire spin in order to protect the motor-generators.

 

I've been driving a 2010 Prius in New Jersey. That's not a snow state like Maine, but we do have our moments. And, for various reasons, chugging back and forth to Massachusetts, which again isn't quite like Maine.

In any case, the Prius handles snow as well as or better than the Civics I'd been driving. For one thing, with the regen braking only working on the front wheels, the car has an aggressive anti-skid function, the better with which not to swap ends. By all reports the Gen II version of the car was a bit too aggressive in this regard, in that if one got a car stuck in an ice rut or something one couldn't spin the wheels a bit to get unstuck. The Gen III seems to allow for enough wheel spin and such to get out of trouble. At any rate, I've never gotten stuck nor felt out of control during the occasional snow skid. (And skidding around corners and sometimes in a straight line is considered normal practice when the snow is packed down.)

Shortly after getting the car there was a 4", sloppy snowfall around these parts. I took the car and my driver's learner's permit daughter to a nice large empty parking lot for skid practice and maybe a donut. The car would skid if you really worked at it, but getting it to swap ends was impossible, at least for me. In fact, I was trying to teach my daughter the ins and outs of countersteering, especially when the rear end comes swinging around after the first countersteer, but that was almost impossible: The car just trues right up and flies right. And, if one purposely tried to make it skid the other way, in a very controlled fashion it would swing the rear end over in the other direction, calmly, and just stay there: No oscillatory action.

Of course, this is the first car I've owned with both ABS and vehicle stability control, but still..

Coming back from MA a year or so ago in the winter a sudden snow storm in light to moderate traffic north west of NYC in CT was encountered. The road got a packed snow covering and everybody slowed down some. It must not have been slow enough; a car a hundred yards or so in front spun out, in slow motion, and ended up crosswise to traffic. The Prius got carefully steered around this obstacle (no sudden moves, please!) without any trouble, the idea being not to do a panic stop. Again, no feeling of a lack of control.. Which couldn't be said for the four-door sedan which did the spinning.

The car does have low ground clearance, so if one is trying to plow through 8" of snow, good luck, you're not going to make it. But that could be said for any non four-wheel, non-high ground clearance car anyway.

KBeck.

 

The new prius have good power if you use the power setting. Surprised hell out me!!! H

 

I went back to the dealer from whom I purchased a 2005 Prius, which has proved helpless in snow despite excellent snow tires. Around the Finger Lakes we have many short steep hills, and my own drive is about 120 yds to gain 100'. As many
contributors to these forums have noted, the Prius does not tolerate any wheel spin: it turns off power to the non-spinning wheel for as long as 1.2 seconds (by our measurement). But Toyota claims that the current Prius has overcome this somewhat with a software fix. I asked the dealer about this and was assured that it's true. I asked if I could borrow any
Prius with this fix and try it out on my drive (just a few miles away); he said No Way.

So I don't think it's true.
jimbob

 

It most definitely is true. I have a ton of experience confirming it...

6 winters in Minnesota with a 2004 (gen-2)

5 winters in Minnesota with a 2010 & 2012 (gen-3)

.

 

West Michigan , highest snow fall in 30 years , went with new rims and winter Michelin xice3
Snows worked great , not a drift buster like my 4x4 RAV4 was but handled great ..... Think spring

 

I would not argue about winter driving with a guy from Minnesota. Whatever you say about it has to be a fact as far as I am concerned.

 

I discovered that too

When making turns, having to push through piles of slush from previous traffic, the Prius may not hold a tight radius turn. Like RWD or 4WD vehicles it would want to go straight a bit each time when you hit a deep pile of slush. But in PWR mode, it handles very differently.

In PWR mode is seems to work a lot better at holding the turn as you punch through foot tall piles of slush.

 

Hi

The prius is doing a fine job in snowy condition, i am out of Quebec, here's what you need to be succesfull..
A good set of winter tire, basic winter driving skills....enjoy the ride.

 

My 2010 Prius Model V is terrible in snow. Admittedly I do not have snow tires mounted on it, but my other car (a SAAB) runs just fine with all season tires. The traction control seems overly sensitive, and soon as a wheel slips, the car locks up and won't move. There is a rather complicated procedure to disable the traction control which I have had to resort to from time to time.

 

You need good winter tires on a Prius because of the traction control is trying to protect the transaxle. Big damage can occur in the transaxle by spinning the wheels on ice or frozen surfaces. This is why you when you step on it nothing happens. It normally pulls you out unless too steep or deep . You probably need good tires in your area, especially this past winter? H

 

I do realize that the front end of the car is really heavy for its class so if you take a turn fast your more like to go straight then turn in the direction you want to turn so be sure you slow down b4 turn but that weight gets you a lot of traction on the front wheels when your moving from a stop, and also ECO MODE works wonders in snow, seriously they should rename that as SNOW MODE because its a bear to use as a daily driver and i swear i feel like my mpgs are worst using it..

 

The Prius 3 is one of the best cars I have driven on slippery surfaces even with the standard all season tires and it steers well ,no push. H

 

You need to drive more cars, and learn how to drive a manual as well. My 5 speed manual subaru is the best car i've driven in the snow. Being a manual, i can downshift going down hills so it slows me down but doesn't slide. It also has a 50:50 power AWD ratio and ascends up snow covered hills like a mountain goat. The biggest problem with FWD cars in the snow are just the hills. They can get by just fine otherwise, but around here it's very hilly. I've driven through peoples lawns in a foot of snow, just to get around some idiot with a FWD car with all-seasons who can't get up the hill.

My normal commute to work is an hour and i live in the country. So i just can't live without an AWD car in the winter, nor can i go too long without driving a manual. So i kept the subie instead of trading it in for the prius. If i only had a FWD car, i'd stay my butt home until the roads are decently plowed.

 

Well a subaru is all wheel drive I realize they drive well in winter but I am talking normal cars. H

 

Passing on AWD cars, which are clearly better in snow conditions, I'd say any car whose weight is over the driven wheels will handle better than a car that's not.

My old '71 VW Beetle was a great snow car, what with the driven wheels (in the rear) under the majority of the weight in the car (the engine, also in the rear). And there's an argument that such a rear driven car, when accelerating, has better traction than a front wheel drive car, since the car's weight shifts rearward under those conditions.

But both front engine/front drive and rear engine/rear drive cars are clearly better than the old standard of front engine/rear drive.

Interestingly, I have a friend with a BMW (front engine, rear drive) that's just horrible in the snow. It has a very aggressive vehicle stability system where it applies brakes to the slipping wheels in order to slow them down to the point where they have traction. As a result, he couldn't make it up mild hills at all this last winter, extra weight in the trunk or no.

KBeck

 

My opinion...after only one winter with the Prius...

Is that it is NOT the best winter vehicle one can own. Even if it IS possible to drive in the snow and ice.

The low ground clearance, the underplating, HSD, electric motors, and an aggressive traction control system that is not designed to be turned off...just as a whole means to me that the vehicle is not really designed to shine in snow or ice conditions.

That's not to say The Prius can't be driven in snow or ice, but it is to say that in my personal opinion, I wouldn't promote it as being "superior"...to say All-Wheel Drive vehicles, or maybe just a lot of other vehicles.