How does your truck do on snow

I agree with Bearskill, I think it's driving habits. I live in West Virginia and commute 77mi round trip over 2 mountains that don't usually see any salt before before I travel them. I have an 08 dbl cab base model, no tracton control and no limited slip. Last winter I had the awful Dunlaps and never had any real trouble. I did slide a few times but nothing really bad. Also I didn't keep it in 4wd the entire trip and was never late. This year I have some new Bridgestone Duelers and I can't wait to see how they handle in the snow.

 

I had to get a full setup. In the winter when snowfall hits us in chicago it usually dumps 6+ inches in a few hours

 

I think alot of the issues has to do with weight. As awesome as these trucks are offroad, they seem to be terrible in snow. My buddy had a 95 that was horrid in the snow and had aggressive tires. I have a 2500hd with a 9ft snow plow and a #2000 salter (when loaded) in the rear bringing total truck weight to 10k#. The truck rides on 235/85-16s which is a nice small contact patch on the road. I could floor it in 2wd and the truck wouldnt spin at all. It has LSD. but high weight= high traction

Point is drive according to traction level. If your fishtailing your spinning the tires...let off the gas a bit. If you want to maintain momentum then deal with a little slippage. If you run open in the rear, you might not fishtail all the time but youll eventually lose traction on one wheel and just stop.

BTW if your running up a hill covered in snow you will probably still fishtail with locker, lsd, or even open because both wheels have equal traction.

Another idea for those of you that run winter tires, get winter tires as skinny as posible to get the best traction on the street. Wider isnt better on the road, you dont want to float on top of the snow you want to cut through it to get to the pavement. 235/85-16 are skinny "pizza cutters" but work great in the snow maximizing Pound/ In^2 excerted on the ground= good traction. And they are 32" tires.

 

Tacoyota, you mentioned earlier as a suggestion for better snow traction about siping your tires. Is this something that some tire shops can do to your existing tires or did you mean getting tires with siping in them?

I've got new OEM tires put on by the dealer for my used truck but don't like the traction I get. These tires slip in the rain on a slight uphill grade, I can't even imagine how much better they would be on ice or snow. I wanted to get better tires but didn't want to just throw away almost new tires, if I could do something to the tires I've already got to improve traction (besides putting on chains) that would be sweet.

 

The traction control system is slow to act on the tacoma though also. On my my old Jeep srt8 the trac would kick in split second from traction loss. On the tacoma you're already sideways by the time it cuts off throttle. Thats something toyota needs to work on

 

For one, i hate traction control. ever get stuck in some snow and try to step on the gas and the damn vehicle wont move because on the traction control? ever come down a steep hill and hit the brakes only to realize "hey im not going to stop, my truck wont let me, it just buzzes and pushes my foot off the pedal"? Ever go up a hill and try to make it but the throttle keeps on cutting engine power so you lose any momentum and lose all hope of making it? Yea, i hate traction control. Instead of making people think or making sure people can drive they practically hand out licenses and car companies have to idiot proof cars...

Every car i have ever owned, with traction control, the traction control is the first thing i turn off every morning there is snow on the road. If you know how to drive, traction control can be your worst enemy. When experienced in snow driving, you learn to anticipate certain senarios and correct accordingly. With traction control the vehicle takes over not allowing the driver to correct.

Ex. if you lose traction around a corner and the ass end slides out, you want to just ease off the gas and countersteer and ride it out (can be fun), with traction control it will completely cut engine power making the wheels lock up getting you into more trouble.

 

my trucks been handling the snow and ice pretty well over the years, I remember being in the ditch so much in my old ford but then again I was 16-18 back then. I do have to say though at about 330 this afternoon I passed by a brand new taco laying on its driver door in the ditch today it was so sad I felt embarrassed kind of.

 

handles pretty sweet in the snow if you ask me

 

100% agreement with ease off the gas. Someone posted a link to another thread and linked to guidelines that said to take your foot off the gas. I disagree with that part. If you're on ice and you start to slip, closing the throttle will result in sufficient engine braking to lose traction. The driver needs to ease off the gas to regain traction.

And FWIW, we had our first accumulation in the Chicago 'burbs this morning. It was just enough to cover the ground, but it was enough to make the roads slick. I was up early to start the smoker so I took the truck for a spin before the plows came out. (We have a middle school on our street so we get plowed first. ) Traction with the Hankook Icebears was amazing.

 

Im glad to hear that! Im getting my rims and Michelin's put on today for that reason . No way was I about to go through winter on the stockers

 

Really hard to get my truck to fishtail without turning off traction control. Last winter I used 2wd 90% of the time and 4wd the 10% when it was really bad snow storms.

Only issues I have are that the stock Dunlop AT20's are crap so getting going from a stop is sometimes hard to do without spinning (in 2wd obviously.) 4wd solves that if it becomes an issue.

Can't wait till I actually have some decent tires on here.

 

Thats not snow, thats a dusting lol You can still see the dirt

Edit: is that cleghorn???

 

my bfg a/t work well in rain and snow .was in battle ground wa last year when they had the worst snow storm in the history of the state lol and im from vegas so if i did ok in 2x2 and 4x4 high never had to put in low bfg a/t's work well and it rains every day there never put in 4x when it rained and never had prob..

 

Ive never used 4x for rain in my life...unless its evil freezing rain. You know the rain that you wake up and trees down all over and that 1/2 in of ice you have to chip off the truck. Those are the times you say thank god they salt the roads...

 

My truck's 1st day in the snow. Not a blizzard by northern standards but we got half of Friday off to start the wknd off right since it's kind of a freak thing for Houston to have snow, much less in late fall. 2 yrs in a row for this early, official new record, so much for global warming eh? Oh noes, Texacanuckian!

 

I like your headlights!!!

 

There are in fact a lot of nice headlights everywhere!

 

That's not snow... More like chubby rain!

 

I have also found the ABS oversensitive on ice. But after avoiding colliding with a white tail deer on a gravel road the other evening, I'm not going to complain about how well they work.
It was getting dark and with me at about 50MPH the deer jumped from the shoulder heading in a path that would have resulted in a sure collision. I hit the brakes hard and instantly the tires wanted to skid on some loose gravel - BUT - already the ABS had kicked in. A few grunts and hums from the wheels adjusting to the changing traction and I came to a full stop, WELL clear of the fleeing animal and sitting straight and centered on the road. I was honestly astonished how quickly and in control the emergency stop was. Good job ABS!!
In this situation I had no time to "think" about how best to apply the brakes. The ABS did the thinking for me, thankfully. I'm getting used to how it handles on surfaces like black ice and am fine with a design that handles some surfaces better than others.
Maybe some Toyota electronics control designer can come up with a little "adaptive intelligence" for the ABS, somewhat like the transmission shift control logic, or the engine VVT-I.
Call it TST - Traction Sensing Technology
It's already out there already...

Neil

 

+1 :d