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Winter driving thoughts so far

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coleAK

Active Member
Oct 23, 2018
1,382
1,254
Alaska
winter started my way 6 days ago and my thoughts so far on winter with the 3. Since Sunday it has been below freezing down to 8F and roads of fresh snow, packed snow, and straight clear ice with little contact with the asphalt. I have AWD and am running Nokian Hakkapeleta 9’s.

I turned regenerative breaking to low and think I’ll keep it that way all winter. The reason is even with the best winter tires going down hill when regen kicks in it isn’t controlled like ABS and the traction control seems confused. I could tell you will straight slide and without winter tires it would be highly uncontrollable. Also “chill” mode is my friend. It acts similar to a 2nd gear start and limits torque that is the enemy on winter roads

As for the tires. I’m a huge Nokian fan, I would never put another brand of winter tires on a vehicle. They are the safest and longest lasting. I’ve had Hakka 3,4,5,7 and now 9. The 9 is amazingly quiet although I will admit they were only on dry roads for 1 day. They have much less “stud tap” at low speeds than any other studded tire I have had before.

Overall so far I put similar to the three best winter cars we have owned: Subaru Legacy, Audi allroad (a6 version), and Mercedes e 4Matic.
 
I have had many Subaru’s. I grew up in Tahoe so drove a ‘84 loyal 4x4 for 5 years. For a while I was a sponsored athlete for Subaru from 1994-2001 (didn’t get paid but did get essentially a free car to drive every year that I then gave back) and had a 1994 legacy wagon, 1996 outback, 1997 Impreza RS, 1999 outback, 2000 WRX, and 2001 legacy GT, and a 2004 WRX STI. Currently have a 2012 legacy sedan with the symmetric AWD and CVT that we bought for my retired Mom.

In my experience the legacy platform it is better than the WRX/Impreza platform in the snow. It has a longer wheelbase, and since you can see all but 1 of the Imprezas I have driven for a long time (since Subaru USA owned most of them) were turbo so the legacy’s had less Power that also equates to better winter performance.
 
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Of the Subaru’s the best. I’ve had for daily winter driving I think is the newest, 2012 legacy. And by best I mean easiest to drive safely, least slipping and spinning. The most fun (and also least safe :) was the Sti. Also I can’t remember the exact tires but always had the best winter tires. Most of the time Nokian, some Blizzak, Michelin, general, one set of perrili (on a 911 996 turbo not Subaru) that were terrible.
 
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I have had many Subaru’s. I grew up in Tahoe so drove a ‘84 loyal 4x4 for 5 years. For a while I was a sponsored athlete for Subaru from 1994-2001 (didn’t get paid but did get essentially a free car to drive every year that I then gave back) and had a 1994 legacy wagon, 1996 outback, 1997 Impreza RS, 1999 outback, 2000 WRX, and 2001 legacy GT, and a 2004 WRX STI. Currently have a 2012 legacy sedan with the symmetric AWD and CVT that we bought for my retired Mom.

In my experience the legacy platform it is better than the WRX/Impreza platform in the snow. It has a longer wheelbase, and since you can see all but 1 of the Imprezas I have driven for a long time (since Subaru USA owned most of them) were turbo so the legacy’s had less Power that also equates to better winter performance.

Of the Subaru’s the best. I’ve had for daily winter driving I think is the newest, 2012 legacy. And by best I mean easiest to drive safely, least slipping and spinning. The most fun (and also least safe :) was the Sti. Also I can’t remember the exact tires but always had the best winter tires. Most of the time Nokian, some Blizzak, Michelin, general, one set of perrili (on a 911 996 turbo not Subaru) that were terrible.

Glad to see you have extensive background with Subies and think the M3 is comparable!

I've had '05 WRX, '08 WRX, '11 WRX, '15 Crosstrek Hybrid (wife's dd) and now an '18 STI. I'm also a Subaru Ambassador.
 
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I have had many Subaru’s. I grew up in Tahoe so drove a ‘84 loyal 4x4 for 5 years. For a while I was a sponsored athlete for Subaru from 1994-2001 (didn’t get paid but did get essentially a free car to drive every year that I then gave back) and had a 1994 legacy wagon, 1996 outback, 1997 Impreza RS, 1999 outback, 2000 WRX, and 2001 legacy GT, and a 2004 WRX STI. Currently have a 2012 legacy sedan with the symmetric AWD and CVT that we bought for my retired Mom.

In my experience the legacy platform it is better than the WRX/Impreza platform in the snow. It has a longer wheelbase, and since you can see all but 1 of the Imprezas I have driven for a long time (since Subaru USA owned most of them) were turbo so the legacy’s had less Power that also equates to better winter performance.

Were you overseas? We didn’t get a ‘97 Impreza RS or 2000 WRX in the states. That’s an impressive Subaru history though!
 
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@coleAK What’s your opinion on ground clearance for unplowed roads? My job requires me to go in whether there’s a Blizzard or not. Right now my g35x with Dunlop SP winter sport 3d’s has been my go to winter beater....but will eventually be on its way out considering its now 14yrs old and 150k. BTW I went through a couple wrx’s. Loved them!! But my bugeye wagon with JDM STI front and rear lips ( and typical mods...uppipe downpipe catback, Cobb, defi guages etc...) was my favorite.

 
All of the Subaru’s mentioned other than the loyal, Sti, and newer legacy were owned by Subaru. They traded me out almost every fall. I got the RS Fall of 1997 it was the non turbo that looked like the WRX they had over seas. The WRX I got in fall 2000 it was the “bug eye”. Thinking about it and the pictures I looked at to figure it out most of those cars I got from Subaru were Probably the following model year since they wanted those on my program in the newest car. When I entered the years above it was what year I got them in the fall
 
@coleAK What’s your opinion on ground clearance for unplowed roads? My job requires me to go in whether there’s a Blizzard or not. Right now my g35x with Dunlop SP winter sport 3d’s has been my go to winter beater....but will eventually be on its way out considering its now 14yrs old and 150k. BTW I went through a couple wrx’s. Loved them!! But my bugeye wagon with JDM STI front and rear lips ( and typical mods...uppipe downpipe catback, Cobb, defi guages etc...) was my favorite.

High centering with the 3 is a mild concern of mine. But I think now worst then the legacy or our MB E 4-matic. I guess what I’m saying is all AWD cars (and most SUVs) have similar risk. I’m also interested in how it is programmed to power the front and rear axel it one is stuck. In theory with 2 indipendent motors on open diffs should work similar to a center diff lock. When I had the 3 on the lift to switch the tires out I noticed it has a good amount of suspension down travel. If I do have issues with clearance when it goes out of warranty I may look at putting 1/2 to 1” spacers above the coils, but that is a long way off now.
 
After another week in the 3. Yesterday was terrable road conditions. Snow that turned to rain on snow covered roads then dropped down below freezing. Ended up with slush on a glaze of frozen snow and ice. We saw many cars off the road. So far the 3 hasn’t recognized the lanes on any roads in 2 weeks, further supporting my theory that
 
After another week in the 3. Yesterday was terrable road conditions. Snow that turned to rain on snow covered roads then dropped down below freezing. Ended up with slush on a glaze of frozen snow and ice. We saw many cars off the road. It was white knuckle but we made it up and down the hill where we live (~800 vertical feet above anchorage). The traction control works very well when traveling in a straight line but slides out more when cornering, had a tendency to understeer. The Hakka 9’s are amazing at stopping, had a hard time making the ABS kick in when breaking in a straight line.

After we made it home I took out our 2004 MB e320 4Matic for a loop on the roads to compare. I have to say even on 7 year old Hakka 5’s the MB is better, it slides less. Not that the Tesla is bad (it does very well). I think the disadvantaged the Tesla has: #1 is power, torque/hp is a disadvantage and even in “chill” it’s extremely powerful compared to the e320. #2 is quick steering, the steering on the Tesla is much more responsive and sporty leading to more quick movement. #3 traction control, the ESP on the MB Kicks in early and cuts power so it makes you drive more conservatively. #4 wider tires on the Tesla, narrower tires are an advantage on winter roads. #5- I was much more afraid of crashing the Tesla. I’ve also driven the MB for almost 15 years so much more comofortable with its dynamics and limits.

So far the 3 hasn’t recognized the lanes on any roads in 2 weeks, further supporting my theory that any of the auto drive features wouldn’t work 6-7 months of the year in Alaska.
 
RS in the fall of ‘97 makes sense but WRX would have had to be the fall of 2001, bugeye was a 2002 model.

I’ve owned something like 10 of them since 2003, still co-drive in lots of them in rally in the US, and used to mod a big Subaru forum.
Looking back at the old pictures with my kids I had the legacy GT and WRX backwards, (damn real film prints with no dates) so I must have gotten the legacy GT fall 2000 and the WRX fall 2001.
 
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Thanks I’ll look at doing a video. I mentioned the Regen on another thread, I had no issues at all. Here it is:

I put winter tires on a little over 2 weeks ago. Did it all my self at the auto hobby shop. Put the model 3 on the frame lift then un-mounted the OEM tires from the aero wheels. Then remounted the aero wheels with Nokian Hakka 9s replaced the wheels and took the car off the lift. I had Regen right away at the same level as before. Then I remounted the OEM all seasons to 18”ENKI’s with TPMS sensors from tire rack that I will put on the car probably in May. We have a LR AWD 3.

From what I have read I think the Regen issue is with the RWD 3’s