RWD and winter driving

[BanaBanuFerry]

I've been looking into a bunch of cars while trying to find something i'd like as a first car. Lots of the cars I like tend to be rear wheel drive. Where I am right now, winter is 6-8 months of the year and there's a lot of snow and ice and generally crappy weather. I'm probably moving somewhere with better weather next year though. I'd like some input on how rear wheel drive handles in the winter time as opposed to front wheel drive. What differences should I expect? Any extra precautions i should take? (aside from the general precautions one would take while driving on a pile of ice :p)

[Cueman]

It's really not bad. You just have to get used to the feel of it.

With LSD and decent rubber, your no worse off than any FWD.

[hjr]

as long as you drive in a responcible mannor then you should be ok in either case. Its on the extremes that some people tend to find RWD harder to control.

A lot of people will say "oh RWD is more fun" or "more predictable" or "easier to save" or some load like that. They think they know what they are talking about, but not reeeeeealy.

fun(er) - that may be true, but it is preference

predictable - RWD in general is not anymore predictable in my experience than a fwd car. you can tell if you are gonna understeer to the same degree that you can tell if you will oversteer. Where the difference comes in is perticular cars. Some cars are very neutral and do what you want, some cars take very little to get into a hairy situation.

recovery - if you are a new driver, niether will be easy to save but i feel that they are basically the same. if you know what to do you can get out of understeer just as if you know what to do you can get out of oversteer. But again, it comes down to the handling characteristics of the car.

and you know im right because i have martha under my name.

[two40sx]

its kinda fun too
if you can handle the car and you have adjusted to the way it feels then it can be very fun.

[switch]

Its really driver dependant.

I think FWD gives the weaker driver a false sense of security.

When I owned a RWD I decided to pretend that winter driving was a low-speed performance event, and started to apply some basic performance driving principles:

1) lots of straight line braking approaching corners.
2) smooth even throttle application throughout the corner.
3) slow in, fast out.

-- it worked really, really well.

What the snow means is that you are suddenly in a performance driving domain, whether you realized it or not, and whether you normally drive that way or not -- get used to it.

Best of both worlds? AWD :D Thats what I did after years of both FWDs and RWDs.

[joegrang]

I find driving in the winter with rwd is a lot more predictable. Sure U'll slide a lot more but u know which way the car is more likely to slide and can compensate. for FWD don't even bother guessing it's soo hard to tell.. One tip though I found that to pull out of slides in FWD u tap gas but it's different on rwd I'm not sure how it goes with rwd

[Zero102]

RWD you steer into it, and depending on the slide/spin, you either hammer the gas to get the ass end back in, or don't touch it, and make it follow.

I drive a RWD, just got it last year, put snow tires on it, and it's a blast in the winter.
Just make sure you got the right tires, and it's no big deal. I don't have LSD, and I very rarely even spun a wheel, just take it easy.

The biggest difference is when you're getting out of parking lots, and over little hills from a stop. Because your drive wheels are still on the hill, when your nose makes it over the top, usually onto clear ground. Makes it a little tougher to get going sometimes, but that's the biggest difference.

If you're really worried about it, go get a Subaru Impreza, with AWD, then no worries =)

[1badPT]

FWD takes more to loose traction than a RWD in winter. That's why people feel that FWD is best for winter when comparing the two. Problem is, if the FWD ever does break away, it usually does so in a way that's hard to predict or control. When RWD breaks away, you usually still have your steering wheels with grip and that's usually enough to bring the back end back in.

AWD/4WD are good, but the main advantages they have are getting rolling in deep snow or ice. Once moving most of the advantages of AWD/4WD disappear (taken from a winter driving perspective). Most AWD's don't split torque 50/50 front/rear so whatever its biased towards will determine how it handles once its rolling (ie 70-30 split means it 70% to the front and the car will handle like a FWD once rolling).

[BanaBanuFerry]

Thanks guys. Sounds like RWD winter driving could be doable. :) I'd LOVE an Imprezza. Except we're talking first ccar, and that's like ..many a thousand out of my budget. :p

[three.eighteen.]

just get winter tires...anyone that says rwd is undrivable in winter really sucks at driving