LeXuSrAcIn

I'm currently in Dallas and got to drive around in the 9+ inches of snow it had. My only other snow experiences have been in good ole Houston where the max was maybe 1 inch, and a snow storm in the midwest with a fwd car which handled great. Before the roads started becoming snow covered my GS430 was running like a champ. With maybe 1-2 inches on the roads, the GS was a nightmare. I was getting stuck in parking lots! In one parking lot every car could back out after a lil struggle except for me and a Smart car. The smart has tiny wheels so thats understandable. I put the car in snow mode and the tires still kept slipping like crazy. I have Goodyear Eagle F1 all seasons with good tread left. I saw other rwd cars gettin out of situations with a little struggle. In one situation, I had to take a uturn and the car got stuck! I was struggling to find grip going in reverse and drive multiple times to get traction in a busy street. I just couldnt make that uturn and had to get myself free to just go straight. I got straight, tried accelerating and the car lost traction again. I gave it gas and it was stuck for a couple seconds on the street, narrowly missing an oncoming car, as the engine finally gave power back to the wheels. Is there some setting I'm missing? Why am I getting stuck? On the plus side, the VDIM seemed to work well on skids, correcting itself very abruptly. My main concern is I might be moving to chicago, and if this car cant handle this little snow, I dont know how I'll get around there. I was getting ready to lower my car but I might have to rethink that as well. Are snow tires THAT much of a requirement on a 430? I know this is a bit of a rant but I expected a lot better from this car, considering other cars weren't having much trouble.

Chancellor

iTrader: (2)

Yeah man I have a RWD and it does not come out of my spot until the snow is off the road. If you move to Chi-town you might need to get a SUV or a AWD.

bigblack06

iTrader: (20)

yeah try driving in boston with snow, I have RWD sucks! but I love RWD

R.DUB

had similar difficulties in my rwd GS. Love the awd in the snow now. Good luck!

Rexus300

iTrader: (1)

No offense, but you have a RWD car with all season tires and with lot of snow. That's a big no-no. You must and should have winter tires. I live in Michigan, and my AWD cars have all season and winters depending on how they do. My RWD cars ALWAYS have winter tires regardless if there is 1 inch or 10 inch of snow. Get winter tires. You will be surprise how good winter tires are these days. I can drive in deep snow, take 90 degrees turn at 30 mph with no skidding on my BMW and Audi cars. If you move to chicago, you are going to need winter tires.

jre002

Tires, tires, tires.

*Batman*

It's all about tires. If you have summer tires like me you should expect your car to be undriveable.

If you have all-season tires then it depends what you have. For instance:
- Bridgestone EL42 OEM tire on GS460 has a deep snow rating of 3.6
- Continental ExtremeContact DWS has a deep snow rating of 8.3

So I would say blame the tires not the car. As an example, I was in DC this week and I was riding in a Black Lincoln Towncar. These are heavy, rwd, poor handling cars. You would think these would be much worse than a GS in the snow. But he had tires that worked just fine in the snow.

LexFather

RWD, no snow tires and wide low profile tires= hell in snow

Alexis-LS

Beating the dead horse here, tires, tires, and tires ....
Age, thread depth, and type of tires are all key players here.
But no matter what, no all season tires can outperform true winter tires.

LeXuSrAcIn

I know snow tires would make a difference. With all season I think I should have atleast been able to get around, considering others were not getting stuck. My tires have a 6.8 light snow rating which should have been more than adequate. I'm thinking maybe the snow mode doesn't work on my car?

BinaryJay

Snow mode doesn't turn it into an AWD. :P The only thing it does is babysit your throttle so you start out slower with less torque.

How well a car handles doesn't have anything to do with snow traction. The only thing that matters, apart from how many wheels can provide power to the ground, is the rubber interface between the slushy ground and your wheels.

*Batman*

A 6.8 light snow rating does not equip your car to drive in the snow. Light snow rating means the snow is patchy with some tarmac to grip. If you are driving on snow (no patches of tarmac, then that is deep snow.

And snow mode doesn't change your snow grip level, it just stops people with poor driving skills from applying too much throttle.

Given that there are people who are driving their Lexus GS with All-season tires perfectly fine in places like New York and Minnesota, I think it must be the tires not the car. What type of tires do you have?

arnieosp

iTrader: (1)

Add some weight to the rear axle, throw couple hundred pounds in the trunk while you still have snow, you will be amazed.

The cheap and clean way of doing it: buy some water-softener salt in Lowe's, it comes it 40-lbs plastic bags and costs around 4 bucks each. Place 5 of those in the trunk and you will be back in business.

gsexy300

yeah plus 300 ft lbs of torque at 1500 rpm or whatever the gs 430 makes haha.

sounds like a good recipe for doing 360s in the the walmart parking lot.

R.DUB

Throw a few bags of salt in the back. You'll use it this winter!