Today for the first time since I got my winter tires on the Evo it snowed. I was out having a little fun and being amazed how well the car just grips even in more than an inch of snow. Well, to get to my point I was using up road rather quickly and realized I was way too close to an intersection at about 60 MPH. I did what was natural – push in the clutch and hit the breaks. I continued sliding toward the intersection very rapidly and I realized I’d never stop in time. Thinking how well the car gripped while going forward with AWD I tried putting it in gear without taking my foot off the breaks and the car stopped like I dropped an anchor.

I can’t say I fully understand why it worked, but it worked amazingly. Try it, you’ll see. If anyone can explain why that works, I’d love to hear it. I can sort of see it in my head but it’d be impossible for me to try an articulate why this works.

 

Well first off did you drop it into a lower gear say perhaps 2nd? I'm guessing you were probably in 3rd @ high rpm's. Its called downshifting and not only did it save your Evo, but it probably also saved you some unnecessary brake wear. Try doing it to slow down when your just driving.. it'll save you on wear and tear on the brakes if you master it.

 

ABS sucks in the snow. By putting it in a low gear you were able to get the wheels to slow way down (perhaps even skid....a GOOD thing in powdery snow) and this is why you were able to stop.

When you skid in powder snow your tires quickly build up a mound of snow in front of themselves. This mound of snow being pushed forward actually clears snow from the contact patch area and you get better breaking performance than you would if the tire was still rolling over the snow.

Keith

PS: The above explanations is NOT true when speaking of hard packed snow or ice....just fresh powder.

 

Did your ABS seem to operate normally (the clicking sound and vibrating feel in the brake pedal)? Also, what was the snow conditions on the road? Powder/compacted snow/ice/a mix? Lastly, what tire are you currently using?

 

It is because the ABS did not lock up your wheels, (or do anything for you). In slush you can stop faster down shifting and that allows more braking force than the abs brembos was putting to the ground, I have removed the relay for the ABS for the winter. makes it so much better (if you know how to drive with out abs) and gives you more control over the car instead of a computer thinking for you!

 

Yeah at sixty the lowest I would downshift to is 3rd as the engine is still breaking in.

The snow was wet, I know that -- but I didn't exactly get out and play in it. I bet you could have made a good snowball out of it. And the ABS was working 100% normally.

I never downshifted in snow with my FWD Eclipse because it didn't help. I'd just skid worse. I'm thinkin the AWD was somehow helpful here but I can't understand why or how as I wasn't applying power.

Thanks for helping me try to figure it out guys.

Oh, and I'm using Continental ExtremeContact tires for winter. They are so much better in the cold than the Advans.

 

I remember when I had my Mustang, it being RWD, if you'd downshift in the snow, it would only slow down the back tires, and through the *** end all around. Kinda neat; same theory.

 

Hmm...I always thought Brake Pads were cheaper than a new Clutch?

 

Yes, downshifting works amazingly well in the snow. Since the US Lancer's do not even have ABS to help us out at all, downshifting is the only thing that will save you butt in the snow, unless you got 10mph the whole way to whereever it is your going.

but glad you figured out the downshifting in time to save you evo

 

Well, I always use the engine to help slow me down under normal conditions. It's a habit I picked up from driving semis for a living, so I do it mostly without thinking about it. And I don't use the clutch to downshift so there is no clutch wear. I match the engine speed to the gear I'm downshifting to and it slides right into place. I do the same thing when shifting up or down in my semi but a gasoline engine revs down a little too quick to up shift accurately compared to a diesel engine. But, like I said before, with my FWD cars in the snow it only made it worse. With AWD it seems to be the only way to go. I'm just not sure why.

The ABS detects when the g's of actual deceleration are less than the g's of deceleration the rotors are “reporting” to the sensors, and the ECU pulses the calipers based partially on those calculations. Boomn pointed out that in RWD downshifting caused the back end to lose traction and flail around, which makes sense. If you do that in an AWD car it stands to reason it would cause all wheels to lose traction, yet if that were the case the ABS would still be detecting wheel spin and should continue to pulse, which it didn’t. If downshifting caused the wheels to lose traction – per Fourdoor’s suggestion – I would think the engine should rev down more than what would be appropriate for the vehicles speed, and it didn’t.

The more I think about it, the more it seems the ABS was erroneously reporting wheel spin in the snow. Either that or Fourdoor is right. I’m going to have to go find a parking lot with a layer of ice to test this further.