[sam_little]

Hey,
I googled this and didn't come up with a good answer. Some said front, some said rear... Since you all seem to have opinions on EVERYTHING, I thought I might voice the question here. I have a subaru, and don't want to buy chains for all four 'drive' wheels. So, when using a single pair of chains on an all wheel drive (not 4 wheel drive) car, do you install them front or rear? If you know the reasoning for one or the other, let me know.

I know, I know... this doesn't belong here. thanks for the help, anyway.

 

[buildyourown]

IMO, all wheel drive cars, especially a suby, with decent tires doesn't ever need chains. NEVER! In washington state you have to legally carry them when the roads get nasty, but you don't have to use them. Buy the cheapest pair and put them in your trucnk so you don't get a ticket.

 

[sam_little]

I agree, and I have never had a problem without them (hence my ignorance on the subject). Still, it would be nice to know the proper way to use them should I need to. I already have one pair of extreme cheapies... I think they'll get me past the boys in blue.

IMO, all wheel drive cars, especially a suby, with decent tires doesn't ever need chains. NEVER! In washington state you have to legally carry them when the roads get nasty, but you don't have to use them. Buy the cheapest pair and put them in your trucnk so you don't get a ticket.

 

[speedster]

It depends on where you are from and how bad the snow is. If your tires have a M+S symbol on them then usually you can get away without chains. However if you have to use chains I recommend all fours because you have an all time 4wheel drive. If you can't turn, or if you can't move you have problems...so might as well do both.

 

[binary visions]

I agree, and I have never had a problem without them (hence my ignorance on the subject). Still, it would be nice to know the proper way to use them should I need to. I already have one pair of extreme cheapies... I think they'll get me past the boys in blue.

Well.. Subarus are primarily FWD cars, with power transferring to the rear if needed. It would make sense to me to put them on the front, where most of the power is most of the time - I believe, at max power transfer, the front gets 60% of the juice anyway.

 

[Brian HCM#1]

If your tires have a M+S symbol on them then usually you can get away without chains.

Thats the main thing there. Especially in CA, they will look for that. However if the car is primarly a front wheel drive then yes, on the front.

 

[kidwoo]

IMO, all wheel drive cars, especially a suby, with decent tires doesn't ever need chains. NEVER! In washington state you have to legally carry them when the roads get nasty, but you don't have to use them. Buy the cheapest pair and put them in your trucnk so you don't get a ticket.

Go get yourself parked at mt baker next time they have a real storm and you let me know how useful that little suby is without chains. If you lose clearance on an unplowed road, chains really can be the only way you get moving on a car that low:devil:

I drive a tacoma with 4wd and plenty of clearance but there's a little road restriction called R3 that means NO vehicles over the passes without chains.

On the original question. Front. I had pretty bald tires up until yesterday and we've gotten a good amount of snow over the last week in tahoe. I went an bought some chains and put them on the front. Everything worked fine. That way you have a drive axle and a steering axle with traction instead of just a drive axle (rear). I've seen plenty of people up here with 4wd vehicles, chains on the back just pushing their turned front wheels in a totally straight line. It's scary. The only problem with front only is you can't slam on the brakes if you're not traveling in a straight line. You run the risk of jack knifing the rear of your vehicle around because your front wheels will absolutely plant themselves compared to your rear. If your in snow bad enough to need chains, you shouldn't be slamming on your brakes anyway.

 

[Kornphlake]

I think you're eluding to the fact that you know how to drive in snow and ice but this statement scares me:

IMO, all wheel drive cars, especially a suby, with decent tires doesn't ever need chains. NEVER!

I don't care how many drive wheels you have, if all tires are skidding nothing will keep you in control. I saw hundreds of Utards with thier 4wd SUV's driving in near whiteout conditions who must have thought that 4wd would somehow help them stop when all 4 wheels start to skid. Infact one of these jack offs decided he'd test his four wheel ability and went into a spin in the lane right next to me and totaled my vehicle the day before finals, a week before christmas. Needless to say I had an ulcer that holiday season. Maybe I'm bitter, or maybe I'm just ignorant because all I've ever driven in snow and ice are 2wd vehicles but I simply don't buy the jargon that AWD will make you a better driver in snow. Being a good driver will make you a better driver, having AWD will only make a good driver a superior driver.

 

[buildyourown]

I prefaced my post with IMO.
IMO, if you can't get traction with good all season tires, chains of 2 of your 4 drive wheels aren't going to get you there. I know there are plenty of asshats who think 4wd improves breaking. Chain are dangerous in there own right. They can come loose and destroy body panels and brake lines. (I've seen it)

A suby outback has better practical ground clearance than most SUVs and the awd system works better too.

 

[kidwoo]

It was kind of funny......last week was the first time I've ever had chains on my own truck so I had to you know.....test the limits and stuff. I went to a parking lot down the street from my house and played around a bit. I went ahead and bought the bigger $75 chains because like BYO said, I've seen those things eat up a car from the wheel wells before. The ones I got just go straight across the tire, perpendicular to travel. When I could get my truck in a full right angle skid, even my front tires with the chains would break free and start sliding. There's something to be said for the criss-cross pattern ones I guess.............

I live in a vacation area that gets plenty of snow so maybe I'll start a picture library of all the ditched/stuck suvs that occur on weekends up here. Might kill some boredom cuz gawd knows I'm not riding my bike during the week these days.

 

[sam_little]

"asshats who think 4wd improves breaking"

wow. you used two newly (and hypothetically) banned words in one sentence.

 

[buildyourown]

"asshats who think 4wd improves breaking"

wow. you used two newly (and hypothetically) banned words in one sentence.

Ahhhh, you're right. I personally like the term asshat but "breaking" in the place of "braking" is one of my pet peeves.

That's what happens when you try and type fast at work...

 

[-BB-]

Over the weekend in Bigbear, I was going up this hill to the cabin and some dude in another pickup was coming down. There was a slight curve and I was on the outside of it.
Being curtious, I pulled over and stopped to let him by.
He slammed on his brakes and started sliding RIGHT AT ME. I had to put it in reverse real quick adn back out of the way so he hit the snowbank instead of my new truck.
F'er almost hit me!!

These damn Southern Californians dont' know how to drive in anything but dry summer conditions!!

 

[punkassean]

I mounted some cheap knobby studded snow tires from pep-boys on my All-Trac Celica (200HP Turbo AWD) for the snow and it was unfawking believable. I have lots of experience driving in snow, I used to live atop Kingsbury Grade at over 7K'. The traction was bottomless. I could floor it on packed ice and just launch while 4WD trucks were stuck in a ditch. I think those tires only set me back like $50-60 a piece mounted and I put them on the stock wheels since I had aftermarket wheels for the summer. I've never felt so safe in nasty conditions and the studs aren't a big deal if the roads are totally clear either, I'd drive to the bay and back on em, they just get a little worn down but mostly they press back flush with the tire under the load of the vehicle...

 

[Curb Hucker]

wow chains, 4wd trucks, mountains. I'd fear the people of illinois trying to drive in tahoe. I pulled 3 cars out of ditches this past week, and we only got 8in.

 

[Racer-X]

all wheel drive is NOT a version of 4 wheel drive.

well...in a sense it is,but it actually aimed at sending power to the wheels that are slipping rather than having all four wheels using power and turning such as TRUE four wheel drive.

in some cars that have AWD,such as Porsches,the system is primarily used for acceleration,not traction (as much so as Subys) which makes total sense because you will never need to be driving a Porsche in hazardous weather to begin with.AWD is a much more complicated system than 4WD as in it uses seperate clutches at EACH wheel (in Subys at least),rather than engaging all 4 wheels into a central mechanism that causes them to rotate and distribute power evenly and similtaineously.

IMHO,4WD is definitely the way to go (if you can) for off-road and nasty weather driving,but AWD is a step in the right direction. READ: anything is better than 2WD.

 

[Jm_]

Maybe I'm bitter, or maybe I'm just ignorant because all I've ever driven in snow and ice are 2wd vehicles but I simply don't buy the jargon that AWD will make you a better driver in snow. Being a good driver will make you a better driver, having AWD will only make a good driver a superior driver.

Totally. AWD and some 4WD systems help you get up a hill, but a decent driver can usually do the same with front wheel drive. Rear wheel drive is next to useless when the going gets icy or snowy (a miata was spinning out in front of me on snow a few days ago on my drive home). The old 4WD systems that sent all the power to the wheel that spins were utterly useless when you got into any kind of serious condition. All the power goes to the wheel with the least traction. That was definitely a steller idea Our 4-runner had that, on an otherwise great vehicle this must have been some sort of inside joke or something.

Going downhill though, ALL vehicles are equal, and higher center of mass vehicles will break traction earlier in a turn and not stop as fast as a lower car. There's nothing out there that will give you reverse thrust and somewhow magically let you stop.

And with all that said, AWD, in a subi, audi, or whatever, makes a huge difference on level ground and going uphill. Of course the fact that it's not going to help your arse at all when you try to slow down should be reason enough not to use systems like this to just "drive faster", but people still do unfortunatly. I've been very impressed with subi AWD though, and if you want a decent AWD car the outback models are definitely great snow cars.

 

[Jm_]

all wheel drive is NOT a version of 4 wheel drive.

well...in a sense it is,but it actually aimed at sending power to the wheels that are slipping rather than having all four wheels using power and turning such as TRUE four wheel drive.

in some cars that have AWD,such as Porsches,the system is primarily used for acceleration,not traction (as much so as Subys) which makes total sense because you will never need to be driving a Porsche in hazardous weather to begin with.AWD is a much more complicated system than 4WD as in it uses seperate clutches at EACH wheel (in Subys at least),rather than engaging all 4 wheels into a central mechanism that causes them to rotate and distribute power evenly and similtaineously.

IMHO,4WD is definitely the way to go (if you can) for off-road and nasty weather driving,but AWD is a step in the right direction. READ: anything is better than 2WD.

Err, it's not sending the power to the wheels that are slipping, that's what the old "4wheel drive" systems were, most of the ones where you could "shift on the fly".

It should be sending power to the wheels that are gripping, not the ones that are slipping. If it sends the power to the ones that are slipping you won't get anywhere.

4wd is inherently flawed because it means all wheels are turning at the same speed (true 4wd). This is where AWD comes in, and why they made a lot of vehicles in the 90s with "shift on the fly 4wd", although the shift on the fly thing was only marginally better than front wheel drive in nasty stuff, and when you got stuck it was infinitely terrible because it would just send the power to the wheel that was spinning. True 4wd really messes up the vehicle and the tires, because as a vehicle goes around a turn the inner wheels have to be turning slower than the outer ones, if this is not happening (true 4wd) that means that the tires are actually sliding across the surface to some extent. This is no problem off-road and on slippery surfaces, but it's a huge problem on pavement or anything fairly solid.

True 4wd is great when you have a system that allows you to select "true 4wd", but it's not without disadvantages and doesn't work on pavement.

This is where AWD systems take up the slack, they give the benefit of 4wd (not having all the power go to the wheel with the least traction) and allow the thing to actually turn and have different wheel speeds on the inner and outer wheels.

 

[lovebunny]

True 4wd really messes up the vehicle and the tires, because as a vehicle goes around a turn the inner wheels have to be turning slower than the outer ones, if this is not happening (true 4wd) that means that the tires are actually sliding across the surface to some extent. This is no problem off-road and on slippery surfaces, but it's a huge problem on pavement or anything fairly

well thats why in your owners manual and on some of the lock sweitches it says not to use unless off road/or needed

 

[Jm_]

well thats why in your owners manual and on some of the lock sweitches it says not to use unless off road/or needed

Wow, you don't miss anything Except for the obvious.

 

[lovebunny]

shut up

 

[zedro]

The traction was bottomless.

i'd like to submit we ban the word 'bottomless'....

funny thing, chains are banned in most populated regions in Canada...not that we get lots of snow or anything...

 

[BigMike]

Whats all this talk about snow? Here in VA its been in the 60s

 

[Toshi]

The old 4WD systems that did not have locking hubs was utterly useless when you got into any kind of serious condition. All the power goes to the wheel with the least traction.

um, no. "locking hubs" are not the same as "locking diffs". most "4wd" vehicles out there don't have locking diffs, with the main, popular exception being TRD toyotas with their rear electrical locker.

 

[BigMike]

um, no. "locking hubs" are not the same as "locking diffs". most "4wd" vehicles out there don't have locking diffs, with the main, popular exception being TRD toyotas with their rear electrical locker.

So whats the difference?

 

[Toshi]

So whats the difference?

manually locking hubs are the ones that force you to go outside and lock the front hubs (usually twist something) to engage 4wd. if you put the transfer case in 4wd without locking the hubs the front axle shafts will spin but since the hubs aren't locked to them the front wheels won't get any power. the disadvantage of manual hubs is that you have to go outside as detailed above. the advantage is that they are mechanically simpler, and allow for less drivetrain resistance.

differentials allow wheels to turn at different speeds. diffs can be open, limited slip, or locking. open diffs will send all power to the wheel with the _least_ traction. this is not ideal in off road situations where you might lift a wheel off the ground, as it will spin freely. however, open diffs drive the best on road and especially in the rain and snow (but not when you start with two wheels on high traction, two on low traction). locking differentials electrically, mechanically, or hydrualically change their layout such that they don't allow their two outputs to be at different speeds when they are locked. limited slip diffs usually have some sort of clutch pack in them that limits the slip . in other words, they won't let the wheel with less traction spin too much faster than the other wheel, at least in theory, so will apply some but not all power to the wheel with less traction.

a typical 4wd vehicle has 3 differentials, front, back, center. often putting the transfer case into 4wd will cause the center diff to lock (which is why the front/rear axle will "scrub" when you turn sharply in a dry parking lot with 4wd engaged). unless the vehicle has been modified or is one of the few (TRD, Toureag, etc.) that explicitly have locking diff options the diffs on the front and rear axles will be open or limited slip.

note that locking diffs and hubs are two distinct concepts.

 

[Jm_]

um, no. "locking hubs" are not the same as "locking diffs". most "4wd" vehicles out there don't have locking diffs, with the main, popular exception being TRD toyotas with their rear electrical locker.

Yeah, I always get the two mixed up!

 

[kidwoo]

Okay so it's dumping here. Like rediculous swimming in the stuff dumping. So of course I was skiing. I had to park my car near the top of a pass because the pass was closed and ski to where I ski. I get back and find a suby spinning all four wheels (different speeds too, looked funny). We dig and dig and he can't get moving. It's so windy 6" drifts are forming around the tires as we're standing there digging. Anyway, a grinder plow comes by and loans me a chain, I pull him out and as I'm putting the chain back on the plow truck I guess he opened my door and stuck 3 20s there.

So YES there are places that a Awd suby can get stuck...............

 

[johnbryanpeters]

Trouble with chains or snow tires on the front only is that it can lead to pivot turns around the front wheels when braking or cornering.

I like studded snow tires on all four wheels no matter what the drive system.

J

 

[zedro]

Trouble with chains or snow tires on the front only is that it can lead to pivot turns around the front wheels when braking or cornering.

I like studded snow tires on all four wheels no matter what the drive system.

J

thats why the official recommendation is to put the better traction in the rear since understeer is deemed safer for public consumption.

of course i like using my hand-brake as a corner-helper...

 

[Curb Hucker]

Okay so it's dumping here. Like rediculous swimming in the stuff dumping. So of course I was skiing. I had to park my car near the top of a pass because the pass was closed and ski to where I ski. I get back and find a suby spinning all four wheels (different speeds too, looked funny). We dig and dig and he can't get moving. It's so windy 6" drifts are forming around the tires as we're standing there digging. Anyway, a grinder plow comes by and loans me a chain, I pull him out and as I'm putting the chain back on the plow truck I guess he opened my door and stuck 3 20s there.

So YES there are places that a Awd suby can get stuck...............

you've got me beat. I only made $20 pulling a 4x4 F250 out of a ditch on tuesday. Dude in the truck was greatful, but amazed that a Discovery pulled him out with no effort

 

[MMike]

Well according to my vehicle dynamics course (MECH 447) I took way back, the following is true:

Lock up you front wheels, you lose directional control. Lock up you back wheels and you lose directional stability. Ie: lock up the fronts, you can turn the wheel, but you'll still slide in straight line. However, lock up the back and the car's ass-end will want to swing out, until you are facing the other way. (I could prove this to you with a diagram, or if I scanned my Gillespie text book)....

This is why a RWD car can get away with only having snow tires on the rear. BUT on a FWD car, you should REALLY REALLY REALLY have 4 snow tires.

So IMHO, if you're only going to use one set of chains, I'd put them in back.

I could be wrong...

 

[Jm_]

Well according to my vehicle dynamics course (MECH 447) I took way back, the following is true:

Lock up you front wheels, you lose directional control. Lock up you back wheels and you lose directional stability. Ie: lock up the fronts, you can turn the wheel, but you'll still slide in straight line. However, lock up the back and the car's ass-end will want to swing out, until you are facing the other way. (I could prove this to you with a diagram, or if I scanned my Gillespie text book)....

I can tell you based upon my winter-driving-fun today on snow, and yesterday doing poweslides and donuts in the wall-mart parking lot (on snow also), that MMike is 100% correct in what happens when front/rear wheels lock up !!!

 

[zedro]

Well according to my vehicle dynamics course (MECH 447) I took way back, the following is true:

.

ha, there was like a half-hour class-wide debate about this...all the fun loving drivers argued oversteer was ok and more desirable, mostly because it's more fun....

 

[***MTB***]

Personally i dont think you need them. but if you really want them, put them on the back tires.

 

[KleinMp99]

IMO, all wheel drive cars, especially a suby, with decent tires doesn't ever need chains. NEVER! In washington state you have to legally carry them when the roads get nasty, but you don't have to use them. Buy the cheapest pair and put them in your trucnk so you don't get a ticket.

That is so weird. Here in michigan all studded tires and tire chains are completely illegal! :angry:

 

[kidwoo]

That is so weird. Here in michigan all studded tires and tire chains are completely illegal! :angry:

California doesn't salt the roads and neither does the nevada side of tahoe. Not allowing studs or chains here would be suicide. I guss michigan salts?

 

[KleinMp99]

California doesn't salt the roads and neither does the nevada side of tahoe. Not allowing studs or chains here would be suicide. I guss michigan salts?

Ahh good point. Yes michigan salts, if I had a camera I would show you what cars look like in the winter up here :devil:

 

[sam_little]

you have a subaru. why are you asking this question? really. why?

Like I said... never had an issue. Just curious in case that I do EVER need them.

 

[ohio]

Chains>Cables>Snow tires>All-Season Tires>All-Weather Tires in terms of traction.

If you're only hitting icy roads, but not deep snow (e.g. New England roads) snow tires are the way to go.

If you're hitting deep snow (e.g. Donner Pass in a storm) you NEED chains or cables, and should just suck it up and put them on all wheels of any AWD, 4WD or RWD vehicle. Chains are stronger and have more traction, but have a definite speed limit and can be downright scary if you hit patches of open pavement. I run cables on my suby and was doing 35mph through a foot of snow on donner pass, while other cars were stuck doing 15mph in the freshly plowed lane, during the late december storm.

Also, in terms of the AWD/4WD misinformation being spewed in this thread. Open diffs don't "send the power to the wheel with the least traction" they send power EQUAL to the wheel with the least traction to ALL drive wheels. That is a major difference. Suby AWD on the base models is 3 open diffs, so it's nothing fancy... no clutches no lockers... power is equal to the weakest wheel times 4. Ditto for the majority of AWD and 4WD-on-the-fly vehicles. Suby mid-range models have limited slip diffs (LSDs) which is a huge step up. High end subies (Sti) and the lancer evo and AWD drive supercars like porches and lambos have active LSDs which can do some really cool **** in terms of directing power. And last, the mercedes SUV/minivan actually uses a very simple and very effective system of open diffs and active single wheel braking the accomplish a very similar effect. IMO, the mercedes system is the most intelligent of them all... too bad it's on that ugly POS.