Two Wheel Rx300's In The Snow

[LexKid630]

The AWD rx300 in the snow is excellent. The AWD Rx330 is about the same as far as i can tell in the snow.

The FWD ES330 was pretty darn bad the first few weeks we had it last March in the snow. The LS430 should handle better in the snow (i think?) or is RWD worse than FWD? Her old 03 GS430 was better than the ES in the snow and that was RWD.

I'm glad my wife has the LS now instead of the ES. With our baby due in May, i want her to be safe these upcoming winter months.

[00RX300]

If this helps any... I own a 2000, RX300 that is FWD. I live in upstate NY, near Syracuse... You probably see us on the news because of all the snow we get. When the schools are closed, no one seems to be in a hurry to plow the roads in the morning. I end up driving on a lot of un-plowed roads in the mornings and slushy ones at night. I grew up with a father who always used snow tires on his big Buicks so I do the same thing now. Every winter, I put on the 4 Blizzaks and wheels that I purchased from tirerack. I can't say that the control is as good as someone with AWD (since I do not have one) but I have never had any problems. I do drive cautiously though. (Oh, by the way, I change my tranny oil every 15K and I now have about 70K on it without any transmission problems.)

[wwest]

TRAC.....as a teaching tool.

MY 1992 LS400, RWD, came with one of the early versions of TRAC. Basically the way it operated was that at the instant driven wheel slippage, spin, was detected it would start applying both rear brakes and simultaneously dethrottle the engine down to something just a bit above idle.

I came to consider it more as an early warning of slippery conditions that I could not note visually. My practice was to then turn it off and drive with an imaginary egg between my foot and the accelerator pedal.

By 2000 the system had been somewhat refined in that my MY2000 GS300 would still instantly apply the brakes but delay the onset of engine dethrottling for a few hundred milliseconds to give me time to react to the conditions and lift, "feather" the throttle on my own.

Then there was the MY2001 AWD RX300. Being predominantly FWD there was NO delay between the onset of wheelslip/spin and engine dethrottling. In a FWD vehicle that few hundred milliseconds of delay before dethrottling can too easily result in a serious accident.

Uncontrolled wheelslip/spin at the driven wheels of a FWD vehicle can potentially be a lot more hazardous than the same situation in a RWD where the driven can still maintain directional control.

So, my advice is to avoid driving FWD or front biased AWD (transaxle types) on adverse roadbed conditions whenever possible. Like a 4WD/4X4 they give you a false sense of security since their forward weight bias coupled with FWD allow you to accelerate or start up from a stop more readily. But even worse than a 4WD/4X4, ALL, or almost all, of the engine torque is being delivered via the front wheels, that's not good if you find you need to "leverage" the front tires into some level of lateral control simultaneously.

[tealboy]

I'll have some good data soon as I am going to put my awd 300 in the mud within the next week or two, lol. that's why i bought the awd while living in florida. we have some pretty sticky, sloppy mud on my property, so it won't take long to find out how well the awd works.