Stuck in the snow

[Kaleido]

Wow does my FFH drive like crap in the snow! We had about 8 inches today and I had to stop at a driveway exit and then restart to enter the street. When I tried to accelerate I couldn't move, weird, so I floored it and got no response! I don’t mind spinning the tires to get going, but I was surprised to find out you can’t spin the tires. No matter how I tried to accelerate I just sat there with my foot to the floor on the accelerator and got no response, what a weird feeling. I backed up and then floored it in drive to get through the little extra snow at the intersection, even then the engine RPM‘s were very low. It didn't matter if I was in low gear or drive, it was the same response. I guess if you ever get stuck in the snow or mud there is no rocking it back and forward and spinning tires. I should have disabled traction control I guess, but it’s a pain to go through the menu to get to it. Weeks ago I wanted to leave traction control off, but as my dealer pointed out it always defaults to traction on. At least my Jetta was a button you could push easily to enable or disable. This makes me not want to slow up or stop in snow, you just have to keep moving to keep it going. Takes some getting used to.

[acdii]

Do you have the 17" wheels with Energy Saver tires? Those do not have the best snow traction. If you do a lot of winter driving, you might want to invest in snow tires next winter. The 18" Goodyears though seem to do pretty good in snow, I was quite surprised at how good the traction was. However with that being said, the Fusions are a wee bit lower to the ground too, and may be easier to get stuck in deep snow.

[Kaleido]

Yes they are 17" energy savers, I actually wasn't complaining about no traction as much as I was complaining about the inability of the engine rev up and spin the tires, thereby creating SOME forward motion instead of flooring the accelerator and having no response to the wheels. It's the weirdest thing to have the car say "I'm going to do this MY way", as you sit there with the pedal to the metal and the engine just about idling.

[acdii]

Welcome to the wonderful world of Hybrids. At least the Ford doesn't shut down the entire drive system when a wheel slips like the Prius did. Took me 15 minutes to go up a short hill one day, Slip-stop-slip-stop-slip-stop, each time I moved an inch. Since the electric motors can provide instant torque, to prevent damage to the drive train, it prevents the wheels from spinning.

[storksb]

Yes they are 17" energy savers, I actually wasn't complaining about no traction as much as I was complaining about the inability of the engine rev up and spin the tires, thereby creating SOME forward motion instead of flooring the accelerator and having no response to the wheels. It's the weirdest thing to have the car say "I'm going to do this MY way", as you sit there with the pedal to the metal and the engine just about idling.

 

 

I think that you may find the lack of ability to spin the tires to be due to the Traction Control. I used to have a GTi with summer tires, when the ice came it would start to spin the tires but very quickly the traction control would kick in and reduce the power to almost nil, effectively stopping me dead.