April 24, 2012 • 20 mins
Driving in snow isn't impossible, but it can certainly be inconvenient. In this episode, Scott and Ben break down some of the most common errors drivers make in snowy weather -- and how to avoid them.
Learn more about your ad-choices at https://www.iheartpodcastnetwork.com
See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:00):
Go behind the Wheel, under the hood and beyond with
car stuff from how stuff works dot com. Hey, sorry,
welcome to pot Yester everybody. My name is Scott Benjamin
on the out editor here at how stuff works dot com,
(00:22):
and my name is Ben. I write some videos here
with the same company as you do. Scott. You know,
I got it as a terrible fat Albert impression. I
should have worked on it. No, No, I think we
have you know what, We have the rest of the
life of this show for you to refine that impression.
And I think now you've just got a new nickname,
Scott the loose cannon Benjamin. You kind of gotta get
(00:44):
your throat ray something like that. You have to prep
see already that was already that was much better. Yeah,
and the other one wasn't that bad. I feel better
about it because nothing to do with today's topic. Well
it does in the sense that we are kind of
talking about being prepared aired. Huh what nice? Yeah? Okay, okay.
As the point, how you're gonna link fat Albert and
(01:07):
snow driving, I'm you know, I'm working. I'm doing the best.
Oh wait, we already said the topic for a segue.
Now something like that driving in the snow. That's what
we're gonna talk about, right, Yes, not just what to do,
but even more importantly, what not to do exactly exactly,
because there's a lot of mistakes that are made in snow,
and a lot of them very costly mistakes because they
(01:27):
end up with you know, crack fender ben you know
ben fenders, and you know, hitting whatever, trees, walls, guardrails,
all that kind of stuff. So there's a lot of
things you can do to avoid that if you just
use some common sense and to be honest ladies and gentlemen,
friends and neighbors out there in podcast lands. Uh, we're
not saying that we're perfect snow drivers. Scott. I don't
(01:47):
know about you, but looking at this list, I have
made a few mistakes. I've had my fair share of
snow driving incidents yet yea. And not even here in Georgia.
Oh that's right. We get ice here and it's it's dangerous.
The ice is crazy. Yeah, because of the hills. It's
very very serious. I kind of laughed about it at first,
you know, but when when there's ice on the hills
(02:08):
that we have here, very dangerous. It's just not the
terrain for something like that, especially when you're stopping suddenly
at an intersection on an incline or something. Not. It's
not as severe as like, you know, like San Francisco
would be. I mean, can you imagine if San Francisco
had snow and ice that type of climate, Um, the
city would shut down. Yeah, you're just a layer of frost.
It would be um. But it's similar here. You know
(02:30):
that it's really dangerous. So UM, I don't know. I
think everybody can take some you know, you know what
these some of these tips apply even in the rain.
Absolutely when driving conditions, conditions are slick, um, you don't
have the first what do they say, first fifteen minutes
or the slickest after rain because of the oils that
can percolate up through the through the pavement. Give me
an opportunity to give my mother a shout out, because
(02:51):
since I was fifteen, she has been telling me that
it's true. Yeah, it's true. Because everything that's left on
the surface is then being it hasn't been washed away yet.
Then you've got this water oil, well not mixture, but
they don't mix all that well, right, and and you know,
kind of skating on the road. Yes, so this even
goes to a higher degree when we were talking about
(03:14):
driving in snow, um, Scott, how how should we kick
this off? Where you want to go with this? We'll
tell you what. We've got an article on our site
that's called five common mistakes you should avoid while driving
in the snow, and that outlines five pretty darn good
reasons to slow down or related to take it easy, um,
and things that you know people do, I guess incorrectly
(03:35):
in the snow often, you know, common mistakes. So you
want to just hit them five through one and then
we'll maybe add to it a little bit at the end. Yeah,
let's do it. Let's let's count down to number one
and then let's put in some bonus. All right, you're right,
he's the number five. Here we go thinking your four
wheel drive makes you invincible. Oh have you seen this?
I have seen it, but I know already you have
(03:56):
seen it more often, many many times. Yeah, give me,
give me atte Well, I mean it's just it's common.
I don't know if there's even one example. But you'll
be traveling on the highway, you know, two hands on
the wheel, white knuckles because you're holding it so tight
um and someone will fly past you in the fast lane,
um and left lane traveling you know, a regular rate
(04:18):
of speed. I guess you'd say you know if it
was a dry like if it was dry pavement, and
sure enough you know either you see it happened, or
it happens way ahead of you that you know that
that person is off and the man the ditch. Um.
It happens a lot up north. I mean, I've seen
it many, many times, and if we could just examine
the mechanics. Is the main thing that people sometimes forget
(04:41):
when they're doing four wheel drive is when your car
is slipping, it doesn't actually matter which wheel your drive
is in. If the whole car is slipping, everything is on.
If you're on ice and you're you're slipping sideways, your
four wheel drive doesn't do nearly as much good as
(05:01):
you know if you were just I have not if
I said that right, I should probably back up. But um,
what I mean is that if if you're driving your
four wheel drive truck as if the pavement were dry,
but it's not, you're on ice and you end up
sliding sideways, that's that's a bad situation. You're not gonna
your four whel drive is gonna help you at that point.
(05:21):
It may help you get out of the ditch once
you're in the ditch, sure, but you know, the deep
snow is fine, and traveling forward it's fine. But you're
you're pretty much on equal ground with everybody else when
you're on ice. If you hit that bounce. Yeah, I
mean you can argue that a little bit, you know,
with the torque distribution and all that, but um, really, um,
it's it's not It's nothing that will make you invincible,
(05:42):
like like Ericle says, right exactly, which is why we
don't say that four wheel drive is not better than
conventional two wheel drive. But we do want to point
out it does not make you immune to ice. No, no, no,
and it is it is helpful. I've had, you know,
four cars before drive trucks with four wheel drive, and yeah,
(06:03):
they're extremely capable in the snow. Don't get me wrong there.
What would you say would be number four? Number four
not being prepared. That's a little bit. That's a little
bit open ended. It's pretty broad. But um, think about
it this way. I think about like snow tires. You
probably want to have snow tires or at least tires
with decent tread. You don't want to have, you know,
(06:23):
like three season tires like we have here a lot
of times those bald punch up tires. Yeah, exactly. You
want to make sure that like you're you're in your heater,
into froster works, you know, things just to keep you
warm in the in the wintertime as well. So if
you do get stranded in a ditch or in a
snow drift somewhere, um, you know, make sure that you
also have decent window wipers. And this is very important
(06:45):
solvent because I've been stuck many times without solvent, you
get this kind of uh slushy mix on the on
the on the glass and you can't get it off.
If if the sunshine comes to that, you'll never be
able to see ahead of you, and it's it's a nightmare.
You have to pull over and you snow or anything
you can to wipe it off. Terrible. No, what do
you mean by solvent? Just just just just the standard
(07:06):
when you'll wash her. Nothing, nothing fancy, doesn't have to
be unless you want to use something with anti freest
that it doesn't freeze up, because oftentimes I had to
use something like that to keep it from becoming solid overnight.
And the reason you use that is because you knew
that you were going to be in a situation where
you might need it exactly. You need to be prepared,
and that that goes down to I mean, we can
take this whole different level that we have before with
(07:30):
you know, like the cold weather preparedness kits and the
first aid kits and all that, but we're not talking
about that right that. Right now, we're just talking about
just be ready. I mean, even if that's um, you know,
just taking warm clothes like hats and boots and admittance
and things like that to where if you do have
to find you know, you find yourself having to walk
to the next gas station. Uh yeah, exactly, So being
(07:53):
prepared as the number four, number three, maybe following too closely.
Oh everybody follows closely, Scott. That's a sad fact of life. Yeah.
I think you're right, But um, you probably experienced this
more in the rain down here, but in you know,
snow and ice, it's even more critical. It just seems
it's a it's you're you're more apt to slide further
and ice, and there's actually a kind of a a rule,
(08:17):
a loose rule that you should follow. UM for every
ten miles per hour, you should have about four car
links or distance between you and the next car. UM.
No one obeys this, this law. I mean, I can
think it's not a law really, just a recommendation. Really yeah.
But I mean, if you think about it this way,
if you go by that rule, every ten miles per
(08:38):
hour is four car links. If you're traveling thirty miles
per hour, which is you know, half of normal highway speed, UM,
you need twelve car links between you and the car
in front of you, which is just now, it's not
gonna happen because eleven cars will pull in between you
and the car. And we know that right make it
exactly happens every time. So that's that's a tough one
(08:59):
to do. But if you can remember to back off
a little bit, you're gonna save yourself from grief. And
it's this one is I would argue pretty important because
tailgating is something that everybody hates if it's at the
rear of their car, But if it's in front of
their car, then it's somehow never that bad, you know
(09:20):
what I mean, because they're in control and they know
that it's not gonna happen to them. I've been guilty
of this sometime sometimes, and I know what most people
are thinking. They're either angry at the person in front
of them, frustrated with the traffic, or they're thinking, I
am such a good driver, I know exactly where I'm going.
What is up with this land rover? Um? Not that
they're bad cars. At a specific instance where I was
(09:42):
a bad guy, understood, and it was snowing, and um,
you know, no matter how close somebody gets behind you, Um,
if you speed up, they're not going to get in
the accident you are, Yeah, exactly, And you know a
lot of times you can. This kind of leads into
the next one. But you know what, we'll just talk
about the next number two slamming on the brakes. This
(10:05):
kind of goes with the last one. They had fallen
too closely, because if you follow too closely and then
find yourself having to slam on the brakes, yeah exactly,
because it's no good on on the ice. Um. Of course,
you may have a BS and that may help you
a little bit, but not not an awful lot. I mean,
if you're too close, it's just gonna happen, especially on ice. Um.
I've had situations where I've slid right up to the
(10:26):
point where I thought I was going to hit a
car and didn't, and I stopped way ahead of time.
You know, I should say not every time, but almost always. Um,
it's it's scary because you can go a long, long
way on ice. Um, you just cannot stop the car.
You're pumping the brakes, you're trying everything you can. Um.
You know if you don't have a b S. That
is because I didn't at the time. Um, it's dangerous surfing. Yeah,
(10:49):
I guess so. I mean it's And the other thing
with this is and and this is critical to remember too.
And I saw this somewhere else, is that you gotta
remember when when you're sliding and this is this is
you gotta put this delicately. Okay, try to steer less.
We do have to put that delicately here. This makes
(11:10):
sense when when you understand what I'm saying. Ah, got
do you think you know you're talking about overcompensation? Yeah, exactly.
Like Let's say that you're you're sliding, and you're sliding
towards the car in front of you, and you turn
the wheel it's instinctive. You want to turn the wheel
to get the car. The car continues to go straight
if you turn the wheel too far, um when it
does catch. If it does catch, you know the pavement traction,
(11:30):
you're going to suddenly end up in you know, the
lane next to you quick and you may end up
into another car and fire hyder on a tree whatever.
You may end up going forward sideways. Now, it's no
good to hit the car in front of you, of course,
but you know, if you overcorrect, that's one thing that's bad.
If you if you don't do anything, that's also bad.
You gotta I mean, there's a there's a balancing act here.
Slow and steady wins. The race goes back to being prepared.
(11:53):
If you're ever, if you're ever saying to yourself, I
have to drive to speed because I have to get
somewhere as cold and cool as it is to point
it out, you should have left earlier. And um, you
know that's easy for us to say. I hope it
doesn't snow tonight. You already hitting on our number one,
our number one? Are we gonna? Are we gonna do
this one? You probably know what it is. Go ahead,
(12:14):
driving too fast, which you know both you and I
are guilty of on our best of days. Yes, yep,
that's right. But um, in you know, adverse weather conditions,
definitely slow down every time I do it, and I
slow down in the rain and slow down in the
snow of course. Um, it's just important. I mean even
I mean, of course you gotta think of other things
like fog and things like that too, but we're talking
(12:37):
about snow and ice, and it's it's critical that you
slow down on snow and ice. Um, I don't know.
That would save an awful lot of a lot of
body work. That's an excellent point that we haven't mentioned yet.
The visibility tends also to be lower, especially if it's
during a snow story. Oh yeah, definitely, it's it's it
can be just as bad as fogs sometimes if if
you got a white out condition and you can't see
(12:58):
what's coming ahead, UM, just proceed with caution. These all
sound like common sense, but really that's that's what this
is all about. It's driving in the snow is all
about common sense. And if you just take your time,
really think it through what you're doing, every move that
you make, you'll be fine. Just as long as you
know everybody and also just kind of monitor what everybody
(13:19):
else is around he's doing. You can kind of you
can spot who's, you know, comfortable with the situation and
who's not. And I just try to stay away from
the ones that are not. I know that's easier said
than done sometimes, but again, it just comes down to
common sense, and I think we should also point out
in all fairness, I don't know about you, Scott, but
I really love my adopted hometown of Atlanta, and I
(13:42):
do not want to say anything bad about the drivers
that is untrue. So I will say something that is
completely true. These people go bananas whenever right snows. Excuse me, Yeah,
a little bit of sweet yeah, a little bit. Oh
God forbid that there be an inch of snow. You know,
we had a light dust and snow recently, we did.
It was sort of like a little bit of powdered sugar.
(14:03):
And as I got up in the morning, this is
extremely late snow. As I got up in the morning,
I heard that on one of the expressways, the bypass,
the when that goes around the city. I think it
was something like a twenty eight car accident, but by
a car accident because of a light dusting of snow.
So that gives you an idea of what. Um, you
know that the conditions that people are accustomed to, and
(14:26):
then they were they were kind of forced into this
d this snow driving condition that they had. A lot
of people just have no idea or they forget from
the previous year. You know, maybe they had one or
two days of experience of it down here as opposed
to you know, three or four months of it up
in a northern climate. Um, I don't know. It's it's
it's understandable in some situations, but I just can't understand
where that's not. That's a pretty flat area that something
(14:49):
was going on there. People were just traveling at the
normal speed as if it was a a normal work
day at that and there's there's also ice, yeah, ice,
And there are a lot of people who we can
assume safely, uh we're commuters from outside or inside the city.
And then also just came from an airport in a
rental car which had the stink man when you know
(15:09):
you drive out of hurts or whatever. Pretty sure, yeah,
pretty sure because the area that they're showing in but um, yeah,
it's a bad situation. And you know that. I mean,
just because they're twenty eight cars involved in this thing,
you know that there's a little bit of driving too fast.
They're they're probably slamming on the brakes, they're probably following
too closely. Um, who knows about preparedness. I don't know.
(15:31):
Maybe there's some of them are four World drive I
don't know, probably statistically out of cars, one of them
trying to link it to all five of our Bringer
bends here, but um, at least three of those were
most likely happening in that case. Scott, remember what you
were telling me earlier this week about your close call
at an intersection. Yeah, we had some ice and black
ice here recently, and I was sitting at an intersection
(15:53):
and a pickup truck you know, umbeos to. The driver
was coming through this patch of ice and I'm sitting
there just like I'm just waiting for the light to change.
And I looked to my left as he rounded the
corner of the back end of the truck, you know,
because it's slow light and slid out towards my car.
I made a half effort to grab the steering wheel
and move a little bit, you know, to the right.
(16:15):
It wouldn't have done any good anyways. But it didn't
hit me, and he wouldn't have hit me even if
I had moved but or hadn't moved, I should say, um,
but it happened really really quickly. The guy just had
no idea that it was there. But that's the kind
of thing that you need to watch out for in
these cold mornings, is the black ice. And um, it's
it's common up here, and it's also it's very dangerous.
It's uh something you hear a lot about. But um,
(16:37):
until you experience it like that, until you see that,
you know how some of these smaller accidents happened. You know,
if you if you imagine that happening all over town
that day, um, you know someone's gonna you know, I
have a bad morning. And this is actually I know
it might sound like it's a little bit of a
finger wag at people and that we're maybe over emphasized
(17:00):
seeing some of some of the problems here, but look,
it's it's not really you guys that we're talking about.
We're just letting you know what these other people might
be doing exactly. It's everybody else. It's every it's never
it's never everyone else. Uh do you have any other ones?
You know? I I don't, But um, there's probably a
lot more to go with some of these. I'm sure
(17:21):
we can talk about these all day really because um,
you know, every one of these has a deeper angle
to it, and you know we're not covering all We're
just trying to quickly go through and and kind of
get people thinking about it that you know, maybe maybe
you should just pay attention to what you're doing out there.
Would you like to try some listener mail? I love
listener mail, Okay, scott. Our listener mail today comes from
(17:45):
Stephen and he says that he was listening to our
earlier podcasts on upsetting driving habits and he agrees with
our topics but and that's good news, but he was
surprised to learn that many of the so called roads
rules of the road are illegal and uh, we know
these things as well. Um, you know, a yellow light
at a traffic light does technically means stop. I was
(18:09):
the one who said it means get ready to stop
now I was I was being a little too casual,
actually illegal, And um, you know, when merging onto a highway,
highway traffic always has the right of way when exiting
the highway. Most states require you to produce speeds to
forty five miles per hour lower. And then this is
the one that I think you and I both know
(18:32):
and everybody knows this, but we didn't point it out
in the podcast, so I really want to underline this
one today. Um, the misconception of the left lane is
the high speed lane, right, although everybody treats it that way,
we all know both lanes are the same speed and
passing a vehicle is illegal technically if you exceed the
posted speed limit. Yeah, supposedly, the idea is that you
(18:55):
could use that lane for passing, but never exceed the
speed limit you're to go around. If there's a forty
five minimum and a sixty maximum. Let's say, if someone's
going forty five and the right the left center lane,
and you use the left lane to go around them,
never exceed sixty miles per hour past them, complete the pass,
(19:16):
and then get back over. Right. That's the idea. That's
that's that's the idea. And of course, as Steven points out, uh,
this is something that people often we'll get a ticket
for because everybody treats it as though it's it's a
mirror technicality. Yeah, as if you know, if someone's going
sixty five already in front of you, use the passing lane,
(19:36):
you go a for brief burst you're going and then
get back in traffic. You've just broken the law. Yeah,
and we we wanted to make sure that we put
this out on the air waves because we did come
off a little bit. I don't know, would you say
we're a cavalier. I don't know if we're quite cavalier.
You were cavalier? Yeah, yeah, Well, all right, I guess
(20:00):
that's it for us today. Thanks so much for listening.
If you have any other suggestions for a future topic
or an upcoming podcast, please send us an email at
high Speed Stuff at how stuff works dot com. For
more on this and thousands of other topics. Is that
how stuff works dot com. Let us know what you think.
Send an email to podcast at how stuff works dot com.
(20:22):
Be sure to check out the new High Speed Stuff
blog now on the how stuff Works homepage
Go behind the Wheel, under the hood and beyond with
car stuff from how stuff works dot com. Hey, sorry,
welcome to pot Yester everybody. My name is Scott Benjamin
on the out editor here at how stuff works dot com,
(00:22):
and my name is Ben. I write some videos here
with the same company as you do. Scott. You know,
I got it as a terrible fat Albert impression. I
should have worked on it. No, No, I think we
have you know what, We have the rest of the
life of this show for you to refine that impression.
And I think now you've just got a new nickname,
Scott the loose cannon Benjamin. You kind of gotta get
(00:44):
your throat ray something like that. You have to prep
see already that was already that was much better. Yeah,
and the other one wasn't that bad. I feel better
about it because nothing to do with today's topic. Well
it does in the sense that we are kind of
talking about being prepared aired. Huh what nice? Yeah? Okay, okay.
As the point, how you're gonna link fat Albert and
(01:07):
snow driving, I'm you know, I'm working. I'm doing the best.
Oh wait, we already said the topic for a segue.
Now something like that driving in the snow. That's what
we're gonna talk about, right, Yes, not just what to do,
but even more importantly, what not to do exactly exactly,
because there's a lot of mistakes that are made in snow,
and a lot of them very costly mistakes because they
(01:27):
end up with you know, crack fender ben you know
ben fenders, and you know, hitting whatever, trees, walls, guardrails,
all that kind of stuff. So there's a lot of
things you can do to avoid that if you just
use some common sense and to be honest ladies and gentlemen,
friends and neighbors out there in podcast lands. Uh, we're
not saying that we're perfect snow drivers. Scott. I don't
(01:47):
know about you, but looking at this list, I have
made a few mistakes. I've had my fair share of
snow driving incidents yet yea. And not even here in Georgia.
Oh that's right. We get ice here and it's it's dangerous.
The ice is crazy. Yeah, because of the hills. It's
very very serious. I kind of laughed about it at first,
you know, but when when there's ice on the hills
(02:08):
that we have here, very dangerous. It's just not the
terrain for something like that, especially when you're stopping suddenly
at an intersection on an incline or something. Not. It's
not as severe as like, you know, like San Francisco
would be. I mean, can you imagine if San Francisco
had snow and ice that type of climate, Um, the
city would shut down. Yeah, you're just a layer of frost.
It would be um. But it's similar here. You know
(02:30):
that it's really dangerous. So UM, I don't know. I
think everybody can take some you know, you know what
these some of these tips apply even in the rain.
Absolutely when driving conditions, conditions are slick, um, you don't
have the first what do they say, first fifteen minutes
or the slickest after rain because of the oils that
can percolate up through the through the pavement. Give me
an opportunity to give my mother a shout out, because
(02:51):
since I was fifteen, she has been telling me that
it's true. Yeah, it's true. Because everything that's left on
the surface is then being it hasn't been washed away yet.
Then you've got this water oil, well not mixture, but
they don't mix all that well, right, and and you know,
kind of skating on the road. Yes, so this even
goes to a higher degree when we were talking about
(03:14):
driving in snow, um, Scott, how how should we kick
this off? Where you want to go with this? We'll
tell you what. We've got an article on our site
that's called five common mistakes you should avoid while driving
in the snow, and that outlines five pretty darn good
reasons to slow down or related to take it easy, um,
and things that you know people do, I guess incorrectly
(03:35):
in the snow often, you know, common mistakes. So you
want to just hit them five through one and then
we'll maybe add to it a little bit at the end. Yeah,
let's do it. Let's let's count down to number one
and then let's put in some bonus. All right, you're right,
he's the number five. Here we go thinking your four
wheel drive makes you invincible. Oh have you seen this?
I have seen it, but I know already you have
(03:56):
seen it more often, many many times. Yeah, give me,
give me atte Well, I mean it's just it's common.
I don't know if there's even one example. But you'll
be traveling on the highway, you know, two hands on
the wheel, white knuckles because you're holding it so tight
um and someone will fly past you in the fast lane,
um and left lane traveling you know, a regular rate
(04:18):
of speed. I guess you'd say you know if it
was a dry like if it was dry pavement, and
sure enough you know either you see it happened, or
it happens way ahead of you that you know that
that person is off and the man the ditch. Um.
It happens a lot up north. I mean, I've seen
it many, many times, and if we could just examine
the mechanics. Is the main thing that people sometimes forget
(04:41):
when they're doing four wheel drive is when your car
is slipping, it doesn't actually matter which wheel your drive
is in. If the whole car is slipping, everything is on.
If you're on ice and you're you're slipping sideways, your
four wheel drive doesn't do nearly as much good as
(05:01):
you know if you were just I have not if
I said that right, I should probably back up. But um,
what I mean is that if if you're driving your
four wheel drive truck as if the pavement were dry,
but it's not, you're on ice and you end up
sliding sideways, that's that's a bad situation. You're not gonna
your four whel drive is gonna help you at that point.
(05:21):
It may help you get out of the ditch once
you're in the ditch, sure, but you know, the deep
snow is fine, and traveling forward it's fine. But you're
you're pretty much on equal ground with everybody else when
you're on ice. If you hit that bounce. Yeah, I
mean you can argue that a little bit, you know,
with the torque distribution and all that, but um, really, um,
it's it's not It's nothing that will make you invincible,
(05:42):
like like Ericle says, right exactly, which is why we
don't say that four wheel drive is not better than
conventional two wheel drive. But we do want to point
out it does not make you immune to ice. No, no, no,
and it is it is helpful. I've had, you know,
four cars before drive trucks with four wheel drive, and yeah,
(06:03):
they're extremely capable in the snow. Don't get me wrong there.
What would you say would be number four? Number four
not being prepared. That's a little bit. That's a little
bit open ended. It's pretty broad. But um, think about
it this way. I think about like snow tires. You
probably want to have snow tires or at least tires
with decent tread. You don't want to have, you know,
(06:23):
like three season tires like we have here a lot
of times those bald punch up tires. Yeah, exactly. You
want to make sure that like you're you're in your heater,
into froster works, you know, things just to keep you
warm in the in the wintertime as well. So if
you do get stranded in a ditch or in a
snow drift somewhere, um, you know, make sure that you
also have decent window wipers. And this is very important
(06:45):
solvent because I've been stuck many times without solvent, you
get this kind of uh slushy mix on the on
the on the glass and you can't get it off.
If if the sunshine comes to that, you'll never be
able to see ahead of you, and it's it's a nightmare.
You have to pull over and you snow or anything
you can to wipe it off. Terrible. No, what do
you mean by solvent? Just just just just the standard
(07:06):
when you'll wash her. Nothing, nothing fancy, doesn't have to
be unless you want to use something with anti freest
that it doesn't freeze up, because oftentimes I had to
use something like that to keep it from becoming solid overnight.
And the reason you use that is because you knew
that you were going to be in a situation where
you might need it exactly. You need to be prepared,
and that that goes down to I mean, we can
take this whole different level that we have before with
(07:30):
you know, like the cold weather preparedness kits and the
first aid kits and all that, but we're not talking
about that right that. Right now, we're just talking about
just be ready. I mean, even if that's um, you know,
just taking warm clothes like hats and boots and admittance
and things like that to where if you do have
to find you know, you find yourself having to walk
to the next gas station. Uh yeah, exactly, So being
(07:53):
prepared as the number four, number three, maybe following too closely.
Oh everybody follows closely, Scott. That's a sad fact of life. Yeah.
I think you're right, But um, you probably experienced this
more in the rain down here, but in you know,
snow and ice, it's even more critical. It just seems
it's a it's you're you're more apt to slide further
and ice, and there's actually a kind of a a rule,
(08:17):
a loose rule that you should follow. UM for every
ten miles per hour, you should have about four car
links or distance between you and the next car. UM.
No one obeys this, this law. I mean, I can
think it's not a law really, just a recommendation. Really yeah.
But I mean, if you think about it this way,
if you go by that rule, every ten miles per
(08:38):
hour is four car links. If you're traveling thirty miles
per hour, which is you know, half of normal highway speed, UM,
you need twelve car links between you and the car
in front of you, which is just now, it's not
gonna happen because eleven cars will pull in between you
and the car. And we know that right make it
exactly happens every time. So that's that's a tough one
(08:59):
to do. But if you can remember to back off
a little bit, you're gonna save yourself from grief. And
it's this one is I would argue pretty important because
tailgating is something that everybody hates if it's at the
rear of their car, But if it's in front of
their car, then it's somehow never that bad, you know
(09:20):
what I mean, because they're in control and they know
that it's not gonna happen to them. I've been guilty
of this sometime sometimes, and I know what most people
are thinking. They're either angry at the person in front
of them, frustrated with the traffic, or they're thinking, I
am such a good driver, I know exactly where I'm going.
What is up with this land rover? Um? Not that
they're bad cars. At a specific instance where I was
(09:42):
a bad guy, understood, and it was snowing, and um,
you know, no matter how close somebody gets behind you, Um,
if you speed up, they're not going to get in
the accident you are, Yeah, exactly, And you know a
lot of times you can. This kind of leads into
the next one. But you know what, we'll just talk
about the next number two slamming on the brakes. This
(10:05):
kind of goes with the last one. They had fallen
too closely, because if you follow too closely and then
find yourself having to slam on the brakes, yeah exactly,
because it's no good on on the ice. Um. Of course,
you may have a BS and that may help you
a little bit, but not not an awful lot. I mean,
if you're too close, it's just gonna happen, especially on ice. Um.
I've had situations where I've slid right up to the
(10:26):
point where I thought I was going to hit a
car and didn't, and I stopped way ahead of time.
You know, I should say not every time, but almost always. Um,
it's it's scary because you can go a long, long
way on ice. Um, you just cannot stop the car.
You're pumping the brakes, you're trying everything you can. Um.
You know if you don't have a b S. That
is because I didn't at the time. Um, it's dangerous surfing. Yeah,
(10:49):
I guess so. I mean it's And the other thing
with this is and and this is critical to remember too.
And I saw this somewhere else, is that you gotta
remember when when you're sliding and this is this is
you gotta put this delicately. Okay, try to steer less.
We do have to put that delicately here. This makes
(11:10):
sense when when you understand what I'm saying. Ah, got
do you think you know you're talking about overcompensation? Yeah, exactly.
Like Let's say that you're you're sliding, and you're sliding
towards the car in front of you, and you turn
the wheel it's instinctive. You want to turn the wheel
to get the car. The car continues to go straight
if you turn the wheel too far, um when it
does catch. If it does catch, you know the pavement traction,
(11:30):
you're going to suddenly end up in you know, the
lane next to you quick and you may end up
into another car and fire hyder on a tree whatever.
You may end up going forward sideways. Now, it's no
good to hit the car in front of you, of course,
but you know, if you overcorrect, that's one thing that's bad.
If you if you don't do anything, that's also bad.
You gotta I mean, there's a there's a balancing act here.
Slow and steady wins. The race goes back to being prepared.
(11:53):
If you're ever, if you're ever saying to yourself, I
have to drive to speed because I have to get
somewhere as cold and cool as it is to point
it out, you should have left earlier. And um, you
know that's easy for us to say. I hope it
doesn't snow tonight. You already hitting on our number one,
our number one? Are we gonna? Are we gonna do
this one? You probably know what it is. Go ahead,
(12:14):
driving too fast, which you know both you and I
are guilty of on our best of days. Yes, yep,
that's right. But um, in you know, adverse weather conditions,
definitely slow down every time I do it, and I
slow down in the rain and slow down in the
snow of course. Um, it's just important. I mean even
I mean, of course you gotta think of other things
like fog and things like that too, but we're talking
(12:37):
about snow and ice, and it's it's critical that you
slow down on snow and ice. Um, I don't know.
That would save an awful lot of a lot of
body work. That's an excellent point that we haven't mentioned yet.
The visibility tends also to be lower, especially if it's
during a snow story. Oh yeah, definitely, it's it's it
can be just as bad as fogs sometimes if if
you got a white out condition and you can't see
(12:58):
what's coming ahead, UM, just proceed with caution. These all
sound like common sense, but really that's that's what this
is all about. It's driving in the snow is all
about common sense. And if you just take your time,
really think it through what you're doing, every move that
you make, you'll be fine. Just as long as you
know everybody and also just kind of monitor what everybody
(13:19):
else is around he's doing. You can kind of you
can spot who's, you know, comfortable with the situation and
who's not. And I just try to stay away from
the ones that are not. I know that's easier said
than done sometimes, but again, it just comes down to
common sense, and I think we should also point out
in all fairness, I don't know about you, Scott, but
I really love my adopted hometown of Atlanta, and I
(13:42):
do not want to say anything bad about the drivers
that is untrue. So I will say something that is
completely true. These people go bananas whenever right snows. Excuse me, Yeah,
a little bit of sweet yeah, a little bit. Oh
God forbid that there be an inch of snow. You know,
we had a light dust and snow recently, we did.
It was sort of like a little bit of powdered sugar.
(14:03):
And as I got up in the morning, this is
extremely late snow. As I got up in the morning,
I heard that on one of the expressways, the bypass,
the when that goes around the city. I think it
was something like a twenty eight car accident, but by
a car accident because of a light dusting of snow.
So that gives you an idea of what. Um, you
know that the conditions that people are accustomed to, and
(14:26):
then they were they were kind of forced into this
d this snow driving condition that they had. A lot
of people just have no idea or they forget from
the previous year. You know, maybe they had one or
two days of experience of it down here as opposed
to you know, three or four months of it up
in a northern climate. Um, I don't know. It's it's
it's understandable in some situations, but I just can't understand
where that's not. That's a pretty flat area that something
(14:49):
was going on there. People were just traveling at the
normal speed as if it was a a normal work
day at that and there's there's also ice, yeah, ice,
And there are a lot of people who we can
assume safely, uh we're commuters from outside or inside the city.
And then also just came from an airport in a
rental car which had the stink man when you know
(15:09):
you drive out of hurts or whatever. Pretty sure, yeah,
pretty sure because the area that they're showing in but um, yeah,
it's a bad situation. And you know that. I mean,
just because they're twenty eight cars involved in this thing,
you know that there's a little bit of driving too fast.
They're they're probably slamming on the brakes, they're probably following
too closely. Um, who knows about preparedness. I don't know.
(15:31):
Maybe there's some of them are four World drive I
don't know, probably statistically out of cars, one of them
trying to link it to all five of our Bringer
bends here, but um, at least three of those were
most likely happening in that case. Scott, remember what you
were telling me earlier this week about your close call
at an intersection. Yeah, we had some ice and black
ice here recently, and I was sitting at an intersection
(15:53):
and a pickup truck you know, umbeos to. The driver
was coming through this patch of ice and I'm sitting
there just like I'm just waiting for the light to change.
And I looked to my left as he rounded the
corner of the back end of the truck, you know,
because it's slow light and slid out towards my car.
I made a half effort to grab the steering wheel
and move a little bit, you know, to the right.
(16:15):
It wouldn't have done any good anyways. But it didn't
hit me, and he wouldn't have hit me even if
I had moved but or hadn't moved, I should say, um,
but it happened really really quickly. The guy just had
no idea that it was there. But that's the kind
of thing that you need to watch out for in
these cold mornings, is the black ice. And um, it's
it's common up here, and it's also it's very dangerous.
It's uh something you hear a lot about. But um,
(16:37):
until you experience it like that, until you see that,
you know how some of these smaller accidents happened. You know,
if you if you imagine that happening all over town
that day, um, you know someone's gonna you know, I
have a bad morning. And this is actually I know
it might sound like it's a little bit of a
finger wag at people and that we're maybe over emphasized
(17:00):
seeing some of some of the problems here, but look,
it's it's not really you guys that we're talking about.
We're just letting you know what these other people might
be doing exactly. It's everybody else. It's every it's never
it's never everyone else. Uh do you have any other ones?
You know? I I don't, But um, there's probably a
lot more to go with some of these. I'm sure
(17:21):
we can talk about these all day really because um,
you know, every one of these has a deeper angle
to it, and you know we're not covering all We're
just trying to quickly go through and and kind of
get people thinking about it that you know, maybe maybe
you should just pay attention to what you're doing out there.
Would you like to try some listener mail? I love
listener mail, Okay, scott. Our listener mail today comes from
(17:45):
Stephen and he says that he was listening to our
earlier podcasts on upsetting driving habits and he agrees with
our topics but and that's good news, but he was
surprised to learn that many of the so called roads
rules of the road are illegal and uh, we know
these things as well. Um, you know, a yellow light
at a traffic light does technically means stop. I was
(18:09):
the one who said it means get ready to stop
now I was I was being a little too casual,
actually illegal, And um, you know, when merging onto a highway,
highway traffic always has the right of way when exiting
the highway. Most states require you to produce speeds to
forty five miles per hour lower. And then this is
the one that I think you and I both know
(18:32):
and everybody knows this, but we didn't point it out
in the podcast, so I really want to underline this
one today. Um, the misconception of the left lane is
the high speed lane, right, although everybody treats it that way,
we all know both lanes are the same speed and
passing a vehicle is illegal technically if you exceed the
posted speed limit. Yeah, supposedly, the idea is that you
(18:55):
could use that lane for passing, but never exceed the
speed limit you're to go around. If there's a forty
five minimum and a sixty maximum. Let's say, if someone's
going forty five and the right the left center lane,
and you use the left lane to go around them,
never exceed sixty miles per hour past them, complete the pass,
(19:16):
and then get back over. Right. That's the idea. That's
that's that's the idea. And of course, as Steven points out, uh,
this is something that people often we'll get a ticket
for because everybody treats it as though it's it's a
mirror technicality. Yeah, as if you know, if someone's going
sixty five already in front of you, use the passing lane,
(19:36):
you go a for brief burst you're going and then
get back in traffic. You've just broken the law. Yeah,
and we we wanted to make sure that we put
this out on the air waves because we did come
off a little bit. I don't know, would you say
we're a cavalier. I don't know if we're quite cavalier.
You were cavalier? Yeah, yeah, Well, all right, I guess
(20:00):
that's it for us today. Thanks so much for listening.
If you have any other suggestions for a future topic
or an upcoming podcast, please send us an email at
high Speed Stuff at how stuff works dot com. For
more on this and thousands of other topics. Is that
how stuff works dot com. Let us know what you think.
Send an email to podcast at how stuff works dot com.
(20:22):
Be sure to check out the new High Speed Stuff
blog now on the how stuff Works homepage
CarStuff News
Hosts And Creators
Scott Benjamin
Ben Bowlin
Popular Podcasts
Crime Junkie
Does hearing about a true crime case always leave you scouring the internet for the truth behind the story? Dive into your next mystery with Crime Junkie. Every Monday, join your host Ashley Flowers as she unravels all the details of infamous and underreported true crime cases with her best friend Brit Prawat. From cold cases to missing persons and heroes in our community who seek justice, Crime Junkie is your destination for theories and stories you won’t hear anywhere else. Whether you're a seasoned true crime enthusiast or new to the genre, you'll find yourself on the edge of your seat awaiting a new episode every Monday. If you can never get enough true crime... Congratulations, you’ve found your people. Follow to join a community of Crime Junkies! Crime Junkie is presented by audiochuck Media Company.
24/7 News: The Latest
The latest news in 4 minutes updated every hour, every day.
Stuff You Should Know
If you've ever wanted to know about champagne, satanism, the Stonewall Uprising, chaos theory, LSD, El Nino, true crime and Rosa Parks, then look no further. Josh and Chuck have you covered.