Winter Is Coming Around The Corner. How Can You Help Protect Yourself And Your Car From The Elements?

Like that picture? If so, you’re probably already preparing for the winter season. Jack Frost is just around the corner, and if you’re a Canadian, like myself, or from the cold, white North in another country, that means one of two things; either you’re putting away the toy and getting out the winter beast, or you’re doing everything in your power to protect yourself and your ride for the months to come. Either way, there are some serious preparations that you need to make.

Tires

I want to mention first before I go one, I work with tires. Tires and oil, that’s my job, 7 in the morning to 3 in the afternoon, 5 days a week. First and foremost to winter proofing your car, you need the right equipment for the job. If you’re a new driver, or are new to a snowy area, winter or snow tires can seem a little intimidating. First thing you should do, is get some good steel rims. Oh yeah, those sexy, solid black rims that look good on any car. Not really, but if you’re like me, you can deck them out with some wheel covers or hub caps from Wal-Mart or AutoZone. But, if someone sees you with black steelies, they assume that you’re taking precautions. Back to the tires, just like summer and all seasons, the winter tires that you choose should reflect on how you drive or what kind of car you drive. What makes a winter tire a winter tire, you may ask? Well, aside from the picture of a snowflake on the sidewall, they’re usually more of a passive aggressive tread pattern with a softer compound. You may wonder why they are softer, and the answer is complicated and technical, but I can explain in a simple manner. When rubber gets cold, it gets hard. When rubber gets hard, it doesn’t have as much traction. When your tires don’t have as much traction, well, that’s when things go wrong. So to combat that, winter tires are softer. When it’s super cold out, they’ll still be hard, but not as bad as summer tires. And let me tell you something else; all season tires aren’t really “all season”. All season tires are good in the rain and in the dry. In snow and on ice, they are as useless as summer tires. Last winter, I drove my 2004 Chrysler Sebring (great car by the way, people will tell you different, but they’re wrong) on a set of Firestone Champion HRs. Just in case you’re wondering, don’t drive in the winter on Firestone Champion HR’s. Amazing summer tires, horrible winter tires. I under steered into 3 snow banks, on 3 separate occasions. Now I use Bridgestone Blizzak WS80s on my Mazdaspeed6. They are quite possibly the most amazing tires in the world. But, I’m a bit biased. I’m a Bridgestone guy. I use Bridgestone Potenza RE760 Sports in the summer. But there are other options as well, Michelin X-ICE X13s are good, so are Hankook Ize-Z W606s and the Goodyear Ultra Grip lineup, although I always said I’d never use a Goodyear product. Which will bring me to my next point.

Winter Mats

Now, this isn’t the most important step, but it is going to protect your cloth mats and carpet. Have you ever seen those plastic mats that dealerships try to sell you? Buy them. Give in. They’re a great investment. They’re designed to catch any water and dirt for easy clean up. There’s one name brand that leads the floor mat industry, and you may have heard of them: WeatherTech. Words can’t even describe how incredible they are. WeatherTech makes products to fit specific vehicles, and their floor mats do just that. They won’t expose any of your carpet to get wet or dirty. The drawback to them is that they’re very expensive. $200-300 price range in fact. Don’t get me wrong, they’re worth the money, but if you’re on a tight budget, buying the cheap ones from Wal-Mart do the job just as well. Measure your stock summer mats and get comparable sizes. I bought Goodyear mats from Wal-Mart because I got a 20% deal off of the normal $39.95 price. They do the job just as…well, not just as well as WeatherTech, there’s just no comparison to them, but they do the job they’re supposed to do.

Oil

This one seems a little redundant, but there are some cars that require specific oil for winter and summer. My old Sebring (again, great car) took 10w30 oil in the summer, but 5w30 in the winter. Did I follow that? Not really. I bought the car off my mom for under a grand. I didn’t care for it to that much of a tee, but if you own a high end BMW or Volkswagen, and you’re winter driving it, you should pay attention to that amount of detail. I’ve even been told that some newer Dodge trucks require synthetic in the winter and just conventional motor oil in the summer. How true that is? Probably not very. But check with your owner’s manual or your local dealership to make sure. Like I always say, no one knows the mechanics of your car better than the people who made and sold it.

Rust Protection

This is, in my opinion, the most important. I’m no stranger to rust. I own a Mazda, after all. But I believe that a simple under oil, or as us Canadians know it as Krown, is the best investment for your car. I’m unlucky enough to have purchased my car from Quebec that has never been undercoated. In Canada, three provinces will argue over who has the worst winters, it seems. Alberta, Ontario, and Quebec. But the truth is really that, for cars, Quebec is horrible. One thing to keep in mind is that it’s not the snow that makes rust. It’s the salt. Most places use salt and sand, both of which will chip away at your underside, exposing the bare metal. That’s when the water moves in and rusts. What an under oil will do is create a layer between the air and the paint and undercoating on the metal. Under oil isn’t really oil as we know it, lubricating and cooling. Under oil is more of a rubber substance. They spray it on in a liquid form and it solidifies, creating more layers for the salt and sand to get through. Some places, like Krown, will even drill strategic holes in your body and fill it with this under oil to prevent surface body rust. If you want to go even further with the rust protection, there are electronic rust protectors. I don’t really know how they’re supposed to work, but I’m skeptical. Something about sending an electromagnetic pulse, or something like that through the body. Again, I’m skeptical. It reminds me of those Q-Ray bracelets that are supposed to make you feel better.

Knowledge

I lied. Rust protection isn’t the most important. It’s knowledge. This isn’t to protect your ride so much as it is to protect you. What happens if you’re inexperienced with winter driving and all of a sudden you’ve started fishtailing? You can be the best track day drifter in the world; snow is a whole other ball game from pavement, especially if you hit a patch of the dreaded, potentially fatal black ice. Never heard of black ice? It’s a silent and deadly killer. Think I’m kidding? Last winter, the winter of 2014-2015, on February 5th, on Ontario’s busiest highway, the Macdonald-Cartier Highway 401, saw an accident involving over 200 cars. Yes, that isn’t a typo. That’s not supposed to say 20. 200. Why? Because of black ice and a lack of driver knowledge of what to do in such a situation. You can’t explain what it’s like to hit black ice, or what to do. Honestly, the only thing you can do is hold on and hope that you only take down a light pole with you and not an innocent pedestrian. Really, and your local law enforcement wouldn’t appreciate me saying this, the best way to get comfortable to how your car performs in the snow, is to find an empty parking lot after a good snow fall and play around. Figure out how to escape a controlled spin and how far it takes your car to stop in snow. You’ll be surprised how much of an impairment snow can be.

Emergency Kit

You should really have a good emergency kit in any season, but in the winter, if your car dies on you in an isolated area and help is even half an hour away, it can get pretty uncomfortable, pretty quick. This is only really explainable with a simple list from my own kit.
-Jack (scissor jack is fine)
-Tire iron or 4-way
-Cotton or wool blanket (preferably a fire or thermal blanket)
-Thermal gloves and hat
-Hand and foot warmers
-Signal flashlight with orange or green handle light
-Wind up flashlight
-Reflective cones or triangles (I use foldable triangles for spatial management)
-A few tea candles and a lighter
-Foldable shovel or spade
-Snow brush and scraper
-Water (plastic bottles that won’t break if iced up and replace every month)
-Food that won’t go bad (such as energy bars and canned food)
-First aid kit including a seatbelt cutter

And some items to keep in your trunk:
-Sand, salt or cat litter (non-clumping)
-Antifreeze and windshield washer fluid
-Tow rope
-Jumper cables
-Fire extinguisher
-Warning light or road flares

In Case You Get Stuck In Snow

-Try to stay calm and don’t go out in the cold. Stay in your car: you will avoid getting lost and your car is a safe shelter.
-Don’t tire yourself out. Shovelling in the intense cold can be deadly.
-Let in fresh air by opening a window on the side sheltered from the wind.
-Keep the engine off as much as possible. Be aware of carbon monoxide poisoning and make sure the exhaust pipe is not obstructed by snow.
-If possible, use a candle placed inside a deep can instead of the car heater to warm up.
-Turn on warning lights or set up road flares to make your car visible.
-Turn on the ceiling light; leaving your headlights or hazard lights on for too long will drain the battery.
-Move your hands, feet and arms to maintain circulation. Stay awake.
-Keep an eye out for other cars and emergency responders. Try to keep clothing dry since wet clothing can lead to a dangerous loss of body heat.

We don’t need to loose any CTzens this winter. Have fun, and be safe.