Hello All. Does anyone put winter tires on their crossfire and drive it in the winter with lots of snow on the ground? Does the ESC and traction help you alot with keeping control? Thanks.

 

I have the regular Continental all-weather (hah!) tires and I drive my Crossfire through the winter. If the snow gets above 6 inches on the road things don't go well.

Our streets gets plowed regularly, though, so as long as I'm careful, not a problem.

The traction control does kick in. It helps a lot. I also have a manual shift, which really helps since I don't have to use the brakes as much.

Pam
Boston, MA

 

I have the Michelin pilots tires, but the car is just not good in snow. Two weeks ago I stopped at a light up hill and no matter how gentle I was on the gas pedal it would not find friction. I finally just fish-tailed up the hill.

 

I did some research on my tires, because I am concerned also about snow driving. This is my daily driver. I have the Continentals and I went to the Conti web site. They have a good explanation about winter driving using a low-profile, wide tire. It makes sense. Considering that the tire IS wide it acts like a plow and pushes the snow, since it can't push it out to the sides enough it eventually starts to ride UP on the snow and then tire-to-road contact is lost and we lose traction. A narrow tire doesn't have this problem because it plows less snow and can stay in contact with the road.

So... that being said, to really get optimum traction for our XF's we need narrow tires, and I think that would look really lame.

The wife has a Chrysler 300, we use it in deep snow. And so far we haven't had too much of the white stuff around here in south Chicagoland.

 

I have Dunlop M3 Winter sport tires which allow me to drive in a foot of snow without distraction. ESP system is amazing not allowing me to do "donuts" in the snow.

 

A little weight in the trunk will also help.

 

Thanks everyone for your help. I love this forum!

 

My last 'sports' car was a '92 AWD Eagle Talon. I was seriously spoiled by the AWD and wish my XF had that option...but that is me...

I'm also concerned with winter driving with the XF... Just going to have to watch/feel and see... Will go through this winter with my performance tires... in another 10k, I'll be buying the Continentals or equivalent.

 

cfire520 I'm not sure where you are and how much snow you get but here's my situation. Here in Toronto we have the potential to get a lot of snow (unless you ask our friends in Buffalo). Winter driving here has to take into account the temperature of the road since summer tires loose elasticity when they get cold. Ice is also a concern and a high silicone content winter tire will adhere, at least a bit, to ice. Wide tires can work in snow if they have an open tread pattern and rounded edges. For these reasons bought 4 18" x8.5" winter mags and put Bridgestone Blizzaks on them even though I have all season Contis as my normal outfit. My last car was a MB C230 Coupe with the same ESP programme as our car. It is amazing in helping to control your car when you are moving but when starting up in deep snow you need to turn it off momentarily and coax your car ahead with low revs like any RWD. A big old bag of sand in the trunk doesn't hurt!