Gravity- Driving in snow and on icy roads

[hwy17er]

PS: glad you are here to tell about this and help everyone on here evaluate these decisions we are making regarding Gravity.
I appreciate your input

 

[NovemberLima]

Those are a great 3PMSF snow rated choice, 149mph speed rated too! Those rims look like the same ones on the Gravity X

Yes, that was the intention.

 

[EarlyAdopter01]

I am running Michelin Cross Climate 2's on 20x8.5 front, and 21x9.5 rear custom wheels (but same size as the OEM "small" rims).

Which rims are those? They look great.

 

[037]

Michelin All Season 4 driving fine in the snow

 

[boydracing]

I think is heavy snow areas of North America, you will need to change out the standard tires. I have drove through heavy rain with nromal standard results (not that it matters but for reference.). I drove the Gravity through a lite dusting (1" of snow) and did not feel anything undue. Now that I changed out to 20"/21" Nokians, the Gravity feels like driving on dry with lite snow, slush, and water conditions near the Deer Valley and Park City ski resorts (same as our new Subaru with Blizzaks). I will check back in a couple of weeks when we really get snow conditions here.

 

[boydracing]

Got 6 inches last night (that’s what she said)
had no issues driving through unshovelled driveway to move car and will soon go on an errand on the icy roads will report back!

That is what we need here in northern Utah.

 

[ejesse]

We've got about 8 inches in my driveway in Northern Virginia of mostly ice stuff that's been really difficult to clear. We dug two wheel paths and the car at full height was definitely hitting the snow in the middle (and angry about it "STOP" "STOP" ) but I was able to get out, drive around a bit as a test, and back in, definitely felt individual wheels slip but the car did really well overall.

Settings for my "snow mode"

- Full height
- Low regen
- Front collision OFF

 

[dbsb3233]

I do believe turning the regen down is useful for avoiding braking on slick surfaces

I assume that means you dialed it from HIGH to STANDARD, right? (Since OFF is the only other setting, unless there's something I'm missing.).

I find STANDARD to still be pretty high. While I generally like strong regen (with CREEP, I don't like 1PD), I do wish there were a 4th setting. Right now it seems like 10-7-0. I wish there was a 4.

The time I find the strong regen problematic is dropping out of adaptive cruise control. It's hard to get the pedal pressed to just the right depth to match current speed before X'ing out of cruise control. If you don't, you get that hard, jerking slowdown during the transition. Wish they would apply some sort of process to that transition where if Regen is on, it makes it gradually ramp up if X'ing out of cruise control.

 

[blagar1000]

We're in the Adirondacks right now and got about 15-18 inches Sunday into yesterday. Woke up with an unplowed 8" at our motel yesterday, set it to highest, and easily pulled out of the lot and up a small hill to the road. Drove probably 70 miles Sunday and Monday on snow-covered roads. Essentially no issues at all other than a little bit of skid turning onto a very hilly drive to a hotel last evening, which frankly was probably driver error. Felt rock solid on the drives. No complaints about visibility in the snow in the evening with lights on. Mostly drove on high or standard with no regenerative vreaking. Preconditioning with pre-entry max front and rear defrost and climate control works like a champ before getting into the vehicle. No issues with frozen and unopening windows, door handles, doors, or trunk/frunk. At zero to 10 degrees though I'm getting between 1.98 and 2.12 miles per kWh on the Dynamic Efficiency meter. And it seems like there's a bit of a cool pocket in the car right over the center console between the front seats (I've noticed that before too).

 

[DKD-CvilleVA]

Love the chat about winter driving. I've not seen anyone mention issues with the door handles freezing. Are they working as intended?
In other older threads, I saw a couple mentions of this problem. Our Gravity is going to sit at Dulles Airport for a week, next week in the freezing weather. I'm hoping we have no problem opening the doors when we return!!

 

[DKD-CvilleVA]

We're in the Adirondacks right now and got about 15-18 inches Sunday into yesterday. Woke up with an unplowed 8" at our motel yesterday, set it to highest, and easily pulled out of the lot and up a small hill to the road. Drove probably 70 miles Sunday and Monday on snow-covered roads. Essentially no issues at all other than a little bit of skid turning onto a very hilly drive to a hotel last evening, which frankly was probably driver error. Felt rock solid on the drives. No complaints about visibility in the snow in the evening with lights on. Mostly drove on high or standard with no regenerative vreaking. Preconditioning with pre-entry max front and rear defrost and climate control works like a champ before getting into the vehicle. No issues with frozen and unopening windows, door handles, doors, or trunk/frunk. At zero to 10 degrees though I'm getting between 1.98 and 2.12 miles per kWh on the Dynamic Efficiency meter. And it seems like there's a bit of a cool pocket in the car right over the center console between the front seats (I've noticed that before too).

Excellent! Thanks for the report. That's exactly what we all want to hear about.

 

[Gravitas]

LOL, I didn't say I owned them all at the same time!

That's a proper 2-car garage!

 

[ejesse]

One note I forgot, I couldn't get the car to recognize the key fob or the key card. In the end I opened the doors with the app and sat in the car and warmed up and took the battery out and let it warm up and that seemed to get the fob going and let me drive.

 

[BrianBigNFun]

I assume that means you dialed it from HIGH to STANDARD, right? (Since OFF is the only other setting, unless there's something I'm missing.).

I find STANDARD to still be pretty high. While I generally like strong regen (with CREEP, I don't like 1PD), I do wish there were a 4th setting. Right now it seems like 10-7-0. I wish there was a 4.

The time I find the strong regen problematic is dropping out of adaptive cruise control. It's hard to get the pedal pressed to just the right depth to match current speed before X'ing out of cruise control. If you don't, you get that hard, jerking slowdown during the transition. Wish they would apply some sort of process to that transition where if Regen is on, it makes it gradually ramp up if X'ing out of cruise control.

Yes standard and keep in mind that the cold weather really depletes the amount of regen breaking

 

[Saksak]

[…] Drove probably 70 miles Sunday and Monday on snow-covered roads. […] At zero to 10 degrees though I'm getting between 1.98 and 2.12 miles per kWh on the Dynamic Efficiency meter. […]

That’s a good data point. What Gravity configuration (seats, wheel size)? I would say that’s reasonable efficiency for those temperatures, especially with snow adding a lot to rolling resistance.

 

[ejesse]

Amusing side-effect of a near silent car: hitting any kind of snow is quite loud in the cabin. I thought I had dented sides or bumpers a couple times this week, but everything looks good.