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7874. thoughtful - 3/5/2012 2:32:02 PM If you're dealing with snow, it's all wheel drive or nothing, IMO. Even tho it means sacrificing some mileage....you get 0 miles to gallon once a car is totalled. 7875. iiibbb - 3/5/2012 3:37:28 PM There is a saying in my line of work... AWD just gets you further into the woods before you get stuck.
It can be extended to... it has you driving in conditions you probably shouldn't.
Front Wheel drive with appropriate tires is quite manageable in the snow. My wife is a AWD person and used to say the same thing when we met... then we had a bad ice storm and she got her car stuck high-centering it on an ice berm. I pulled it off with my FWD car.
You can also have all the traction and stopping power in the world, but you car will still be totaled by the moron with bald tires and a RWD truck. 7876. iiibbb - 3/5/2012 3:46:43 PM This stuff never gets old
7877. thoughtful - 3/5/2012 3:56:20 PM Well, my experience is the opposite. I used to have a lot of hills between me and work, and more times than not, FW drive cars were stuck on the hills, but my subaru got me past them nicely.
I am not a fan of 4 wd as I lost control once because the wheels grab differently and i was shot back and forth across the road in the truck...another time hubby was going up a hill nicely and suddenly did a 180 in the truck. So I'm much more leery of 4wd. 7878. iiibbb - 3/5/2012 4:31:36 PM Using your head is still >>> Drivetrain
The modern computer assisted stability control are pretty impressive. We bought a Subaru Forester last year and we had to take it up a muddy field. It did it when several older 4WD couldn't do it.
It just depends.
I put snow tires on my car for the first time this winter and I was amazed at the difference on ice. 7879. Jenerator - 3/8/2012 8:55:27 PM How many of you are going to be purchasing the iPad3? 7880. arkymalarky - 3/9/2012 12:58:26 AM I'm a droid girl and Stan's school just got him an ipad2. We got our SIL one for Christmas, so I don't know who's getting one. Are you? 7881. iiibbb - 3/9/2012 5:25:43 AM no.. agree with kindle ad... I can get a kindle and an android for the price of a ipad. 7882. thoughtful - 3/9/2012 2:00:29 PM I have an ipad2 and it's fabulous as it is...I think I'll skip a gen or 2 before I reinvest. So often the upgrades do not provide quantum improvements....or at least quantum enough for me to notice.... 7883. wabbit - 3/9/2012 9:03:19 PM My 1979 Subaru Brat was by far the best snow car I've ever owned. Never got stuck, never slid, never went out of control. And that was before Subaru started using the viscous linkage set-up, I had to manually put the car into 4WD.
When I lived in the Catskills and had a Subaru Legacy SW, I got studded tires for the winter months, which make a huge difference on ice. Ice trumps all, 4-wheel drive won't help much. 7884. Jenerator - 3/10/2012 12:01:01 AM Arky, I might get an iPad3 - we'll see. :-) 7885. arkymalarky - 3/10/2012 12:42:23 AM Cool! It looks like the screen is amazing. 7886. iiibbb - 3/18/2012 5:03:56 AM 
7887. vonKreedon - 4/12/2012 7:02:57 PM Check out this terrifying infographic. It's a complicated infographic, so it takes a bit of time to grok, but then...
P.S.: I really like the Smithsonian Magazine, so many fascinating articles about all sorts of things.
7888. vonKreedon - 4/12/2012 9:15:53 PM I sort of hate the idea of adding further complexity to the above infographic, but I would like to see a couple more lines:
- Global renewable energy production
- Global metal recycling 7889. arkymalarky - 4/14/2012 11:09:09 PM This new satellite internet is fantastic. First good internet we've ever had here. It's as fast as broadband at work. Hope it stays that way. 7890. concerned - 4/16/2012 9:18:04 PM Re. 7887 -
Interesting graphic, but I suspect its premise is outdated. Correct me if I'm wrong, but the economic collapse it predicts is predicated on mankind's using up all of one or more critical available resources by 2030 or something like that, resulting in mass starvation and war.
Well, now we're 40% of the way to 2030 past the farthest extrapolation shown on the graph, and there now is no imminent fear that an economic collapse will be caused in the forseeable future due to an insuperable lack of natural resources.
What looks like more probable causes of economic collapse now, IMO although more localized in scope today (such as with the EC PIIGS) are widespread demographic shifts coupled with increasingly irresponsible governmental spending and social policies. So eventual war is still a possibility; not so much starvation. 7891. vonKreedon - 4/16/2012 9:37:14 PM Yeah, the non-renewable resources curve was supposed to be the driver for the collapse and that curve is the furthest off the predicted track, and if the graphic showed the years from 2001-2010 it would probably be further off track, thus pushing the collapse back by some decades. OTOH, my wife looked at the graphic and what leaped out at her was the Global Pollution track. Her take is that if observed levels are close to predicted levels then we won't have a chance to run out of non-renewables before choking ourselves to a Malthusian collapse. 7892. concerned - 4/17/2012 12:04:36 AM How about a nice exhilirating bike ride in China to clear out your lungs?
According to the article that included this picture, there are 750,000 deaths a year from pollution related illnesses in China. And it's interesting that a primary source for air pollution along much of the US Pacific Coast is the effluvia from Chinese coal fired power plants. I once saw a satellite photo showing that.
Did you know that China has the world's most colorful rivers? Proof:
And they call this the Yellow River....
It's not easy being green....
Here's the Yellow River actually being yellow with cute bubbles on it. 7893. Wombat - 4/18/2012 3:29:46 PM Hey, it's a nonregulatory paradise! If your guy gets elected, our rivers can be just like that! Consarned environmental regulations are holoding the recovery...
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