New 20 ounce tumblers available now! Forum donation credit with purchase. https://www.wildguzzi.com/Products/products.htm#Tumbler
And it depends on which AWD and which RWD and which 4WD. The vast number of 4WD trucks and SUV ( up until a few years ago) were really just 2WD since they did not come with limited slip as std. Like that 4WD in the video above. And it also looked like the little car had limited slip.And like the comparison to the Subie not all AWD are equal.
Kev; these guys don't look like Consumer Reports and are running what they got (the guys in town, not sure who the guys are in the hockey rink). Which means instead of taking the worst All Season tire and comparing it to the best snow tire. So I'd say each car guy bought the best tire he could afford (why buy the worst?).But it does make wonder how each class of tire would compare (i.e. instead of one sample, provide as many as possible for as many data points as you can afford).But it will take some work to find the worst snow tire to compare to the best all season.
4WD vehicles have existed for years, but when I was coming up, only a very few people could afford them.The alternative was simple. Put studded snow tires and/or chains on the back of the Pontiac, put some weight in the trunk, and just drive. Where I started out working, they expected you to get to work regardless of the weather. We've all got tons more money than we used to have, so we use it to make things easier for us. But we generally made it where we were going in them days.....Lannis
Now this is the truth.....And it snows here in western NY state a lot more than many other places mentioned here and up until maybe 20 years ago 2 wheel drive was most got along with. And as Lannis says,we all got were we had to go....
Now it seems no one can venture a half mile from home without all wheel drive,back up cameras, I phones and GPS.......
Kev, me and you are from different worlds... ;D
Kev; good points (and being late; I didn't state my main point which was your cynical statement stating they probably cherry picked the worst all season and best snow tire to exaggerate the differences, it was inferred but not stated. I needed sleep. :) )Under the video is a link to the full test: http://www.tirerack.com/tires/tests/testDisplay.jsp?ttid=116They stuck with one brand of tire so we don't know how they perform to other brands (there is a Finnish brand of snow tire that escapes me that was the gold standard back in the day; expensive too, but scary good in the ice and snow that I would expect to smoke anything Bridgestone makes) but I think it does show they did not cherry pick, from the full market, snow tires and all seasons. I don't know the Bridgestone line that well but it appears they did take the better Bridgestone product line.Typically I'm not as cynical as you and in this case I think the vendor did good. They do have a profit motive but I think they did a very good job of making a good test with very little bias towards a product. Which they easily could have by not including the details on the cars, tires and reasons why they did the test. All that info is provided in the link I have above.
In real world terms we make less than we did twenty years ago; what has happened is that a lot of technology has filtered down to where we can afford some of it (typically just due to scale of manufacturing). A well designed RWD car can do as well as a well designed FWD car, with the proper tires and a good driver. AWD/4WD can do even better; but I think real world experience shows that unreasonable expectations of AWD and bad drivers or poor judgement have these cars in the ditch and in accidents more than they should be. Same goes for RWD and FWD cars that end up stuck. However; I think there are more RWD cars out there (or were, back in the day) totally unsuited for winter storm driving; mainly because of too big of an engine which makes too much power for snow and puts too much weight up front were it's not needed.When it gets really bad, I'll take a Snow Cat. :)I never owned one in Minnesota (did have one in Arizona for a spell) but I've seen the local pizza place delivering pizzas during a blizzard with a Suzuki Samuri. With good snow tires I bet that sucker was the bomb! Unlike the Suby, it had very good ground clearance.