 Driving Through Snow and Ice: Dunlop's on the job! [message #110798] |
Tue, 04 January 2011 14:59  |
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Well just got back from my New Years Trip, and on the way back from NorCal to Los Angeles, and ofcourse the whole state was in the grips of a winter storm, and Natrually the Grapevine got snowed in and closed down. For those not familure with I-5, the grapevine is the 40 some mile pass that must be climbed to get back in the LA area, when that is closed, only 2 options remain, either back to the Coast via Paso Robles which often has its own issues with high winds, or up the 58 through the Teahachipi Summit to the 14 via Mojave in the high desert. As luck would have it I chose the latter to the former, and after a quick stop in bakersfield for some Monster energy drinks I headed up 58. at about 2500 feet we started getting high winds and light snow. I had to pull over since the wind somehow opened the right side engine hatch. I tied it down with some wire and soldiered on up the grade. Soon it was snowing, and then snowing heavily! Natrually CalTranz is usually slow to react with salt and the road soon was covered with the cold white stuff. The rig has new Dunlop RVxt tires all the way around and these Tires have an extreme weather rating and are advertised to have great snow and ice traction. Well allow me to say the tires lived up to the hype and stuck to the road while other cars with lesser capability went sliding and many wound up stuck on the side of the road.
We stopped at a Loves in Teahachipi to top off the tanks incase we were gonna have to camp out in the snow and to get some hot coffee. So onward we went with the defroster on and furnace on full blast. It was a nice comfy 78 degrees in the coach and outside was about 28 with an unknown windchill. The normally 7 hour ride back to LA took 12 hours and going over the 14 in Lancaster we encountered ice, once again the rig held steadfast and we plowed on. I thin the combo of the tires and Front Wheel drive of the coach made that drive possible. The only thing that would make it better would be one of Jim K's LSD final drives!
So I'm wonderineg who else here has any snow stories with their rig?
73 Canyon Lands, (a.k.a. The Yellow Submarine) West Los Angeles CA
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