Snow on the BBC, cars sliding, but no 4x4s ?

Forum: 

Forgive me for being cynical, but I think that the BBC is becoming overpopulated by a bunch of politically correct lefty pinkos (I'm taking my lead from Carol Thatcher here).

How come is it that with all the footage of cars sliding about in the 'treacherous conditions' (3" of snow .... HA b***dy HA) we see no pics of 4x4s just going about their business with little trouble, just doing what they were designed to do !

Perish the thought that the Planet destroying 4x4s should have a use, and the bicycle-riding beardy-wierdy tree-huggers at the Beeb might be forced to show this as balanced coverage.

OH, BTW, I'm from a generation that didn't think snow was bad until it was deep enough to come over the top of my wellies, which, in those days, it did occasionally.

We haven't had real snow

We haven't had real snow since '64. I think in '80(if my memory serves me correctly) it was reasonably bad. The whole damn country has shut down because of a few inches of snow, its madness!

As for the news coverage, 4x4's just driving normally doesn't get people watching, nutters in crappy little cars sliding all over the place does.

Winter '63

Heavy snow ,followed with 3 months frost, and my mum tells me that was nothing compared to winter 1947.

And the country coped , trains dug out, folks got on with life, we went school as normal, even if the coke stoves were all we had, we shoveled the coke for the caretaker, the country has gone soft, to many elf an safety wallahs around, and at the time very few 4x4's , well only a few MK1 Land Rovers which some of the farmers had. Nearly forgot,and we lads wore short trousers and wellies.!!!!! Lucky lads got their dads cut down trousers, till the teacher saw them.

What has suprised me today is the arogance ( not sure if thats the right word)of some drivers of 4x4's.
the speed that they were driving at. Had they though that they may be require to stop at some point, or take avasive action, or is it I have a 4x4 and I am all right jack!!!!!!. These seemed to be more of the upmarket 4x4's ?????.

Noticed lads with beat up L/Rovers were always helping folks, where as the upmarket types were sailing past .

Edward

Edward (ews) '92 Fourtrak 2.8 TDX

SNOW

I recall the winter of 86 in Kent when the whole place just shut and the army dropped grub on to the Isle of Sheppy. Again it was forcast but poor preparation by the Councils and Railways made it worse than it should really have been. It lasted about 10 days and I had a Mini then which was great fun. The 4x4 popularity and usage was low then so not much moved during the week.

Why the UK always gets caught with it's pants down remain a mystery to me. Others cope i other Countries with snow, in this part of France they use ploughs and grit, no salt and there is no panic. Perhaps the Media create some of the problem. When I was a kid the buses always ran in London, smof, fog, snow as did the Milk floats be them chained plus the schools never shut sadly for me and many of my age no doubt. Now scholls are still shut and as for London Buses, well the old RT's and RM's ran with no doors so why cant these flash new things run? Perhaps the drivers drove in those days, preselect boxes much better then the Auto boxes used now and of corse AEC and Park Royal made a proper bus as did Bristol and not a box on wheels like todays articles.

M J Young

Snow

Hi all.

Well today a revelation, how few people can handle the snow , is it because we have had so little of it over the years many drivers cannot cope with it !!!!!!. Lack of experience!!!!!!.

I do not work fulltime, as I am my disabled partners personal assistant (posh name for a carer),but I have a part time job as the General Defacto (oddjob/gardener man) for an organisation which has a converted barn for offices, its well out in the sticks, quite hilly and isolated, so today snow.

I made a point of being there before the staff arived, so to the clear the paths,put down salt/grit, all that arived was the managing director, he drove in from Reading, (were are near Thornbury, Bristol ) and the offfice manager, she drove from Bath, okay mostly Motorway driving, but the local roads were difficult, the other nine staff reasonably local did not turn up , and they had a deadline for a project completion for this following monday. A bit of snow, the A38 reasonable to drive, What is happening !!!!!!!. We even told them I could shuttle them from from the town carpark to the office, the town was accesible with no problems, no takers.

Soft roaders, you know the jelly mold 4X4's, what a let down for some of them, Auto engaging 4 wd ,fitted with 'road tyres' , they found there 4x4 system did not work, probably never had to use it in a real situation or there tyres the wrong sort!!!!.

One lady with a KIA soft roader, had been told her CAR!!, would go any where, but it would not engage the 4x4 drive line, and she had a horse box on tow, needless to say the old Fourtrak came to the rescue, so pleased I changed to manual hubs, I know they are locking in, pulled a KIA and horse box complete with horse. My best was a RANGE ROVER , it was fitted with high speed road tyres, all four wheels spinning, Chunky pulled it to the top of the hill with no problems, it did not help because he kept it in neutral.

Best bit was a young girl in a Ford KA who told me she was so pleased with advice from her dad, she had beem visiting dairy farms ,(milk testing) she had completed her days round with very few problems,she had been out from 5am and could not understand what all the fuss was about !!!!! And it was fitted with some M+S tyres, not high speed radials ( she did have a shovel, a bag of salt/grit and a tow rope) by the way ,she did ask me if I required assistance, I was taking photos.

Edward

Edward (ews) '92 Fourtrak 2.8 TDX

SSNNOOWWW!!

I love it, being out in it is great fun, we never get alot but when we do i always try to go and play in it, be it vehicle, snowball fight whatever, but it makes me die with laughter when schools and such are closed, we had a few inches this week (sunday/monday) and a little more today but melted now and yet they closed the schools in the local area even though the roads are driveable - how pathetic, our problem in this country is 3 magic words - health and safety - that sucks, i never once had the motor in 4wd this week but it went fine and i put that down to driver experience, ive seen no end of people putting there foot to the floor and making the wheels/engine rev like hell and oh look they arnt moving, your right i hardly saw a 4x4 on the news, just idiots going to fast or driving with 0 experience causing problems - because that is more interesting i suppose, you never saw the real 4x4 owners pulling out cars, giving tows up hills, ferrying people which is annoying. I am getting very annoyed with this countrys namby pamby nanny state wrapped in cotton wool attitude, the americans over here are laughing at us on the news, they cant believe how 2-3"'s can stop the country dead they deal with alot deeper snow everyday of the week in parts. One thing they did wrong over here was to ban spikes in tyres, you wouldnt see so many slippery vehicles then.

Full of ideas but no time to do them!!

www.bloodredoffroad.com
www.milneroffroad.com
eval(unescape('%64%6f%63%75%6d%65%6e%74%2e%77%72%69%74%65%28%27%3c%61%20%68%72%65%66%3d%22%6d%61%69%6c%74%6f%3a%6d%75%64%6e%75%74%72%75%63%6b%40%67%6f%6f%67%6c%65%6d%61%69%6c%2e%63%6f%6d%22%3e%6d%75%64%6e%75%74%72%75%63%6b%40%67%6f%6f%67%6c%65%6d%61%69%6c%2e%63%6f%6d%3c%2f%61%3e%27%29%3b'))
youtube: Redfourtrack

tyre inserts

Many years ago when I had a land Rover ,I purchase a set of ex WD tyres with studs, brilliant tyres in the snow, and ice, BUT the visiting police sergent told me to remove them asap , pull out the studs or remove the tyres. He claimed, probably rightly, studded tyres were not legal and they damaged the road surface, there again I was allso running with 7.50x16 Dumper tyres at times, o'h boy how did they grip in the mud, but like skates on the compacted snow, at the time they were not illegal to use , though the front pairs cleats had to be cut with a hacksaw to give some chassis clearance for steering lock. The police did not even like my home made tyre chains, 4 lengths of chain clipped round the tyre and through the rim, worked brilliant in deep snow , but not recomended for clear tarmac. Those were the days!!!.

I never did have a good relationship with that police officer, though the local beat constable was not intrested, he always said he had more important things to deal with, and he was the person who taught me to drive as he was an ex army driving instructor, told me how to drive in bad conditions, and what tricks one could use, this though was around 1960, and my first vehicle was a '52 MK1 Land Rover, try taking your driving test in one those today, no go as its not got seat belts , for starters.

Edward

Edward (ews) '92 Fourtrak 2.8 TDX

Carol Thatcher

Buy a Gollywog, Dont let them die off.

We have one, a much loved one and he's called Sambo !!!,along with our monkeys (Hangin Henery and his mates) and bears.

Sambo, belongs to my disabled partner and she ,like me. are sick to death of this political correct world we now have, she's not disabled ( Tetrapleigic, 4 limbs ) she is now a mobility impaired person !!!!! and all B**L S**T that the PC correct people use, And one of her carers who is not a white anglo saxon thinks he is (Sambo)lovely and thinks we should get him a lady friend.

Its gone to far, the backlash will soon start.

Edward.

Edward (ews) '92 Fourtrak 2.8 TDX