There's about 6-8 inches of snow in the driveway. no problem. driveway is a little less than a quarter mile. no problem. I'm cruising down it, plowing snow the whole way with my nose. no problem. I slow down towards the end of the driveway against my better judgement. There are huge snow drifts on each side of the driveway where it meets the road so I can't see around it. So I slow down in case someone's coming. There's an area of raised snow in the front of the driveway where the town plows have lovingly deposited snow for my enjoyment. this snow is thick and hard. Like the Ron Jeremy of snow. I could have bashed through it without much of a problem if I wasn;t worried about traffic.
My skidplate is angled such that it acts like a boat prow. it's higher in front than in back. that's just the way it has to be since the engine sits lower in back than the subframe that the skidplate bolts into in front. As a result, when I slowed down at the end of the driveway, I had planed up onto the snow and effectively beached myself. It took me more than an hour to get out. If I had limited slip diffs in front and in the back, it would ahve taken significantly less time. of course if I had FWD or RWD, I'd still be digging my way out.
attempted solutions (Keep in mind I'm 1/4 mile from my house so I don't feel like walking all the way up there again. I'd already been back once to get a shovel):
1) dig out snow from underneath. This failed because of the wonderful "back saver" handle on the shovel. It's bent so you don't have to bend. of course, that means it can't get under the car to pick out the snow that it's resting on
2) put sand/ice melt under the tires. This failed because there wasn't enough weight on the tires that were spinning. if I left it in gear and took my foot off the throttle, the auto-magic of the 4EAT would keep the wheels spinning slowly in their ruts. that's how little weight I had. The sand and ice melt would just get spun through the rut, digging it deeper. yet it would not impregnate the ice with sand since there wasn't enough downforce.
3) Use floor mats for traction. this was actually a good idea. I was kinda proud of myself for this one. I wouldn't have done it in the Impreza, but these were worn, 10-year-old legacy mats. I put them under the wheels that were slipping (well, behind them), so they would pull the mats under them.this way, I'd get about 3/4 inch extra clearance since the mats are thick. also, they have tons of little spikes on the bottom. This would have worked by itself, but the tires were too wet and the cloth on the top of the mats didn't provide enough traction to draw the mats under the tires.
4) use the fire extinguisher. it only costed 10 bucks, right? I sprayed the tire and mat with the extingusher. It's a BC type so it's just powder. That dessicated both objects enough that the tire gripped the mat, and I was able to back up.
Yay. now I'm just need a new set of rear mats and a new fire extingusher. and it's only 9:30 and I'm spent. happy tuesday, everyone
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