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Big Bear


bakabakablah

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Just wondering, but has anyone been up to Big Bear City/Big Bear Lake recently? I wanted to know what recent road conditions were like since it seems to vary a lot... 2-3 years ago there was hardly any snow and ice the whole way up and a little bit when we got to the residential areas but last year there was a ton of snow and a CHP checkpoint.

 

Also, does anyone have experience with the Kumho Ecsta ASX in snow? Tirerack says it's somewhat decent so I'm hoping it'll suffice for my three day trip up there and that CHP (if there is a checkpoint) won't give me any problems about not having chains (since we're not supposed to use them on our cars) :spin:

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For socal they should be okay and it has not snowed in a while. They have good price point, but are by no means snow tires. They handle light stuff well but its start to get ugly on ice. Just back from Colorado (2500 miles round trip)with mine brand new put on at Americas Tire (Torrance) the night before I left. Hit some snow in flagstaff and that was a bit sketchy but I made it through with no major problems.
Infamous Tuned
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Hm, good to know. I haven't had any driving experience in the snow with this car yet so I'm feeling a bit nervous about not being able to use chains if my tires aren't up to it (getting a new set of Kumhos tomorrow). I've been keeping an eye on the weather up there and it seems like for the whole two weeks leading up to the trip, temperatures will be in the 50's during the day and at or below freezing at night... which leads me to think that there will probably be ice on the road. I guess I'll have to drive even more slowly than I normally would with a chained-up car :(
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The rest of this week should be fine. To give you an example, I was up there last Wednesday a couple days after the big dump and there was still plenty of ice and snow left on the 18 basically from Snow Valley and on.

 

The CalTrans retard in neon vest told me to show him my chains or turn around so I told him to kiss my snowboard and kept going hahaha! :lol:

 

Seriously though, if you don't have much experience driving in winter condition or don't feel too comfortable doing so, it's best to get chains just to be on the safe side. I made it up there no problem on that day (no sliding and ABS didn't kick in once) but not to toot my own horns that's because I've driven through similar situations on numerous occasions. I however always exercise caution.

 

If you're going to drive in snow/ice w/ those Kumhos the first advise I'll give you is brake EARLY and do so with very light force from the beginning. Imagine how you'd drive in the rain then go even slower than that. Good luck and have a good time. Hit me up if you want to take a few laps together. I'm usually up in the mountains every week! :D

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Haha thanks for the advice. One thing I know I won't do is go too fast.. had a close call with that last year. I was stopped at the bottom of a pretty steep hill and my friend was coming down too fast and his car wouldn't stop even with chains... the only way we managed to not get into an accident was me getting out of the way (at the time I had no idea that he couldn't stop and how close we were to getting into a fairly big accident).

 

In any case, when I get my tires switched out today I'm going to try to see if they have the Continental ContiExtremeContact DWSs in stock and get those if the price difference isn't too much. If not, it looks like I'll have to invest in a couple pairs of chains just in case it's really bad and return them after the trip.

 

At this point it doesn't seem like I'm going to board/ski but if I change my mind, I'll be sure to shoot you a PM before I head up there :D

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I went to Bear during Thanksgiving weekend. CHP had a chain checkpoint and wouldn't let me pass unless I showed my chains... I didn't need to have them on the tires, just need to show that I have it in the car. Also be aware that after crossing the Bear Lake dam, there's some spots that get pretty icy.

 

I'm getting the Continental DWS put on my wagon this weekend. I like that Continental has a 60 day test period on the DWS. If I don't like them then I'll be going back to the RE92.

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