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Lessons you will learn living in a snowy place

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Re: Lessons you will learn living in a snowy place

#141

Post by bradfa »

Tor3 wrote: post #96
dboreham wrote: post #83

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Perhaps it's an AI generated article. A real human would have realized quite quickly that you can put snow into the tank of a toilet when the power is out.

This is about _tankless_ toilets. They only work with electricity-powered flush pumps. That's why the author wrote about having to physically dump water into the toilet to flush it. For our new home we're making we have two toilets (always practical). One of them is tankless, but we made sure the second one is a traditional cistern toilet with no electrical requirements. Just in case.

Most well pumps are electric powered. The holding tank will give you a very small amount of water that’s in it if it’s up high but after that without electricity it won’t refill.

In the USA most residential toilets are tank type and don’t directly use electricity.

Re: Lessons you will learn living in a snowy place

#142

Post by matttproud »

kalleboo wrote: post #128
dlcarrier wrote: post #78

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I wonder if it's a carryover of an old regulation that used to make sense. Modern all-season tires are better in snow than the best winter tires were several decades ago. Also, you need studs or chains to get traction on ice. The difference between a winter tire and a summer tire is the temperature range where the rubber stays flexible. When the rubber gets hard, it will keep its shape instead of complying with the s…

Nordic studless winter tires (different from Central European winter tires so also probably different from whatever you get in the US) do give some grip on ice, while all-seasons can be nearly as bad as summer tires. https://link.springer.com/chapter/10.1007/978-3-031-66968-2_... The government has done ongoing research on these subjects and the regulations do get renewed (e.g. some properly rated all-seasons are now…

Piggdekk in Norway are equivalent to North American studded tires. When I lived in the northern parts of the U.S., I had a set of these for times around freezing rains.

Beyond the questions of winter weather properties, there are adjacent tradeoffs between the tire types (outside of studded):

1. Fuel economy

2. Noise

3. Degree of particulate pollution emission

I'm sure that the all-season tires probably have some negative tradeoffs in these regards to, which yields a choose the most optimal product for the time of year. All-season tires to me seem like a convenience food for places where the weather can be legitimately bad.

One other difference that is hard to articulate to North American drivers with respect to understanding Scandinavia and roads: there are places where snow and ice will literally not be removed (maybe not even removeable) from the road when plowed (I presume until spring melt). It just becomes a thick ice pack over the course of weeks. I never encountered any roads in my life (including Northern Minnesota) that were this inclement. North American roads tend to be cleared (plowing or melting) to asphalt or pavement.

Re: Lessons you will learn living in a snowy place

#143

Post by dlcarrier »

jjav wrote: post #134
dlcarrier wrote: post #59

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm in the foothills in Northern California, and I've never met anyone here that changes their ties out for winter. When there's chain controls, they'll let you through if you have winter rated tires, including all-season, and all-wheel drive, otherwise you need chains. Everyone I know who drives a lot in the snow gets a vehicle with all-wheel drive and everyone else carries chains. (really they're cables, on a small…

> The difference between what winter-only tires can handle vs winter-rated all-season tires is so minimal that they're not with getting. Yeah.. no. The difference is night and day. Put on some Nokian Hakkapeliitta tires and prepare to be amazed. The grip on snow is spectacular. All the years I lived in snow areas I drove a Miata of all things.. RWD, light, no ABS, no TC, 4" clearance. But with Hakkapeliitta tires I n…

The difference between two-wheel and all-wheel drive is night and day, compared to the difference between winter and summer tires. Even then, it all goes out the door when conditions get icy and the only option is studs or chains, to get any traction.

Chain controls, and really all winter regulations, like snow load factors in buildings and whatnot, are created locally, not by the state. Most politicians are from Southern California, and all the state cares about is air condition efficiency and water usage, as though everyone lives in the desert.

Re: Lessons you will learn living in a snowy place

#144

Post by nxtbl »

degosuke wrote: post #84
computerdork wrote: post #23

Moved a year ago from California to northern Michigan. To add to this list, specifically regarding "Do NOT get wet and cold": o If you're walking out in the cold, have many different ways to keep your feet and your hands warm, because usually, you'll have a good-enough coat and winter-pants that'll keep your core relatively warm, but it's the very ends of your extremities that get cold (just got a small amount of fro…

Any recommendations about the boots? Or what to check for?

There are many brands making proper shoes/boots for winter hiking. I would recommend taking a look at Haix, Lowa, Salomon Quest series, Lundhags and Meindl.

Re: Lessons you will learn living in a snowy place

#145

Post by dlcarrier »

kalleboo wrote: post #128
dlcarrier wrote: post #78

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I wonder if it's a carryover of an old regulation that used to make sense. Modern all-season tires are better in snow than the best winter tires were several decades ago. Also, you need studs or chains to get traction on ice. The difference between a winter tire and a summer tire is the temperature range where the rubber stays flexible. When the rubber gets hard, it will keep its shape instead of complying with the s…

Nordic studless winter tires (different from Central European winter tires so also probably different from whatever you get in the US) do give some grip on ice, while all-seasons can be nearly as bad as summer tires. https://link.springer.com/chapter/10.1007/978-3-031-66968-2_... The government has done ongoing research on these subjects and the regulations do get renewed (e.g. some properly rated all-seasons are now…

I've also seen snow tires perform worse than all-season tires, e.g: https://www.tyrereviews.com/Tyre/Michelin/CrossClimate-2.htm vs https://www.tyrereviews.com/Tyre/Barum/Polaris-5.htm

If tires complying with the standards overlap, then the standards are meaningless. When there's requirements for snow tires, but not for X brand or model of snow tire, than it's not doing any good. That's why it's important to have a snow rating that can apply to tires of any type, and if it meets that rating, regardless of the rating for dry warm weather, than it should be good to go, otherwise not.

Re: Lessons you will learn living in a snowy place

#146

Post by theothertimcook »

silcoon wrote: post #114
yokoprime wrote: post #25

> In the first really heavy winter storm of the year, your power might go off. This is understandable Having lived in Norway most of my 40+ years on this earth, I can with some confidence say that this is not an universal truth. I don’t think I’ve experienced any power interruption of over 1 hour in winter ever, and it’s been at least 5 years since the last time. Yes it snows here. A lot.

I lived in Australia in Far North Queensland until last year and power was running out every heavy rain. The point is that in that region there are only two seasons: a short dry season and a long wet one. So everyone expects multiple power off a year and every household has generators and stock of fuel and matches for emergency. Locals have a “it’s gonna be fine” attitude against a poor (but expensive) infrastructure…

"she'll be right" =/= "it's gonna be fine"

More of a it's not going to be fine but we will deal with it.

1000+KMs away in/not far from the capital city of Queensland it's not unheard of to have a multi-day power outage after a severe storm.

Considering QLD is almost 6x the size of Norway it's not actually that bad.

Re: Lessons you will learn living in a snowy place

#147

Post by dlcarrier »

matttproud wrote: post #142
kalleboo wrote: post #128

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Nordic studless winter tires (different from Central European winter tires so also probably different from whatever you get in the US) do give some grip on ice, while all-seasons can be nearly as bad as summer tires. https://link.springer.com/chapter/10.1007/978-3-031-66968-2_... The government has done ongoing research on these subjects and the regulations do get renewed (e.g. some properly rated all-seasons are now…

Piggdekk in Norway are equivalent to North American studded tires. When I lived in the northern parts of the U.S., I had a set of these for times around freezing rains. Beyond the questions of winter weather properties, there are adjacent tradeoffs between the tire types (outside of studded): 1. Fuel economy 2. Noise 3. Degree of particulate pollution emission I'm sure that the all-season tires probably have some neg…

All-season tires aren't simply a matter of convenience, they offer a safety benefit. If you aren't driving at normal highway speeds, even if it's the dead of winter and the air is below freezing, your tires will heat up and the winter tires won't have as much traction. The disadvantage on dry roads can be several times what the advantage was on contaminated roads, including during the winter.

Re: Lessons you will learn living in a snowy place

#148

Post by euroderf »

> If the power’s been off for a while, like, over 24 hours, and then suddenly it comes back on for a few minutes, and then it immediately goes out again

This is probably because the average idiot neglects to unplug motors (refrigerator, and other inductive loads), bringing down the network again, entirely unnecessarily.

Re: Lessons you will learn living in a snowy place

#149

Post by ChrisMarshallNY »

ansgri wrote: post #125
throwaway290 wrote: post #112

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Even in deep Russia I don't think "power goes out with first winter storm" is a thing. and I thought russian infra sucked... That said I remember power could go out from a lightning storm or without any reason. But pretty rarely

Russian infra doesn’t suck that much, I guess it was overbuilt in soviet times. Armenian, on the oner hand… But they’re “societally prepared” in the sense that repairs are quick usually, and there are even some upgrades recently.

I had a Russian friend tell me that the Soviet mindset was to overbuild.

He said they tended to build “two of everything,” which is why there’s so many sets of two.

If one craps out, the second can be used in its place, or scavenged for parts.

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