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 Ouze wrote:

Not Online!!! wrote:

 Ouze wrote:
For the last two days it was -25F (-31C) with wind chills of about -50F (-45C) so I worked from home both days (I live about 2 hours from Chicago).

Didn't even try to start my car.

Today it's back to 0F, so I am at my desk :/

Boy, you can complain when you had a whole week of -20C and wind and were forced to go to work, work outside, or worse, were in bootcamp survival week.

-20C is pretty common here during winter. This is actually the first time I ever worked from home due to severe cold: -45C wind is not common here at all. The news kept mentioning 4 minutes outside would require medical attention. Super glad I have an indoor job. My dad was a roofer, and froze every winter and burned every summer.

Hmm wonder is -45 wind different to -50 without wind? Not that long time ago there was news article in local site telling how couple crazy finn in 1998(I think. Or 1999) when there were record colds here went up north and slept outside at -50(think -52.4 was exact). Said worst part was crawling out of sleeping bag! Each had 10kg worth of whatever material they put inside sleeping back(don't recall english term for it).

Me, I hate going outside when it's -25. Good thing that's rare where I live.

There's a lot of states where chains aren't allowed since they chew up the roads really bad. They aren't legal in a lot of states, those that do allow for them are usually places with a lot of annual snowfall or where they have steep mountain roads. I used to live in CA and there were areas chains were allowed only on semi trucks but required removing them once you were out of the mountains which is a giant pain to do. They're super heavy and it takes a lot of time to strap them on or take off.

Legality of snow tires depend on the type, most of the ones with metal studs aren't allowed the ones with rubber nubs you can drive in most places but most people don't use them because of costs and they wear out very fast. They certainly help in a storm but if you like in the midwest or other areas where snow is routine the roads are usually clear again within 24 hours so while there's a lot of snow the roads are clear for the majority of the season. The rubber on snow tires is much softer in order to help with the grip and you're lucky if they last more than a single winter before you need a new set which is costly to maintain. Not only do you need to buy a new set every year you also have to have them mounted and dismounted which means extra trips to the mechanic and more money. If they aren't worn out then you need someplace to store them the rest of the year.

I used to manage a Just Tires and we'd see maybe 3 people total each year with snow tires (out of hundreds) People ride around the rest of the year with almost bald tires without too much of an issue but that first week of snow everyone jumps into panic mode to get new tires because they are stuck spinning their wheels at every intersection. Nobody ever plans ahead enough to get them replaced late Oct or early Nov and the first snow flakes have people freaked out every year.

Here don't think I have ever seen chains in use on standard cars though seems they are legal. Snowtires meanwhile are mandatory in winter time. You try to drive around with summer tires and if you are caught by police you are in for a ticket. And if you crash with those pretty sure your penalty will go noticably higher.

People in US go for mechanics to swap tires? Wonder how unusual I am swapping them myself. Maybe not fair comparison dad install's cars for work so while I'm no mechanic something sticks.

I'm in the Ottawa area and it hasn't gotten as cold as the northern US (thank goodness) but we have been been getting all the snow. about 100cm in January and another 20cm in the last few days. It's gotten so bad that the snowplows are running out of places to put it.