In the mountains, people who are not use to it, will ride the brakes almost all the way down the mountains. I remember seeing a family drive down from a ski resort, their brake lights stayed on the entire time. Eventually smoke started pouring out away from the front wheels ( and of course the awful smell of burned brakes … )

Well what else can you do really?

You put in a lower gear and let the engine do the breaking...

Oh, so is that what the "L" and "2" gears are for? I have never had to use them before...

[quote atom You put in a lower gear and let the engine do the breaking...]

This is a very good thing in some reasons:

- it saves fuel, especially at cars with ignition-system.

- it saves brake-pads

- it doesn't makes the brakes hot (overheated brakes will finally lost their complete power!)

- it cools down the engine. You can really see the temp-needle go down within a few seconds.


I have to drive a long way to work every day, 130 km, mostly on the Autobahn. If there's not much traffic (as usual, when I'm starting at 5.30 in the morning), I really can make the whole tour without using the brake).


A stick-shift-car you can park on flat ground without using the handbrake, the first or rear gear is good enough. I'm living in an area without any hills of mountains, I nearly never use the handbrake for parking.
And this is good! Don't use the handbrake for parking in a garage or on plain ground! Especially not in the winter or at wet weather! And definetely not, if the car stands for a longer time!

At first it's typical girl's driving-style (in my opinion), but the main reason is, that you can be in big trouble, if the handbrake is getting stuck. This can easily happen, when there is rust, salt and/or water on the brakes. How you are able to fix it again? - You aren't! You can call a towing-truck and bring the car to the mechanic.


Using the handbrake while driving is possible to shock or irritate the driver behind you (surely, it must adjusted correct and geometric). I don't like, if the car behind me is too close - a handbrake-use helps to wake him up.


atom, our member from the far North haven't told the way, where a back-wheel-drive-car is much better than a FWD-car: on frozen lakes in Scandinavian winters!. I haven't done it, but a Swedish friend told me, that it's a big fun to slipping around with cars in the deepest winter on frozen lakes. He told me, that the most fun ever he had with his old, rotten Ford Taunus Turnier, much more than with the VW K 70, Jetta or Vento, he had later on.
He invited me to visit him in the next winter with my Opel Omega.

P.S. Using the brake is always destroying and wasting of energy, the energy, the engine has made before. To gear down isn't.

This is so true, especially on older cars like ours, where thinks often get "stuck". For instance, we try not to open the sunroof of the cars becuase it might get "stuck" open, and then you are most certainly screwed, especially went winter comes along. It's the same with the power windows (one of the reasons my father perfers cars with crank windows), if they run slowly or jerkily like some of them do on some of our cars (only just the Van and the Honda), it can get stuck halfway down, and again, you're screwed. I don't think there's an easy way to fix this either, even if you do take it to a mechanic. My father has removed the door panel on the passenger's side door of the Honda (in attempt to lubricate the window for easier sliding) so many times it has become loose when after he fits it back on.

And don't think that this kind of thing happens only to "old" cars either. I have seen many newer cars such as the Ford Focus and Chevrolet Cavalier with plastic wrap on their half-open window to keep the winter cold out after an obvious power window failure. Electric "conveniences" such as this often turn out to be not so "convenient" after all. I miss the old days...

I have only done it once but it is fun as hell!
Last winter there wasn't lot of snow only two weeks or something but every night those two weeks there where crowded of Volvo 740's and 240's at the local supermarket parking, people sliding around in the snow.
This winter I used my Volvo PV and the winter befor that my Kadett B.
Most of those people have a nice summer car but at the winter they buy a cheap 240 or 740 since they are RWD.

Here is some pictures from when we where at that lake:

Change the winter tires for the real thing...

That looks fun, I am jealous
I didn't even know that the 240-series was RWD, that surprises me. Too bad my family doesn't have any RWD cars... well except for the Volkswagens, but I doubt we'd be able to off-roading in them at all

Even the smaller 340/360-Serie (the Dutch ones, orign planned as DAF 77) have RWD. You see one in the middle of the 2nd pic.

Wasn't the 480 the first FWD-Volvo?

About 10 years ago, when me and my friends had our driver's licenses, there still was a small airfield near our home town, leftover by the US Army. In winter the whole area often was coated with ice and snow and it was a great pleasure drifting on it, doing handbrake turns and 360° spins without ruining the tires of our parents cars.


The Mercedes 280E of a friend's dad with almost 200 HP and RWD was always a good choice...


The airfield was a perfect testing area, even in summer. We sometimes borrowed cars from local dealers like this Audi TT.