Some brief thoughts on the Panda Cross when driven on snow.
Well, actually here in the North East we had less extreme conditions than in the South and, due to it warming up and raining last night, here in Sunderland there is no snow at all.
On Sunday evening I drove up to Alston, snow was falling fast but only a dusting had settled on the road. The winter tyres of the Cross, which are a bit narrower than the tyres on the Climbing, performed extremely well and I never felt the car slip once, even though I was keeping up a faster pace than most other road users. The diesel engine was well suited to the conditions as I could often hold a higher gear than in the petrol 4x4 would allow. In general the Cross felt much safer, more stable and solid than the petrol-engined Climbing.
On very wet, sometimes flooded, roads last night the Cross was rock solid and I cruised happily at 70 mph, a speed that most other road users did not feel happpy to attain. However, despite repeated attempts to repair the system, the dreaded 4x4 unavailable warning came on once on a very wet bit of road. It hasn't appeared since, so I'm keeping my fingers crossed.
Oh, and the rear wiper does not always operate as it should. Now this could be a result of my rear-end shunt, as the tailgate was replaced and the wiper motor and its wiring will have been interfered with. I'll have a look at the situation later before I complain either to the bodyshop or the Fiat garage.
Odd how all the London buses were off the road yesterday. I lived down there for years and through some harsh winters but the buses still ran. However, in those days they were sensible, smaller, easier to control buses running on narrower tyres. I refer to vehicles like the single-deck RF and RT and RM double-deckers.
