[s-cars] Altimax again, S-car in single digits (& aero blade wipers?)

[LL - NY]

I got the Michelin Aeros as the rebate was too good to pass up. FWIW, unless
it's on sale, I'm going to stick by Bosch MicroEdge. Can't beat them for the
price. I'd say about the only good things about the Michelin Aero's over the
MicroEdge:

1.  No frame means nothing to ice up. Sort of like having winter blades
without the effort.

2. On the Saabaru, there is not interference (unlike MicroEdge) if you
foolishly pick up the driver's side wiper before the passenger side wiper
when trying to clean the windshield.

Disadvantage:

1. You can't flip the wiper all the way around if you don't want the blade
against the glass (to prevent freeze-up) but you don't want the attention of
wiper arms sticking straight up off of the windshield, like when parking in
a public place when you just *know* it's going to ice and snow while you're
gone.

Yes, I *hate* scraping *that *much!!!

LL - NY

On Tue, Dec 29, 2009 at 9:10 PM, JC <jc at j2c3.com> wrote:

> Just back from 6 days in Vermont & Quebec running in lots of slippery snow
> &
> ice, Altimax still get full marks.  For real ice OK you want them studded,
> but I can only believe they'd be great - very Hakkapelitta flashback.
>
> And we remain amazed at the 187k mi S-car battlewagon's willingness to be
> completely dependable at its abused and infirmed age.  Fired up in single
> digit Farenheit temps in Montreal darkness this morning, and ran all day at
> said temps with no complaints or hiccups, just hitting home an hour or so
> ago.  (note I was not willing to post this until I was safe at home... Audi
> gods must be respected...)
>
> Even took a firm hit to the transom from a renegade Kia sliding on black
> ice
> with no major damage (poor Vermonter was looking at the Audi thinkin' "this
> Massh0le guy's gonna be pissed and that damn german car looks expensive to
> fix!!", completely thrilled when I said "ahh couple scrapes, nuthing that
> won't buff out on this old beater..." and drove away).
>
> The oil temp gauge did run colder than I've ever seen it, but the water
> temps were the usual Audi rock-solid... had a momentary thought about doing
> the trucker-trick and stuffin a piece of cardboard up in front of the oil
> cooler but wife wouldn't have probably endorsed me rolling around in the
> sand and salt on the cobblestones in 4 degrees this morning...
>
> Change of topic - I'm guessing I'm out of the loop on this one, but what is
> the collective wisdom on these new pricey aero blade wipers? I am trying a
> set of Michelins and found:
> - Not suitable for passenger side, due to too much window curvature,
> doesn't
> wipe well at the far end... Hence currently I'm running a 'regular' blade
> on
> passenger side and auditioning an aero on drivers.
> - Driver side is pretty great at warm temps and low speeds, but seems to
> develop a 'dead spot' in the middle of the blade at high speed & cold
> temps.
> Also a small dead area at on tip like the passenger but less
> noticable/important.
>
> I'm wondering if this is endemic to the breed or if brand is an issue -
> I've
> always done OK with Bosch so am wondering if their version would be more
> successful and was the Michelin a bad idea....  Any BTDT?
>
>
>
>
> John J. Cunningham
>  <mailto:jc at j2c3.com> jc at j2c3.com
> US Mobile +1 (617) 750-5025
> China Mobile: +86 (0) 136 6080 9560
>
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