Icedriving...where/who?

[David van Eyk]

Ok, here is a question for the nordic boys.
A small group of petrolheads are looking for a nice place to
do and try some icedriving...// drifting
Do you have any adresses or links what we can check out? Sweden/Finland etc?
Do you have some experiences with some companies?
Found some of the big names via google, but for sure there must be some local known places.

So shoot, give me some names/tips

greetings,
david

[Anders]

Hi David!

I assume it is during your trip to Lofsdalen you will want to have a go at some driving on ice/snow, right?

I will try and search some Swedish language forums for this, and maybe I can dig something up.

Let me just tell you a few things about winter activities on wheels here:

The problem with sliding and drifting on a relatively safe, flat, and big place is that any such place is always somebody's place, not just a general place. If you try doing this in say a parking lot or something similar, it will not be very long until people, or the land owner will get irritated and send in the police to stop such activities.

When some people make a sort of track or use a snow plow to make an area to "play around" in, in a more serious way, it is almost always a car club or an official activity where you need to be a club member. For instance, not far from where I live there is a huge old airfield that would be useful to try on, but that is always closed (for good reasons). When it is open, it is most likely the Porsche Club of Sweden running a club-competition there. You can't access if you are not a member (and own a Porsche obviously).

Some Audi clubs do make tracks for manouvering and sliding techniques, but I don't know where and when. I will have a look at that.

Sometimes people also take away the snow from areas of a frozen lake to drive on. I've seen that. But again, it's often closed curcuit racing or club membership required. The reason for that is because otherwise people from everywhere would come there and race. Personally I would NEVER run my Plus on a lake, regardless of the below-zero temperature.

Also, I am interested to know what winter tyres you are using for your december trip? Maybe you answered that in another post? I will have a look.

Cheers!

Regards,

Anders

[David van Eyk]

Anders,
i asked this question for some guys I know. they organize official
driftdays and trackdays in Holland, germany and Belgium.
Now they asked me (with my sweden expierence... been there a lot of times. got allready 8 years a swedisch girlfriend.. drove some big km´s in all kind of weather over there... also some frozen lakes..)

so they checked out allready some companies like: John Haugland in Norway, vatannen in Finland, further Prodrive, 333events etc..

But there should also be some swedisch options..
Just need some adresses I can pass through

The guys I talk about are not some "beginners"... so they take it seriously..(it allready a long drive from Holland for just an event)
Cars: Evo´s, M3´s...etc

And maybe it´s not even a bad thing that they combine it with some local clubs.
greetings,
david

[David van Eyk]

by the way, now i got 225 wintertires on it(the highspeed editions for Germany---autobahn), but in sweden i got some S2 rims 16" with some Spikes... for they really bad days...They are forbidden here in Holland
Normally I´m in the area of Gotenburg/Boras, Bollebygd.. and thats often clean to drive..
But if you go into the forrests.. ...quattro is the thing

www.driftdays.nl
these guys want to go overseas...

[Anders]

This is me and my dad on our way to our summer house - except this was during winter.



His car is a V6 Passat Variant with 4Motion system (same as quattro on this car)

It's actually a road, but the trees hang so low from all the snow.

/a.

[David van Eyk]

this will be the idea:
plane to a place-city, taxi or bus to village with icedrift scholl /club or so.. with some rental/club cars

just give some shots! bottle of nice liquer for the winning place!

[Marc Welsch]

Personally I would NEVER run my Plus on a lake, regardless of the below-zero temperature.

Why not? I think it's not really dangerous for the car, if you are the only one...

[Anders]

Uhm... Marc I'm not exactly talking about the risk of running into anybody else or sliding hard into any obstacle, or another car.

I'm not aware of the temperatures in Sylt this season, but being south of Denmark I suspect it's seldom that lakes freeze fully there, right?

What I am talking about is bringing out 1840 kg of Audi on basically.. frozen water.

No way José. We all know that (or if some don't, I'll say it here) lakes sometimes do not fully freeze during winter. Some days of good wheather is sometimes enough to bring not-so good parts of an otherwise frozen sea to become what it once used to be: water. Cars don't float. Catch my drift?

In Sweden there's even a law (yeah I think they made it a law thses days) to wear spikes with wooden handles around your neck if you are about to go out on a frozen lake, regardless of what day or temperature it is. (spikes are used to pull yourself out of a hole in the ice if you go through, otherwise you simply die in there if there's nobody else around)

So, in essence, what I mean is that even though I find enough seconds enough to get out of the car myself if the accident is there, I will lose some 200.000 swedish money of beloved Plus.

That's why.

/a.

[Marc Welsch]

Ok, if I would go on ice with my car, it must be sure, that it is thick enough. Of course that's not possible down here, but in the north of Sweden or Finland are alot of car companies, which are testing their cars on frozen lakes.

I think, if Porsche, or Audi are going on to ice, it should be safe enough...

[Anders]

He He, yes Marc, that's probably correct.
It's just me being a bit over-cautious.

I've had a friend going through the ice once (not in a car) so I'm full of respect to lakes even though they seem frozen enough. Maybe that's why.

Regards,

/a.

[Marc Welsch]

In the north of Russia and Canada they have motorways on frozen rivers at winter! Over their, that´s the only chance and the only time of the year to reach some points. If ice of a frozen river is hard enough for a 38t-truck, it should work with our cars as well...

[Mathias Kremer]

For a car, 40-50cm Thickness of ice is ok, a truck needs a little bit more. Tested it myself once with my old M5 (E28) in St. Moritz many years ago. Cost me on foglight and a lot of self confidense

Greets
Mathias

[Anders]

BMW M-fünf on ice.....

Not exactly the ideal combination.

/a.

[Robert]

10-15 cm of good ice will support a car, even if I would not trust it (you never know with ice)

Swedish Ice Roads can be down to 20 cm thick and are then granted for vehicles up to 2000 kg. 50 cm is actually granted for 12000 kg.

[SilverP]

Where I come from we usually start raceing and drifting activities on lakes when ice is 18-20 cm thick. This year we had a law come into power that says you must ask for permission to drive on frozen lakes or etc. from the local government. If they say its OK then ANYBODY can come and try on a permitted lake. Our local Audiclub also organizes trackdays quite often in wintertime... If you are close to Estonia or planning something visit www.audiclub.ee or give me a call +3725295728 Silver