Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Hunter's Campfire 2wd Pickups outnumber 4wd pickups about 4:1 down here.

I'm guessing that the further north you get the more 4wd you see....... depending on the annual snowfall amounts. I seem to recall seeing more 2 wheel drive stuff in the southern U.S.. I've been driving nothing but 4wd Tacomas , ( 2 different ones ), since November 1996. Got sick of a 2wd truck in winter, and with annual ritual of getting a couple hundred pounds in the bed over the rear axle to help with traction.

Probably not much need for 4WD down there unless out swampin'.

Just back from Maui. Good Lord there are a lot of 4WD there! Why? I bet most of them never get off pavement. And there isn' a helluva lot of places one can! Obviously some sort of macho status symbol. Never saw a dirty one either. We drove a Red Mustang Convertable. For the last damned time! Scary! And hard to get into/out of.

46 and raining in Anchorage when we arrived. Wet roads/ rain on ice in places on the 150 mile drive home last night. Slush on ice in the passes. Reduced speed in 4WD with 300 lbs of sand in the back and studded tires on the wife's EL Expedition got us here - no problem!

Would have been a bit hairy with the Ram 3500 4WD, as I'm not running studs. Or much weight in the back as yet- using it for hauling stuff...

As Hot Rod alluded too, the proper way to utilize 4WD (for most of us) is to get you out of the off-road trouble 2WD got you into - not to get you in deeper, farther, before the SHTF! Boat ramps, slick hills, snow, etc.

If FWD is that great what's with the chains?

Ice is ice! TWD, AWD, FWD if you a sliding on ice you are sliding period. Chains are what gives you the traction not the type of drive. as for no weight putting sand bags in the bed is no big deal and will get you what you need. FWD has a place, but Ice isn't one of them!

I can get my TWD into about 95% of the places I hunt just fine. Add chains and I can get to 99% of the places I hunt. the remaining 1% at times even FWD you still need chains and winch.

Cost of FWD, fuel, maintenance over the life of a truck isn't worth it in the big picture. I have both FWD and TWD, I drive the TWD a hell of a lot more than the FWD. Smoother ride, less noise, less gas, and if I really need FWD its in the driveway.

We've never owned a 2wd truck. I'd rather have a car. I don't need 4wd often, but when I do need it......I REALLY need it.

Ice is ice for sure........ So is anything that won't allow much traction. That's why some inexperienced clowns get stuck because they think 4wd can go anywhere. That's when they discover that they can sit there stuck and spin all four wheels at once instead of just two. I don't use the 4wd on my Tacoma all that much but when I do it's worth its weight in gold. Have navigated some deep unplowed snow with both my 97 and 09 Tacomas with no problem in depths that I would never even think of with my old 2wd trucks no matter how much weight I had in the bed.

I carry approx 450 lbs of sand bags in the bed of my truck during winter, been doing that forever. While I try to drive around in 2 wd most of the time, I can’t count how many times I’ve not been able to even get going forward from a stop in 2wd without flipping it into 4wd. [bleep] I wouldn’t even have made it to the house today if all I had was 2 wd, had 3-4 “ of snow yesterday then it turned to slush , then it froze solid last night with temps in the teens. Whole neighborhood was solid ice ruts of frozen slush. Unless you live in the Southern Hemisphere and don’t own a boat I can see owning a 2wd but anywhere else no way I’d buy a 2wd.

I am beginning to believe Flave's assessment of Texans..... 2wd and truck do not go together .... good grief

I have not been without a 4WD pickup since 1977.

not many 2wd trucks in my parts......

here's the wife's '05 Taco with new wheels & tires.....

Goodyear Ultra Terrains LT 265-75x16's

Ready for another heavy snow winter......DTD my tire store

Both my kids drive 4wd trucks. I've tried to beat the fact into their heads that although a 4wd will go virtually anywhere, they are fitted with the exact same brakes as the non 4wd models. Leave plenty of room for stopping!

Chain the front of a 4wd and see just how good they are on ice.

I've never owned a 4WD.

Like Dad always said, it just lets you get stuck further from the road.

Pay attention to what you're doing, drive with some sense, and some extra weight in the bed, and you'll do fine most of the time.

Of course, we rarely get snow here, and very little of it most of the time, so it's not needed. The most snow I've seen here is 24" at one time, and I didn't need to go anywhere anyway, for a couple of days. Good tires and common sense can do more than 4WD, if you're not stupid.

Just did an inventory on our short street. 10 trucks all 4x4
A 4x4 option isn't much money % wise, wait for the sales and they'll usually throw it in.
Plus 4x4s aren't maintenance heavy hard riding noisy pigs like they were 30 years ago. That's part of the reason you see 4x4s in the city that never leave the pavement I would think.

I remember seeing a cartoon in a hunting magazine in the 1970's that showed two hunters stuck in the wilderness in their 4x4 pick-up. the caption said

"The way I look at it, 4WD just allows you to get stuck in a more inaccessible area"

Drove a 2WD Chevy C10 around rural NE PA for 4 years. Only had to steal pallets from the feed mill one time to get enough weight to make it up the hill to my house. As said above, good tires, and some common sense goes a long way in 2WD.

Having said that, have had 4WD here on the farm in KY for the past 26 years. Would not be without it. Considering putting a 1/4" diamond plate "bed liner" in the back of the 3/4 ton Dodge to have the extra weight without having to load it in and out, and without taking up bed space....

Common sense applies.....


I've probably used 4WD about 20-30 times in the last week.

Snow on top of greasy mud on level ground will you leave spinning in 2WD.






Dan, just a quick count of our street as well.

8 homes.


13 4x4 pickups.

6 AWD SUV's.

1 car but it's an old classic that rarely gets driven.

I was pulling my home made snow plow, The Snowminator. As I said, my driveway is 3/4 mile long, gravel and steep, you can't run it with 2WD in the summer, without trashing up the gravel. In the winter forget it without 4WD. Plus in a week I will be putting on studded snow tires for the winter. Studded tires rule on the ice, with 4WD. If the snow is 12 inches deep, then you need chains and the studded tires.

As for smoother ride and less noise, I don't know what you mean. My new truck is a red 2010 Frontier, 4WD of course. I just took the girlfriend on a 5,000 mile trip to Yellowstone in that truck and she couldn't get over how quiet and smooth the ride was, and how comfortable the seats. She owns a Lexus and an Acura and she says the ride in the Frontier is as good, or better than her cars.

Similar deal here Sam, one guys got a 71 Mustang another's got a 2 seater Beamer, one Mercedes sedan neither of these driven hardly. The balance would be about 8 awd SUVs.

Edit- Actually I forgot about Johnny 9 car down on the corner he's got a 2 wd T bird, about 5 vans, a Volkswagen a few others behind his fence since bi-law got after him that may be 2 wd. I don't consider them on the road though, more on the road to the crusher one of these days. LOL

2WD's do just fine in the snow..All our city plow trucks are 2WD-DRW 1-tons..

I would not own a truck that was not 4x4.