Is anyone else having troubles with snow/ice collecting in the rear wheel wells? I spent (seriously) about an hour in a heated garage with a hot water hose blasting out all the ice. It built up so much that the struts could barely work. The wheels had about an inch of travel before they impacted the ice in the top of the wheel well. The inner liner of the rear wheel well is a fuzzy material that helps any slush and snow adhere to it.

I usually wash my car once or twice a week. Put a few bucks in and try to spray the ice off as much as possible in the wheel wells. The cold water at the coin op doesn't seem to be up to the task.

Has anyone come up with a way to prevent this build-up from happening? Or am I going to have to make a weekly trip to the garage for the hot water treatment?

CM.

 

The only sure cure for that is to move south ...

(I know, I know, nobody likes a smartass. )

Mike

 

Remove all the snow and try to spray pam or some other paint "safe" no stick coating it should work for a little while.

 

Mmmmmm, and its butter flavoured too. Tasty.

 

I live in Omaha, so I definately can feel your pain. I dont think I had quite as much snow & ice built up underneath the car, but I had enough built up that it was causing a crazy vibration in the wheel when the car got up to about 40+ mph. I dont know about the Pam thing (I guess its worth a try), but I would suggest just taking it over to a self-car wash place & spray out the wheel wells real good ocassionally.

 

I did that a couple times a week for most of the winter. I was really suprised when I went in there with a flashlight and saw it was solid all the way up into the strut towers in the rear.

Now that I have access to a heated garage with a unlimited free hot water its not so bad. But still going in every week to mess around with that isn't what I call fun. Upside is that I can keep it showroom clean all winter long now.

CM.

 

I feel your pain brother. I had a similar experience earlier in the winter when we had snow (if I can get there by 7:30am before they are full on snow days).

I also had the ice and slush from the highway build up on the inside of the rims. I got a real nice butt massage over 100kph when that happened.

I'm not sure, but I think my rear wheel wells are sagging from the experience.

 

This problem was reported by another Canadian poster last November(?).

It seems Nissan found that putting fuzzy material inside the rear wheel well cut down the road noise level in the cabin. That makes sense, as the cabin (and trunk, which is not 'sound-proofed' from the cabin) are adjacent to the rear wheel well.

The fuzz make a wonderful place for the ice to begin sticking. Once the sticking begins, it only continues to build.

If I lived in the frozen north, I would be sorely tempted to find a way to remove the fuzz and endure the slightly increased road noise. Maybe flatten the fuzz with several coats of thick paint or something; just so the fibers won't be sticking out where ice can form around them, maybe.

But don't take this rash action until you have explored other less-drastic possibilities.

 

I've also had snow build up problems with my rear wheels.. at one point, every trip from home <-> work I had to dig out the ice scraper and break the ice from the wheel and the body. It's amazing how easily the snow is able to fill the gap, and then freeze together like that...