A front-wheel drive car has 60 percent of its weight placed over the front tires, creating more traction during acceleration. But any car can experience loss of traction in other situations, such as cornering. The reasons for loss of traction vary, but there are steps you can take to reduce slippage while driving.
Tires with worn tread cannot efficiently squeeze water and snow away between the rubber and road surface, resulting in poor traction. Your vehicle's tires begin to lose their grip once the tread wears to the halfway point. As the tread wears beyond this point, your car's traction becomes progressively worse.
Having your vehicle's suspension checked may eliminate understeering traction problems during cornering. Understeering is the result of too much weight transfer to the outside rear tire when cornering, thus causing the outside front tire to lose its grip on the road.
Ensuring that the traction-control function of your vehicle is activated and monitoring your front-drive wheels will reduce tire slippage. This electronic system will sense when one wheel is spinning and apply brake pressure to allow the tire to regain traction. Some traction-control designs may slow the engine or incorporate the transmission to slow the slipping tire.
