Thunderstorm + WRX + Rainx = Fun.

Anyone that knows me, knows I drive a Subaru WRX. I bought this car after bickering with the Honda dealer about a Honda Accord that I wanted. Turns out they couldn’t get the color, or transmission I wanted in the states of Texas, Oklahoma, New Mexico or Louisiana. A friend of mine suggested that I check out the Subaru Impreza, and thus, after one test drive, I bought it. AWD (all wheel drive), 227hp, 0-60 in 5.4sec. Yeah, you know what I’m talking ’bout.

Saturday, during the day, I washed my car like I normally do. I detailed it with my show polish, and then my roommate pulled out the Rainx. He was washing his car as well, and suggested we try it. Now I have had limited success with Rainx back 5-6 years ago, it just really was more trouble than it was worth so I was apprehensive at first. I went ahead and applied 2 coats to my windows, let dry and then buff off. That night we drove to San Antonio and then drove back so I didn’t get a chance to find out if it was worth the effort.

Sunday rolls around and after a long day we start noticing the clouds building. Jason, my roommate calls me outside to look up at the clouds and we see a bunch of circulation, the forming of a funnel cloud and then it dissipated. There were tons of updrafts and we could see these clouds just shooting up several thousand feet. Needless to say, it was going to rain. Quickly turning the weather channel on, my 2nd favorite channel on the TV, we find ourselves in the middle of a buildup of a bunch of powerful cells. The front was upon us.

Thirty minutes later, the sky opened up and let forth a downpour with thunder and lightning that was awe-inspiring. I looked at Jason and said, “I’m going to Wataburger.” He looked at me like I was crazy.

I slipped on my flip flops, grabbed my keys and made a mad dash to the car, pushing the alarm/door lock like a mad man as I became soaking wet in a matter of 15 feet. Reaching the door, I yanked it open and jumped in, sighing relief. A quick survey of my windows, the water was just running right off. A nod, a turn of the key and my engine was revving up to 3000rpm.

For Rainx to really be effective you need to be going 45+ miles per hour, that way the rain goes up the windshield and not down. At 60 + miles per hour the instant the rain hits the window, it rolls right up and gone in less than the blink of the eye. You can hardly tell that water is hitting the window its sheeting off so quickly. I came to the quick opinion that they fixed said issues and now had a product that was worth the effort. Who needs window wipers?

I slide to a stop at the stop sign at the end of my neighborhood. Turn out, hit 75mph or so before the light at Parmer. I take my right, drifting across the road as I did my turn, accelerate to 70mph or so. As I am driving, this red truck pulls up behind me in the slow lane like he is going to pass me. I can’t believe what the guy is doing, he must be crazy driving this fast in this weather! I accelerate to 85mph (yes I truly am crazy). At 85mph, torrential rain, it seems like a lazy Sunday drive. I turn on my mp3 player and put on some jazz.

Going in the opposite direction down Parmer, there is a car in the turn lane wanting to turn across my lane and into an apartment complex. I had already slowed back down to 65 or so, a safer speed, but when I saw this car, I could tell he had other plans so I accelerated a bit, the car turned right behind me and started to drive across traffic. One problem. That truck was still behind me, albeit a little ways back. I looked in my rearview mirror and all I saw was spinning headlights. They had collided. Normally I would have slammed on my brakes, turned around and checked if they were all right, but there were 4 other cars that stopped. I liked driving in the rain, but I don’t like standing out in it.

Continuing down the road, I zipped up to Wataburger, came back uneventful, and I stopped at the accident, emergency vehicles etc, I rolled down my window and told the cop I had seen the accident, and that if he wanted me to give him any info to let me know and I gave him my cell number. He said that 4 other cars had seen it, so it was ok but thanked me for stopping. Continuing on home, I had to laugh. It was typical of Austin traffic. Austin was voted as the worst traffic in this state, and one of the worst traffic for a medium sized city nationally. Turns out the woman that pulled out in front was talking on her cell phone, and doing her makeup at the same time. I laugh because my insurance is probably triple what hers is. Your thinking, “Hey, you were driving dangerously in wet weather.” Yes I was, but 1.) I am from Louisiana, so I am used to driving in the rain. 2.)I had both hands on the wheel and was paying attention 3.) I was taught when driving, always anticipate the worse, thus I saw that car with its blinker on, I assumed she was going to turn in front of me, so I accelerated to get out of the way before she could. 4.) I have the advantage of having a car that was made for extreme driving conditions. All this means, you should not be driving in the rain, it is reserved for crazies like myself that want to find out how well Rainx really works.

Buy it. It will increase your visibility in the rain ten fold and you won’t need your windshield wipers.

Posted in General |

This entry was posted on Monday, October 6th, 2003 at 10:04 am and is filed under General. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.