V-Bars are highly recommended by folks who need them a lot. But that is often for driving on roads regularly ice covered etc. For occasional use it might be overkill.
I reccomend V-Bar chains to any one who has never run chains before and is trying to explore unmaintained (fresh snow) for the first time. I learned how to drive in snow with a 1985 Bronco II pushing 6' of snow with my front bumper. My first time out, I was very discouraged using "onroad chains", I looked at the chains that the local loggers were using on thier trucks while in the mountains and bought 2 sets of V-Bars. Next time we had fresh powder, I pushed that 6' of white mess without a problem, jumping through drifts, and burrowing over stumps like it was nothing.
Just an fyi, take your chains off before you hit the hardball (bare pavement).
Toward the end of that winter (97-98) the snow was still coming down hard in the higher elevations, but raining down under the pine tree line. I had a friend who lived in a small 1 room log cabin at the end of the county road and the start of a major FS road. His driveway made a perfect spot to chain up a rig because it was right at the end of pavement and the beginning of the gravel road, and because the snowline hung uphill from his cabin about 20 yards.
Any way on this last fateful trip, I stopped and chained uo as usuall, his wife came out and told me not to be uo there too long because she didn't want to have to go out in the snow and rain to find us. Me and the rest of the "boys" cralled into my Bronco II to spend the afternoon playing in the snow.
After several uneventful hours we turned around and headed home.
The day had been a few degrees warmer on this day than the few days before, and the snow had crept up the side of the mountain a mile or two. All that remained was a stream of molten snow running down the gravel road towards my friends house. In this late afternoon hour, the snow-river froze back over making the gravel beneath hard like asphalt.
I pulled into my buddy's drive, and we all piled into his cabin for hot chocolate and to tell him and his missus about our adventures for the day. We sat around bsing for several hours, the sun went down, and it was getting close to dinner time. So, like the good boys we were, we headed out to unchain the Bronco II.
We got the chains all unhooked so I started her up put her in reverse to get off my chains. But as hard as I tried, all the little Bronco would do is groan. I checked the parking brake, it was free, so I put the girl in 4 low and tried to inch forward. Still nothing but groans from the Old Bronco. I decided to tey backing up agqin, but this time when she started to protest I just gave her more throttle.Just as my right foot pushed the skinny pedal to the floor, there was a loud "SNAP!!!", and the bronco went flying backwards into a ditch as if shot from a slingshot. I put the 5 speed I to 1st gear, (transfercase was still in low range) and tried to drive out of said ditch. All I got was the back wheels to spin frantically while searching for traction. All the while the front tires didnt even budge. I pushed the transfer case up into 4H, with out any change.
Finally my buddy steps outside and tells me he think I broke a front axle. "No", I explained in disbelief. My buddy got into his souped up 69 Ford F250 and pulled me out of the ditch. Then we jacked up the bronco and sure enough the axle had snapped right where the shaft comes out of the lefthand side of the front TTB. We wired up the frunt shaft so it wouldn't fall out on my way down the mountain to my Dad's shop where I traded rigs and took my friends home.
The next day I started tearing down the axle. What I found I couldnt believe. Water inside my front differential. The only explaination we could thinkmof was that my breather hose had gotten water in it while we were out wheeling,
Any way the water inside the diff acted like a locker (becuase the water had froze while we sat inside my buddy's house for so long), and woukdn't let the left axle break free from the right axle
When I gave the rig gas, the front tires had too much traction and were also kind of frozen in the ground. This caused the axle to snap.
Had I unchained when the extra traction wasn't needed and shifted out of 4 wheel drive, I may have never learned how to rebuild a differential.... or at least before my actual mechanic carreerr took off.
