What transfer case setting are you using for driving in heavy snow? I have not put the Cayenne into off road mode yet. Is off road mode the best for heavy snow? How fast can you drive in off road mode? I cannot find any information about speed in the owner's manual.

 

Depends on the model Cayenne, we have a diesel with PASM and air suspension. Porsche neutered the CD, only the center differential locks on the diesel model. Took ours off road in the snow yesterday. Used hill control with the center diff locked as gravity is not your friend going down a snow covered hill. Kept up with the Rubicon except when the snow got to deep for the Cayenne. Yes the stock Cayenne went down like a Denver Bronco to the stock Rubicon when it came to ground clearance. Note that we set the speed limit warning to 18mph as it will kick out of "off-road" mode at 19mph. The cruise control only works above 20 mph. Very frustrating to constantly reset.

 

My Cayenne GTS can raise the ride height to Special Terrain. I think it's about 2.25 inches above normal. The Diesel doesn't do that?

 

We have air suspension that was set to the highest level #2. Going slow in the highest setting we were not able to go as far thru the snow as the stock Rubicon. It had to winch us back to traction even after the Rubicon we were following had cleared a path for us.

Believe the computer got confused when all four wheels lost traction. It expressed its displeasure with some unkind dash displays.

For some reason Porsche deleted, not even available as an option in the USA, the locking diffs on the diesel. The central off-pavement switch on other Cayenne's have three settings, the diesel has only one. Low range gearing for off road is not available on the diesel. Also not available on the USA Cayenne diesel are Porsche Dynamic Chassis Control and Porsche Torque Vectoring Plus. These would be a big help in off road conditions which Cayenne's are advertised as being capable of.

Good news is that the diesel engine did not have any issues starting or running with an outside temp of minus 5 degrees F. We had added a can of fuel anti-gel prior to it getting cold.

 

In my Rubicon, I look for the biggest piles of snow to play in. 3.5" lift, big knobby mud tires, I have a blast.

 

We had a big 4-day snow & ice storm here in Portland this weekend. Only about 6-8 inches, so clearance was not a problem. The Portland area is very hilly, so it's not unusual when this happens to see cars slide sideways down big hills and smash into all the other cars stacked up at the bottom of the hill.

But I was surprised, even with snow tires, that when all four wheels were losing traction when climbing a big, steep 16% grade hill that the computer did seem to get confused.

Actually, maybe it didn't. Pedal was floored but RPMs never went above maybe 2500 - 3500 RPMs. I actually thought it was going to stall. The ABS light on the dash was flashing like crazy. I was tempted to stop & hit the brakes so I could turn it off, but the car just kept steadily climbing up through the snow & ice.The wheels spun every once in awhile and only a little before the computer shut that wheel down and I sawed my way up the hill at about 6-8 MPH, easily avoiding the couple of cars that were sideways & backwards on the side of the street.

The more I thought about it, I was really impressed. Seemed like it was Hill Descent Control in reverse.