The winter months are coming, which means you’ll wake up to find your driveway and your car covered in snow. There are plenty of ways to prevent snow from building up, such as salting the driveway. Or you can spend the day shoveling the snow. But is it a smart idea to attach a snow plow to your car so you don’t have to shovel the driveway?

Should you put a snow plow on your car?

If you have a long driveway, attaching a snow plow to your car to clear the path is a great idea. Not only does it save you a day’s worth of work shoveling the driveway in the cold, but you can get out of the house at a moment’s notice. And if you’re worried about the plow damaging your car, don’t be. Most cars should be more than capable of pushing snow out of the way.

An article from JaysPower suggests that, in order to plow a few inches of snow, you need at least 20 horsepower and a strong automatic transmission. So unless you’re driving a BMW Isetta, you should be just fine. However, chances are your car doesn’t have a front hitch like some trucks or SUVs do. So you’ll need a universal snow plow.

Where can you buy a universal snowplow?

You can purchase your own universal snow plow from Nordic Plow that’ll simply strap to your car, no hitches required. It’s also lightweight, weighing in at just 58 lbs. The one drawback to this fancy plow is the $399 price tag. For that, you could buy a couple of hundred snow shovels or a decent snowblower.

However, if an old Chrysler minivan can plow a couple of inches of snow, then your car can too. But there are some implied limitations to this personal snow plow. For example, you probably shouldn’t take this car to plow out on the streets.

Should you use a universal car snow plow on public roads?

While you may feel confident in the universal snow plow’s ability to clear snow, you should stick to using it on your driveways. For starters, while the plow is durable, it’s likely not built for constantly plowing snow at high speeds. Nor is your car built to plow snow for long periods of time.

It’s not that the car can’t, but that it isn’t heavy enough to dig into the snow. Snow plows are often strapped to trucks, which can force snow out of the way in greater quantities. On top of that, those trucks have specially designed hitches to make sure the plow doesn’t move or shift while in motion.

Yes, a universal car snow plow is excellent to have for your long driveway, and maybe to help out the neighbors so they don’t have to shovel their driveway either. But stick to personal use, and let the professionals handle the heavy snow removal this winter.