Winter specific tires for cars, do don't why which ?

[Launch Mini]

I used to think All Seasons were great, until I got a set of winter tires.
Around here, we only get to freezing a few days a year, so in the winter we are just above freezing with rain most of the time. Then when it does snow, it quickly turns to slush/ice for a few days.
I have made it a winter on summer tires, made it many winters on all seasons, then I got a high powered car ( rear wheel drive) and a proper set of winter tires.
What a difference they made, so much I got my wife a set for her front wheel drive car.

When the temp drops below 7C, the all seasons do get harder, and noticably less traction as a result. The good winter tires stay soft, disperse the rain, slush & snow very nicely, and BRAKING is much much better. Comparing same cars from all season to winter.
I have been paying attention, and temps are starting to drop ( lows are 3C, Highs still in the 15ish area), and I can feel my traction changing. It won't be long until I swap them over.

Now, on our all wheel drive vehicle, I did go with an all season that is winter rated. Not M&S, but true winter rated. These things kick arse too. Obviously not as good as true winters, but much better than 'regular" all seasons that do not have the Mountain Snowflake symbol.

Remember, the only thing between you, your car & the road is the rubber, don't skimp. IMO
If you live in SoCal, all seasons will be fine.

 

[Empath]

Many posts, by two members, were removed as a means of civility control, rule 4 violation, and failure to adhere to a moderator's admonition.

If either of the two of you contribute any additional posts to this thread, please consider his words:

Easy here guys. Let's try and avoid statements that others might consider "offensive", and likewise, let's not be overly offended by statements by others. Lot's of different opinions here, so let's respect each others opinions.

Bill

 

[ShineOnYouCrazyDiamond]

I think the one part of the OP which has been ignored most is the 'which'. I would like to see more posts from people using winters which ones they use/used, on what type of vehicle, their experiences in different weather, how many seasons you've gotten out of them and if you'd buy them again.

As far as my experience goes:
- Audi sedan w/ quattro - Bridgestone (can't remember which). Got three seasons out of them. The third season I moved and because the summers were packed up I had to run the winters well into 70 degree weather. When it got that hot it felt like I was driving on squishy sponges and I cringed that I was leaving a black trail of rubber behind me. Could've got a fourth winter but I traded in the car.
- SUV - Pirelli Scopion Ice and Snow - I've only had these for one season on my wife's SUV but they were very nice. Too early to say if I would buy again.
- SUV - Bridgestone DM-V1 - I'll be getting these shortly for this winter for my SUV. Their reviews on TireRack are quite good.

The one thing I would say is be careful with some of the cheaper after market wheels if you go that route. A lot of them are gravity cast and much softer than OEM. With winter conditions being what they are with more potholes they can be bent more easily.

 

[kaichu dento]

The one thing I would say is be careful with some of the cheaper after market wheels if you go that route. A lot of them are gravity cast and much softer than OEM. With winter conditions being what they are with more potholes they can be bent more easily.

Are more expensive wheels forged or vacuum cast then?

 

[ShineOnYouCrazyDiamond]

From what I have seen (and believe me, I am not an expert on this subject matter) TireRack seems to carry the gravity cast, low pressure cast and forged. And yes, there is a significant price difference. They sell:
Gravity Cast - ~$150-200 "Sport Edition" brand are soft junk. I had a dented rim after driving 1000 miles and not hitting any big potholes or curbs that I know of. My mechanic said the metal was very soft.

Low-Pressure Cast - ~$200-300 Enkei brand. I had a few sets of these and I can say that they are great rims for the money. Light, strong, round and easy to balance - an excellent rim.

Forged - ~$500+ - BBS - Top of the line and very expensive. You get what you pay for.

My new direction for snow rims is to get a used set of OEM wheels for that brand of car. IMO OEM rims are usually better quality than after market stuff. I go to Craigslist and the forums to look for a set. I tried ebay but I was burned bad on a misrepresented set so I will never do that route again.

 

[jorn]

Using nokian hakkaleliitta 4 on a bmw touring. 2 seasons on the front wheels, this is the fourth on the rear wheels. I prob need to change the rear wheels during this winter, they are down to 3mm and have lost a lot of spikes. They dident feel good at the end of last season. The square spikes seems to work well on packed ice/snow.
Driving conditions during winter can be awful. The gulf current heats up the area, and moist air gives lots of snow. Tempratures switches between melting and deep freezing depending on pressure and wind direction. Usually between+2C to -20C. Roads is packed with melting or frozen snow.
It's a circus here during cold response. (there are so many pepole here not used to the winter roads and conditions at once) Even police cars have been rammed by a "sliding bambi on ice" Espesially when it's around 0C, and the roads gets extra slippery. Canadian and scandinavian drivers seems to stay on the road better. We havent towed too many out yet during a "tow patrol mainia" . So there is no doubt that the driver needs to be used to snow, and drive in a well planned and smooth manner here.

 

[Launch Mini]

Tires
On the Front Wheel Drive Vehicle - Gislaveds. Amazing. Best winter tires I've owned. Used on car for long trips in the winter.
On Rear Wheel drive - Eagle Ultra Grip GW2 ( I don't drive in much snow)
Daughters Car and an AWD Vehicle - Nokian WRG2. These are "all weather" tires with the Mountain Snowflake symbol. Great in the snow & ice, good in rain & summer, but noisy. Have many clients who use these and are pleased.

 

[jorn]

Used gislaved norfrost 5 on my old toyota mr2, worked great. But the car was too lo and stiff for any comfort at all, and got stuck if more than 15-20 cm fresh snow on my parking lot.. So got late to work a lot every winter haha. But grip wise it was incredible. Drowe up icy hills and passed stuck suv's with bad wheels several times. You bet they gave me a look when slowly and genlty passed them in a lowered little 2 seater haha.

 

[StarHalo]

You're already saving money if you're going with a smaller diameter snow tire, get the basic steel utility wheels; no point in spending a load on sport wheels that will be completely caked in salt and slurry after a few miles anyway.

This is correct: winter on left, summer on right, properly sized using the plus system:

 

[orbital]

^

when I see someone w/ the dedicated dark rim winter setup, I breath a sigh of relief
...for the safety of them, and more importantly,,, everyone else.




..

 

[127.0.0.1]

^

when I see someone w/ the dedicated dark rim winter setup, I breath a sigh of relief
...for the safety of them, and more importantly,,, everyone else.




..

yup ^. couldn't live with myself and have snows, when GF has all seasons.

for her B-day soon, it is a delivery from the
michelin man... 4 Xi2 balanced and mounted on new Ford-built basic black steel wheels

 

[kaichu dento]

From what I have seen (and believe me, I am not an expert on this subject matter) TireRack seems to carry the gravity cast, low pressure cast and forged. And yes, there is a significant price difference. They sell:
Gravity Cast - ~$150-200 "Sport Edition" brand are soft junk. I had a dented rim after driving 1000 miles and not hitting any big potholes or curbs that I know of. My mechanic said the metal was very soft.

Low-Pressure Cast - ~$200-300 Enkei brand. I had a few sets of these and I can say that they are great rims for the money. Light, strong, round and easy to balance - an excellent rim.

Forged - ~$500+ - BBS - Top of the line and very expensive. You get what you pay for.

My new direction for snow rims is to get a used set of OEM wheels for that brand of car. IMO OEM rims are usually better quality than after market stuff. I go to Craigslist and the forums to look for a set. I tried ebay but I was burned bad on a misrepresented set so I will never do that route again.

Thanks for the rundown on the differences, something I'd never given any thought to, since I've always been a stock-wheels user. I would assume that most manufacturer supplied aluminum wheels, including my Subaru, would be the vacuum cast variety?

If I ever were to go with two sets of tires I think I'd probably just go to the wreckers and get another stock set of wheels. I'm sure that steel wheels are probably the strongest, but the additional weight counts into the handling equation as well.

Using nokian hakkaleliitta 4 on a bmw touring. 2 seasons on the front wheels, this is the fourth on the rear wheels. I prob need to change the rear wheels during this winter, they are down to 3mm and have lost a lot of spikes. They dident feel good at the end of last season. The square spikes seems to work well on packed ice/snow.
Driving conditions during winter can be awful. The gulf current heats up the area, and moist air gives lots of snow. Tempratures switches between melting and deep freezing depending on pressure and wind direction. Usually between+2C to -20C. Roads is packed with melting or frozen snow.
It's a circus here during cold response. (there are so many pepole here not used to the winter roads and conditions at once) Even police cars have been rammed by a "sliding bambi on ice" Espesially when it's around 0C, and the roads gets extra slippery. Canadian and scandinavian drivers seems to stay on the road better. We havent towed too many out yet during a "tow patrol mainia" . So there is no doubt that the driver needs to be used to snow, and drive in a well planned and smooth manner here.

Can't agree enough about the driver needing to understand what it is they're doing and the majority of Alaskans going off the road are newcomers, the younger drivers and the sleepy ones!

I remember helping a lady get 'unstuck' at an intersection with a slight uphill in the spring a few years back, and her studded tires on the four wheel drive weren't enough to get her moving, since she kept flooring the throttle every time we got it to start moving. Finally we got her to just gently allow the vehicle to start moving and keep the throttle easy.

You're using a cousin of one of the tires I strongly considered, the Nokian Hakkapeliitta R, which only got sidelined due to lack of funds.

I actually think driving conditions, as far as ice, slush and road-ridges are much worse down south due to the more moderate temperatures and the main advantage we have in the north when it comes to experience with winter driving, is that winter is so much closer together up here than it is down south!

 

[orbital]

^

careful with the stock wheel thought

because winter tire performance comes from the taller/softer sidewalls
actually much taller sidewalls than stock setup.
~ Winter tires sole function is gripping packed snow & ice,,,, its the give in the tire, combined w/ the sipes and soft rubber compound ~


:: if Top Fuel dragsters had stiff sidewall tires in the back, they wouldn't go 5 feet.
the give in a tire is very complex & very important.



I hope that makes sense.

 

[kaichu dento]

You're already saving money if you're going with a smaller diameter snow tire, get the basic steel utility wheels; no point in spending a load on sport wheels that will be completely caked in salt and slurry after a few miles anyway.

This is correct: winter on left, summer on right, properly sized using the plus system:

A picture is worth a thousand words! I like the fact that your summer wheels still have a little bit of sidewall, as opposed to some of the don't-ever-take-them-on-a-dirt-road wheels I've been seeing the last couple of years!

careful with the stock wheel thought

because winter tire performance comes from the taller/softer sidewalls
actually much taller sidewalls than stock setup.
~ Winter tires sole function is gripping packed snow & ice,,,, its the give in the tire, combined w/ the sipes and soft rubber compound ~


:: if Top Fuel dragsters had stiff sidewall tires in the back, they wouldn't go 5 feet.
the give in a tire is very complex & very important.



I hope that makes sense.

Since I've never had anything newer than about 10 years old, all my wheels have always taken tires with taller sidewalls, but that's a good point to make. I'm not a really aggressive driver, and as such have always been happy with the trade-off between better handling on asphalt and a bit of give that non-racetrack tires allow.

 

[StarHalo]

I like the fact that your summer wheels still have a little bit of sidewall

Pic is from the internet; I live in Southern California, it rains 30 days out of the year and there is no winter. But growing up in the midwest and having some harrowing instances on snow-covered black ice taught me that there is no such thing as too much traction..

 

[Johnny2Bad]

It is critically important that you choose winter tires based on your specific local conditions. Right off the bat, that tends to diminish the value of asking in a forum with a wide audience from a wide geographic area. Look to the advice and experiences of others who live a few hundred miles from you, and with every increase in distance, derate the advice. Not because it's bad ... chances are that they are giving honest advice based on their experiences and hard earned cash outlays ... but because they have different weather than you do.

Making matters more complex, different vehicles in the exact same conditions may need different solutions tire-wise. My FWD car and my RWD truck don't use the same winter tire, and it would be a mistake to choose a given brand/model winter tire from someone who drives a different weight/type of vehicle.

I've used dedicated winter "ice radial" type tires on all my vehicles for more than 20 years. Using very highly rated ice radials that are popular in Eastern Canada proved to be a disaster ... they were the worst I've used by a significant margin here in Western Canada (Nokian Hakkapolita LT Load Range C on a "1/2 ton" what Canadians call a "pickup" over beers). Yet in warmer, wetter, slushier and heavier snowfall Southern Ontario, or in the Lower Mainland of BC, apparently they're fantastic. I went back to Coopers and it's like night and day (Weatherall LT's, which aren't made anymore, were outstanding. Now using Discoverer AT3s, which are not a true ice radial, but instead a M&S rated tire with a winter-ish silica impregnated compound and yeah, the mountain symbol. Load Range E's).

On the other hand, same weather, different application, my FWD car uses Continental ExtremeWinterContacts, which are the best I've used so far on a car. I've ventured out in blizzards with 8+ inches of accumulated snow, where I never saw another non-4wd vehicle all day, when the RCMP are advising against any travel whatsoever, when my front air dam is plowing snow, and had zero issues. We normally only get 1 or maybe 2 big snowfalls a winter so deep snow performance isn't a priority, and yet they still perform excellent on dry frozen, wet, and ice-covered roads. Better than Blizzaks, much better than Michelin X-ice, and leaving the Hakkapolitas in the dust.

But unless you live where I live, that may not be of any use to you whatsoever. In North America, 500 miles can be a long way when it comes to local weather conditions. The tires I love may be substandard, the tires I hate may be perfect for you. Your best bet is to start focusing in a smaller circle, perhaps in local forums, rather than here or some other forum with a big footprint geographically.

With regard to wheel size for snow or ice, although using the Plus-size calculators backwards to move to a smaller wheel/taller tire combo is useful, much more important is to narrow the tire width. If the tire you want forces you to compromise, go with the option that gives you a narrower tire even if it means you need to run a slightly shorter sidewall than the chart recommends. If you have the clearance in your wheel wells, by all means look at a narrower and taller tire, but if the exact right size can't be found for some reason, compromise on height, not width.

Your speedo isn't accurate in the first place, as a quick check with a GPS using brand new tires in the OEM tire size will quickly tell you. It's probably out at least 5% from the factory, reading high (speedo says 60 mph, you're doing 55) which is standard OEM calibration practice. These days there is not much keeping almost anyone from checking the speedo vs actual speed over ground with a GPS so do that whenever you change tires, and maybe tomorrow morning on whatever you're driving now.

Another thing about any really grippy-on-ice or soft-below-zero-F tire ... the winter compound is only on the outside of the tread. The short answer is it's just not technically possible to build a true cold-weather compound tire any other way. Put some miles on them, and visually there's lots of tread left, but you've worn past the special compound. So they are going to act like more ordinary tires at that point. No winter tire is as good as a summer tire or even an all-season when the temps get above about 40F ... braking distance is poor, for example ... but you can use them for a spare, saving you the cost of buying 5 of either summer or winter tires just for an emergency that might not happen.

A final advantage of going to a proper winter tire is you can now get proper summer tires, which are better than any all or 3-season tire when summer comes along.

Studded tires are an option in some locations, not an option (legal limits or bans) in others. If you're not in the city, and deal with ice or hard-packed snow most of the time, they are great for traction, but in any condition other than that they are the poorest of the bunch for stopping distance, handling, etc. That includes below-zero dry pavement. If you know you need them, and live somewhere where they are allowed, use them, but otherwise avoid. You have to choose to stud your tires when you buy them; you can't add studs to a tire that's been on the road even for a few miles.

 

[Launch Mini]

Well said Johnny2Bad.
Talk to some of the local tire shops where you live. They know the weather you get & the conditions to expect, and most importantly, your vehicle.

What I really need, is a bunch of spare tires hanging around the sides of my car in the winter ( like a boat bumper system), to keep all the other drivers, who did not get winter tires, from tagging me.

 

[chmsam]

My two cents worth are based on living in upstate NY, about 25+ years of amateur road rallying in the winter months, and seeing a lot of idiots on the road at any time of the year but even more in snow and ice.

So...

The number one thing to learn is that no matter how fast you can get going on any sort of tire, sooner or later you have to turn and stop. That's what you want to learn how to do. Moving off the line is easy and the rest takes a lot more practice.


For passenger cars, look at Nokian tires. The WRG2 tires are the ONLY true all-season tire I've ever found. They are asymmetrical and will work in winter and summer. They won't "go away" rapidly in the warm weather like other snows. They are a bit noisier than other tires but worth it. They'll cost a bit more than other good tires but you won't have the hassle of switching them over in different seasons and they're pretty good in the rain and the mud too.

Nokian also has snow tires and studded tires. It's also good to know that there are different size studs too -- one size does not fit all conditions so ask and choose wisely.

Blizzaks and Michelins are good choices too.


Mostly, learn how to drive in any condition. A good all weather driving course is a smart choice. As I said before, getting moving is only a small part of the concept. Avoiding the other idiots on the road and the "ditch magnets" being turned on are both good things too.

 

[kaichu dento]

What I really need, is a bunch of spare tires hanging around the sides of my car in the winter ( like a boat bumper system), to keep all the other drivers, who did not get winter tires, from tagging me.

You need to post pics when you do - you're going to look like a tug boat!
Don't worry about looking at the tires on the other cars though, because it will depend less on what tires they've got than it will on whether they can drive or not.

 

[TedTheLed]

Launch, I think that would be illegal, of course. What I know is illegal, here anyway, are wood timber bumpers.. was considering this for a female friend who often became directionally challenged in her car... but wouldnt you know it, playing bumper cars on the highway is frowned upon in this state...