campgottagopee
New member
hehe, fyi, campgottagopee is a subi dealer.
Shhhhhh, that's our little secret8)
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Ski Cars
- Thread starter thinnmann
- Start date
Shhhhhh, that's our little secret8)
air0rmc
Member
I like the ice x,it is my #2 choice for dedicated snow tire.Comparing it to the wr is not apples to apples though for obvious reasons.The folks in Finland claim to have worked out the noise issue with the wr and also improved slush performance by 30% with the newly designed wrg2 which if turns out to be true will dwarf any tire on the market in severe weather performance plus it stays on your car for 50k plus with minimal performance degradation that I have found to be 90% true,thats not bad.So if you travel at highway speed in changing surface conditions (like going skiing in the North East) you will not be let down by the nokian wrg2... or hakkapalita 2 for very severe snow and slush 100% of the time for 5 months....! I do not want to get in trouble....we should be talking ski's and skiing
playoutside
New member
Lots of great comments on the snow tires. Really appreciate the info from all of you. Now I just need to help my sister narrow her choices and negotiate. Such fun buying a new car.
Geoff
Well-known member
I went with the Blizzak WS-60 last November mostly because I could one-stop-shop the tires, wheels, and tire pressure monitoring system at TireRack.com. I would prefer to run Nokians since you get 2x the wear out of them and I'll likely replace what I'm running now with Nokians. If you have the time, you can poke around eBay and the enthusiast web sites for your car to find almost-new used wheels somebody has pulled off their car. I've done that twice before but I bought my VW last Halloween and needed a winter setup ASAP.
I think the Nokian WR is a very good choice for metro-NYC or points south where you're doing 90+% dry road driving and see fairly warm temperatures during the shoulder seasons. I prefer to run a softer tire to get better black ice performance. You have to get soft snow tires off the car prompty on April 1 or they'll melt away to nothing in the warm weather. The WR gives you the advantage of using it all year so you don't need separate wheels but you give up some winter performance... I prefer the added safety margin. I got 25,000 miles out of a Nokian Hakka Q (which became the RSi and is now the Hakka R). I doubt I'll see anything close to that with the Blizzak's I'm running now.
If you are trying to do snow tires on the cheap, the big box warehouse stores like BJ's Wholesale and Costco usually sell snow tires at a discount with free mounting and lifetime free tire rotation. You're going to end up with whatever models they happen to sell but the price is right. With used wheels from a take-off, it won't break the bank for a compact car. I tend to see them selling the Michelin X Ice. That snow tire does just fine in any of the bake-offs I've seen. Consumer Reports rated it #1 but I always take their car-related reviews with a grain of salt.
I agree that snow tires are like custom footbeds. Once you have them, they become essential.
Geoff I've been taking a look at Tire Rack for package deals as you suggested. It seems to me that it makes more sense to simply buy 4 new snows on wheels instead of taking off my All seasons and putting them back on in the fall. I have an extremely limited budget though and the steel wheels that are offered don't have a pressure monitoring system. What disadvantages or safety concerns might I have without it?
You've probably got a TownFair tire near you and they match Tirerack pricing as well as having free tire rotations/flat repair for the life of the tire. Even if you are not matching tirerack prices you can usually negotiate a discount out of them.
Also, free snow tire swap over if you bought them from them.
eastcoastpowderhound
New member
I got the Hakkas for my wife's tribeca from john & sons (627-1585) tire in Manchester...they were $100 less (for the set of 4) than tire rack and town fair. Not sure what you drive but sometimes you can get wheels from a junkyard for a good price. I got the steel wheels for my outback from lake region imports in windham me for $15 a piece.
campgottagopee
New member
Not having the TPMS sensors isn't a big deal. Only thing that will happen is your "warning light" will stay on letting you know you have a "soft" tire. No worries, no biggie
Geoff
Well-known member
Personally, I've always had problems with slow leaks and flats. Like most of us, I rarely check my tire pressure. Most cars I've owned, I've blown up at least one tire by running it under-inflated. With TPMS, you know you have a problem immediately. With expensive tires, I think TPMS pretty much pays for itsself since you don't blow up tires as they leak. As far as safety, I don't think it's that big a deal. If you have a flat, you can certainly feel it before you've completely shredded the tire and lost control. It's more the convenience of knowing way in advance that you have a slow leak so you're not changing a tire by the side of the road. The system I have on my VW is a Bosch system on the valve stem that transmits pressure and temperature to a receiver unit in the wheel well. If I wanted to be a true geek, I could hook up a diag cable and see my tire pressure and temperature in real time as I'm driving. I scan the car for fault codes once in a while (usually at 5K oil change intervals) but I rely on the idiot light to tell me I have a tire pressure problem.
It doesn't hurt anything to drive a car with no TPMS. On my VW, I can reprogram the engine control unit to disable the idiot light. I'll bet you can do that on pretty much any car but you need the cable and the software.
If you're on a tight budget, take a hard look at the Nokian WR. It's an all-season tire... if you live north of the Arctic Circle. Pull your stock tires off and run the WR all year. If you still have life in your old tires, sell 'em on Craig's List. Davies Tire in Portsmouth carries them. They do not discount and they charge for mounting. I beat them down a few dollars but I was awfully close to paying retail. I haven't shopped Nokian recently but you might be able to find internet dealers who are cheaper these days. The Nokian Tire web site has a dealer locator so you can probably make a few calls to try to cut the price some. They're not cheap but you don't have to go out and buy spare wheels and they're way better than stock all season tires.
riverc0il
New member
I got the X Ice last season. Good but not worth the premium compared to cheaper snows (IMO). Almost too soft as handling suffers on dry pavement more than other snows I have used.
Geoff
Well-known member
Any tire designed to give you black ice performance is going to feel like you have four gum erasers out there for tires. If you are optimizing for black ice, you give up handling. I have 18" performance tires on my VW GTI. With 16" Blizzaks on it, the handling is awful. I could have gone with 17" wheels for the winter but I'd rather have the extra margin so I'm not bending rims on pot holes.
The studded Nokian Hakka SUVs on my Mountaineer make the car handle like it's farm equipment. The stock tires are so lousy on ice that the thing is dangerous on downhill sweeping corners. It's little surprise that you see so many SUVs upside-down in the median strip. You get a huge false sense of security in them. They feel stable as long as you are going straight. If you touch the brakes or turn the wheel, your world can end pretty quickly. With studded tires, my biggest worry is getting rear ended if I ever need to apply the brakes.
roark
New member
Picked up a set of these for the AWD SUV from Tire Rack over the summer for about 50% off. Should be nice...
That said, the fwd econobox with el cheapo studded snows (next time I'll probably go studless, the noise is intense) usually gets the nod and has yet to let me down (or even scare me) in snow as deep as the bumper (that was a hoot actually). Second set of wheels was cheap (13 in), so I just swap em and call it the annual "tire rotation." If I ever did slide into a ditch or something like that, the lighter car is also easier to extract than a behemoth.
Really, my only concern in the econobox is saftey with all the flatlanders in big SUVs with all seasons around...:x
riverc0il
New member
Of course. My point was that I gave up too much performance which can be a dangerous compromise in the other direction and that other snows that I have driven had a better compromise for my driving style. Everyone needs to pick a tire that matches their needs and driving style. I don't need the ultimate in black ice performance but the tire is probably pretty good for those that do need that performance. Snow performance is more my concern.
billski
Active member
over-nervous at winter driving.
My wife struggles with winter driving. I don't think she'll ever master it. She has a front wheel drive Sienna minivan with abs and "traction control". She complained about the handling in wet (non-winter) weather, so I found the best rain rated tires I could get. She says it's "better" but not perfect, whatever that means.
So she complained about traction in the Metro-Boston snow, and I bought her four WS-60s. She said it was "better" but again, not perfect, with no more substantiation other than that she still "slides around sometime". She wishes she had All wheel drive.
Last winter, I was driving the family, went around the snowy corner a wee bit too fast and slid a wee bit (maybe a couple inches) on the WD60s. But we were all in control, never came close to hitting anybody or anything or wiping out. It was a pretty lame slide for about a second or two. and so the conversation goes: "are you sliding? just a little bit. then slow down. you're going too fast. But that's part of driving in the snow, it' happens sometimes. I don't care, slow down. it's dangerous." She also dosn't grasp the notion that sometimes you have to slightly accelerate to get more traction.
I usually drive pretty conservatively and have always driven in gobs of snow. I knew it might happen, it sometimes does, but I'm always in control and always prepared to handle these things.. I tried to explain that sometimes it just happens, it's a part of winter driving. I think she's just very fearful of any sliding at all, no matter how minute. I think part of it is that she likes to be in total control; Sometimes you're not, you just have to figure out how to deal with it.
At this point, I think it's more the driver than the equipment, just like skis. I think she is over-nervous. I am unconvinced that all wheel drive would really make that experience any better. She's a predominantly suburban jungle driver. (I drive when we go up north.) Thoughts?
My wife struggles with winter driving. I don't think she'll ever master it. She has a front wheel drive Sienna minivan with abs and "traction control". She complained about the handling in wet (non-winter) weather, so I found the best rain rated tires I could get. She says it's "better" but not perfect, whatever that means.
So she complained about traction in the Metro-Boston snow, and I bought her four WS-60s. She said it was "better" but again, not perfect, with no more substantiation other than that she still "slides around sometime". She wishes she had All wheel drive.
Last winter, I was driving the family, went around the snowy corner a wee bit too fast and slid a wee bit (maybe a couple inches) on the WD60s. But we were all in control, never came close to hitting anybody or anything or wiping out. It was a pretty lame slide for about a second or two. and so the conversation goes: "are you sliding? just a little bit. then slow down. you're going too fast. But that's part of driving in the snow, it' happens sometimes. I don't care, slow down. it's dangerous." She also dosn't grasp the notion that sometimes you have to slightly accelerate to get more traction.
I usually drive pretty conservatively and have always driven in gobs of snow. I knew it might happen, it sometimes does, but I'm always in control and always prepared to handle these things.. I tried to explain that sometimes it just happens, it's a part of winter driving. I think she's just very fearful of any sliding at all, no matter how minute. I think part of it is that she likes to be in total control; Sometimes you're not, you just have to figure out how to deal with it.
At this point, I think it's more the driver than the equipment, just like skis. I think she is over-nervous. I am unconvinced that all wheel drive would really make that experience any better. She's a predominantly suburban jungle driver. (I drive when we go up north.) Thoughts?
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hammer
Active member
If your wife doesn't want to drive to the point of slippage then AWD will not do anything IMO...only time I really notice the AWD kick in on my Subaru is when the front wheels lose traction.
Does the minivan handle well with the snow tires? I always wonder who mini-vans handle the snow...I saw one lose it on Rt. 3 SB last winter, and the resulting spin-out in the median made me dizzy.
thinnmann
New member
Back to the beginning post of this thread - Thinnmann has been minivanning snowcountry since breeding 15 years ago. With snow tires on front and decent all-weathers in back, I am usually passing the shorter-wheelbase SUV's with my full size Town & Country on the NY Thruway when heading up in snow. I can't remember ever losing rear end traction on any snow or rain compromised roadway with this configuration. I guess I drive fairly carefully in those conditions. Rear end skids cause the real problems on the road - have read your best tires should be on the rear of your vehicle for this very reason. Traction trouble comes when I have to go up a frozen slanted driveway a few times per year.
For me, this validates the value of tires over AWD, as many posters have noted.
Check me on this, AZers: I notice in Colorado, just about every ski resort town's taxi service uses FWD Chrysler minivans.
Geoff
Well-known member
Never tried that. I thought that if you run snows on the front and regular tires on the rear, the rear end wants to cut loose when you brake. Is that just propaganda from the tire dealers to sell you a set of four?
I guess that if you completely suck as a winter driver, you should own an AWD car with good snow tires. A competent snow driver can get around just fine in a RWD car and summer tires with the usual caveats about living on a steep hill or having a really crappy plowing service for your driveway.
bobbutts
New member
Skills and experience #1, if you don't adjust your driving for the snow and know what to do with a sliding car you're in trouble.
after that it's all about the tires
studs rule if all you care about is traction
blizzaks or similar dedicated snow tires are good (what I use)
everything else is a pretty big compromise.
awd is great for starting and controling slides, but not much help with bad tires and/or driver
after that it's all about the tires
studs rule if all you care about is traction
blizzaks or similar dedicated snow tires are good (what I use)
everything else is a pretty big compromise.
awd is great for starting and controling slides, but not much help with bad tires and/or driver
andrec10
Active member
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Using different types of tires like that is VERY DANGEROUS! The all-seasons stick to the road differently and will cause you to spin out even with Stability control. It is not worth saving a few bucks to put yourself at this risk.
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thinnmann
New member
I questioned that config also - snows on front and all weathers on back as recently as last November. My tire guy says he has been doing that for years on his own cars without a prob. I personally have had no prob so far. Perhaps long wheelbase, traction control + ABS helps the situation. And I come from a long line of Italian rally car drivers....
Yea - everywhere anyone is gonna research on the Internet says to put four on. Maybe I just have been lucky. If I don't buy a Subie I will get two more snow tires, OK?
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