In my experience over many years the rubber is harder with mileage and age when the tread is about 65% worn. I have had many tires that were great in the rain the first 3 years,then wet traction starts to decline.I have heard that some tires have different durometer rubber after 50% worn to help to get more mileage out of them!
2WD Trucks and Wet Traction - a losing battle?
- Thread starter The Critic
- Start date
My Silverado came with General Grabber HTS tires. I had to merge from a dead stop onto the PA turnpike during a rainstorm. Even putting the pedal to the floor didn't cause the tires to spin. My truck was in 2WD and also has an auto locking rear end. The Michelin Defenders I have on there now don't have any issues spinning either.
My advice is ditch the Goodyears. I don't have experience with the Fortitude, but I know the former SRA tires were junk even when new. Being worn to 6/32nds can't be helping.
An ex lead foot here. Since I've retired, I've slowed down. The Camry gets a little floaty above 80 dry or 60 wet. I think the tires are original Firestones and have 60k. on them Plus, I've lost a few Milli seconds in reaction time. So I drive to suit the weather, and if there's too much weather, stay home 
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I highly recommend tires if it's in your budget. The "all terrain" tires that came with my truck were really good for the first 25,000. Second winter, not so much; the wet and snow traction was much less even with 8/32 tread left. Swapped on some new H/T tires with top wet and snow ratings and it's so much better. I didn't even need 4Hi to get up my driveway in the snow.
My 2011 Ram is a regular cab, short bed with the 5.7l, I have yet to experience any wheel spin with the Michelin Defender LTX M/S tires. I have a stop along my daily that has a hill, they’ve never broke loose in wet conditions there or anywhere else. The original GY tires were horrible in the rain, so bad they came off when they were still fairly new.
Weight distribution is a thing, but I say your biggest issue with this particular problem sounds like a tire issue.
Cheers!
Weight distribution is a thing, but I say your biggest issue with this particular problem sounds like a tire issue.
Cheers!
When I had my wrangler it came with wrangler rt/s tires, it came to me with 19k miles on it back in Y2K, was a 97. With the least amount of frost, dew etc I could not take off from a stop without putting it in 4wd. Inline6,stick, 3.07 gears. After 500 miles of that BS I scrapped the wranglers and went to Michelin LTX A/T. That made a HUGE difference.
Dis the same when I had my 3/4 ton dodge van. Also came to me with nearly new (still had the "blue walls" when I got it) wranglers. HT I believe. After about losing it at a steady 50mph across a small bridge because of a light frost I again put Michelins on that and no more issues with traction. I deal with alot of the oem Goodyear fortitude tires at work and most drivers (fellow state of IL employees) can't stand those. Our contract is with Goodyear so I'm stuck putting somw model of their company's tires on the state fleet, we have better luck out of (I think they're called)trail runners. Less complaints. There's another one real close to that that also get less complaints than the fortitude. I think those are "all terrain Adventure" or something like that.
Dis the same when I had my 3/4 ton dodge van. Also came to me with nearly new (still had the "blue walls" when I got it) wranglers. HT I believe. After about losing it at a steady 50mph across a small bridge because of a light frost I again put Michelins on that and no more issues with traction. I deal with alot of the oem Goodyear fortitude tires at work and most drivers (fellow state of IL employees) can't stand those. Our contract is with Goodyear so I'm stuck putting somw model of their company's tires on the state fleet, we have better luck out of (I think they're called)trail runners. Less complaints. There's another one real close to that that also get less complaints than the fortitude. I think those are "all terrain Adventure" or something like that.
I'm with the above, your tires are hard. Tread shouldn't make a difference until you hit 45+ mph.
New ones will help, until they get hard, which with your driving will be before they wear out. Throw some weight in the back or get off the pedal.
New ones will help, until they get hard, which with your driving will be before they wear out. Throw some weight in the back or get off the pedal.
@The Critic, I feel your pain. There’s a lot of good advice in this thread. The hands down best wet traction tires I’ve had are the continental all terrains. It looks like they get good reviews here for other models as well. A coworker also swears by the Michelin ltx like earlier in this thread, while their all terrain offering gets so-so wet traction reviews on tire rack. On my trucks, wet traction is done well before the wear bars.
my f150 has an open diff while the tundra had a limited slip. mixed bag. When the lsd locked, the truck was ready to go sideways, and if one wheel broke free, the 2nd was basically going to follow it. One had to be ready for it. With the open diff, there’s less drama, especially in a tight rainy turn. Both have pros and cons.
as much as I enjoy my Yokohama g015, they didn’t do me well in the rain. A mild acceleration at 35 can break it free on level ground, and there are neighborhood streets here I can’t climb steady state without spinning out in the rain.
im learning to either favor wet weather tires, knowing they may have to be changed early, along with simply lowering expectations of what the truck will do in rain.
my f150 has an open diff while the tundra had a limited slip. mixed bag. When the lsd locked, the truck was ready to go sideways, and if one wheel broke free, the 2nd was basically going to follow it. One had to be ready for it. With the open diff, there’s less drama, especially in a tight rainy turn. Both have pros and cons.
as much as I enjoy my Yokohama g015, they didn’t do me well in the rain. A mild acceleration at 35 can break it free on level ground, and there are neighborhood streets here I can’t climb steady state without spinning out in the rain.
im learning to either favor wet weather tires, knowing they may have to be changed early, along with simply lowering expectations of what the truck will do in rain.
I noticed that no one pointed out that these were OE tires, which are notorious for having wear and/or traction issues.
My recommendation would be to replace the tires with something known for good traction and if that doesn't fix the problem, go with the other suggestions.
My recommendation would be to replace the tires with something known for good traction and if that doesn't fix the problem, go with the other suggestions.
The OEM's use hard compound tires for better mileage. Yours are now harder. New tires will make a huge difference, but softer compound will decrease your mileage a bit.
Whats your tire pressure? Google chalk test, and see if you might want to air down a little. Again, it will lower mileage.
X2 on a couple hundred pounds of weight - get it all the way back - behind the rear axle.
Its sort of normal, but each truck is a bit different, and these are the fixes. Good luck.
Whats your tire pressure? Google chalk test, and see if you might want to air down a little. Again, it will lower mileage.
X2 on a couple hundred pounds of weight - get it all the way back - behind the rear axle.
Its sort of normal, but each truck is a bit different, and these are the fixes. Good luck.
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GY Duratracs on my truck still slip when wet.
Wet rating is listed as 8.50 per TR.
https://www.tirerack.com/tires/tire...2&autoModel=Colorado ZR2&autoModClar=Crew Cab
Wet rating is listed as 8.50 per TR.
https://www.tirerack.com/tires/tire...2&autoModel=Colorado ZR2&autoModClar=Crew Cab
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4WD
$50 site donor 2025
So I don’t think we are talking evacuation issues - that gives rise to the lack of rubber patch that M&S suffers by design … (voids) …
Our newer Tahoe came with the 275 CC LX20 - they are great launching that heavy beast at wet intersections …
Our newer Tahoe came with the 275 CC LX20 - they are great launching that heavy beast at wet intersections …
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edyvw
$50 site donor 2025
edyvw
$50 site donor 2025
In wet, they rank from poor to abysmal, with few exceptions in the car tire line up.
Sorry, but no. OEM's use tires that are good for rolling resistance, which are soft. Grippy tires are also soft, but good wearing tires are hard. That's why OE tires have the reputation for having poor wear and/or traction. It's a 3 way, triangular relationship.
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I know some winter tires are like this, where it starts off as a super soft compound and then it's a harder all-season compound underneath. Wonder is that's also becoming common on all-seaaon tires too, like you said, to make a great early impression of the tire and then bait and switch so the customer feels they got great treadwear too.
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You've got it backwards. Low rolling resistance tires are harder.
"Primary methods of reducing a tire’s rolling resistance include a harder tread compound, stiffer sidewalls, narrower tread width, different tread design and less tread depth".
https://www.cars.com/articles/what-are-low-rolling-resistance-tires-444766/
