Nokian Hakkapelitta R3 - Winter Tires

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It's too bad the R2's are that bad.
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Originally Posted by StevieC
It's too bad the R2's are that bad.
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I had 17 years ago similar tires. Sava Eskimo S3. Great (maybe even better than R2) in snow and ice. Abysmal in dry and wet.
What Nokian does is really not some achievement. Achievement is when you have tire that is well rounded in all disciplines.
 
Originally Posted by Finn
Originally Posted by StevieC
It's too bad the R2's are that bad.
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They are not.

I think "that bad" is poor choice of words, but they re not top tier tire.
 
Tekniikan Maailma (World of Technology) is a Finnish magazine founded in 1953. They with other magazines each tend to do these big tyre tests for winter and summer annually. Results are every year naturally a starting point for numerous heated discussions but you should get general idea of the results.

Quick check showed that Nokian R2 was included in the tests in 2013, 2014, 2015 and 2016. Before 2013 it was Nokian R. I could not find 2017 test.

This is unmodified copy/paste summary of those four tests.

R2 did very well in tests and was very well liked tyre by the customers me included. R3 is even better.

[Linked Image]
 
Originally Posted by edyvw
I have never had winter tire with such dramatic drop in performance. Other test of AS tires and poor performance retention of Nokian entyre (or whatever) makes me think that Nokian might have an issue with this.


Hi there edyvw,

I've had the eNTYRES on the VW for a year and half and they've worn super fast. I emailed Nokian about it recently and they did finally get back to me. Hopefully I'll get a credit later this year if they keep wearing at the same rate. But have to wait till they get down a little lower.
 
We had slushy snow with freezing rain this morning and it was enough that you could hear it hitting the underbelly of the van on my commute into the office today and they did amazing. I was actually quite impressed over my previous X-Ice and Blizzak's I had for other vehicles before.
 
The R2 SUV tires on wife's Q5 are on their 5th winter now. Other than slightly more noise (compared to all-season tires), I have no complaints.
 
Originally Posted by Finn
Tekniikan Maailma (World of Technology) is a Finnish magazine founded in 1953. They with other magazines each tend to do these big tyre tests for winter and summer annually. Results are every year naturally a starting point for numerous heated discussions but you should get general idea of the results.

Quick check showed that Nokian R2 was included in the tests in 2013, 2014, 2015 and 2016. Before 2013 it was Nokian R. I could not find 2017 test.

This is unmodified copy/paste summary of those four tests.

R2 did very well in tests and was very well liked tyre by the customers me included. R3 is even better.

[Linked Image]


I know a lot of tests from 2013/14 when Nokian was cheating with special compound.
That is not point, point is degradation of performance after a year.
Also, they cannot compare to Michelin in dry, wet, comfort, noise, pretty much anything that is not snow and ice.
 
I have R3's which are better than R2's apparently, and I will tell you they perform better than the 2 pairs of X-Ice I had before them and the Blizzak's before that. I'm a good test case because I'm on the road daily in some of the worst weather imaginable and my job can take me between varying weather in a day because I travel far north and far south west in Ontario which is known for terrible ice and snow.

I'll let you know next season how they are fairing though...
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Originally Posted by edyvw
I know a lot of tests from 2013/14 when Nokian was cheating with special compound.

I am sharing my experiences of R2 sets which I bought over the counter.

Originally Posted by edyvw
That is not point, point is degradation of performance after a year.

I did not notice this degradation.

Originally Posted by edyvw
Also, they cannot compare to Michelin in dry, wet, comfort, noise, pretty much anything that is not snow and ice.

I disagree.
 
Originally Posted by StevieC
I have R3's which are better than R2's apparently, and I will tell you they perform better than the 2 pairs of X-Ice I had before them and the Blizzak's before that. I'm a good test case because I'm on the road daily in some of the worst weather imaginable and my job can take me between varying weather in a day because I travel far north and far south west in Ontario which is known for terrible ice and snow.

I'll let you know next season how they are fairing though...
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Ontario has bad weather, is it worse than blizzard on 11,500ft is questionable.
I ski every week, twice, 240mls round trip.
Yesterday I went from +7 degrees (I will use celsius since you are in Canada) in Colorado Springs, sunny weather, to blizzard and -29c. Went back, drove around 40km, and temperature changed from -29 to +11 in Denver, sunny dry roads.
 
Last edited:
Originally Posted by Finn
Originally Posted by edyvw
I know a lot of tests from 2013/14 when Nokian was cheating with special compound.

I am sharing my experiences of R2 sets which I bought over the counter.

Originally Posted by edyvw
That is not point, point is degradation of performance after a year.

I did not notice this degradation.

Originally Posted by edyvw
Also, they cannot compare to Michelin in dry, wet, comfort, noise, pretty much anything that is not snow and ice.

I disagree.

Well, good for you, you can disagree, but Nokian is, well, Nokian. They are OK, Michelin, Continental, Bridgestone, Pirelli, they are definiately not.
 
Originally Posted by edyvw
... Nokian is, well, Nokian. They are OK, Michelin, Continental, Bridgestone, Pirelli, they are definiately not.


Nokian is not for you. They have always been more willing to sacrifice wet/dry traction for the sake of ice/snow traction than Michelin, Bridgestone, Goodyear, and Pirelli. They apparently attempted to build a more "balanced" winter tire with the R3, and were halfway successful: improved wet traction, but mediocre dry traction compared to the R2.

Since you don't like to slow down when driving in winter, you should import a set of V rated Continental TS860 tires for your vehicle.
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Originally Posted by SubLGT
Originally Posted by edyvw
... Nokian is, well, Nokian. They are OK, Michelin, Continental, Bridgestone, Pirelli, they are definiately not.


Nokian is not for you. They have always been more willing to sacrifice wet/dry traction for the sake of ice/snow traction than Michelin, Bridgestone, Goodyear, and Pirelli. They apparently attempted to build a more "balanced" winter tire with the R3, and were halfway successful: improved wet traction, but mediocre dry traction compared to the R2.

Since you don't like to slow down when driving in winter, you should import a set of V rated Continental TS860 tires for your vehicle.
grin2.gif


I did not have TS860 on my European cars, but had 780, 810, 830, 850.
These R2 cannot carry water to those tires in any conditions, including snow and ice.
I was really impressed with R2 last winter in ice and snow, this winter, not so much. Also, my R2 are DOT 2015. That could be a factor in dropping performance as I got them "new" but actually two and half years old.
And I was saying before, building tire like R2 is not an achievement. I had Sava S3 some 17 years ago which were phenomenal in snow and ice, but everything else, not so much.
They are OK tires do not get me wrong. But far from hype. It is like Liquy Moly oil. Let's buy it bcs it has oversized Made in Germany sign.
 
The michelin xice xi2 on the 2010 accent are still going strong..5-6/32's tread depth and 6 years.

They are actually wearing better than the 90000mile defenders I had on that car(those were way overrated)
The defenders wore out in under 25000 miles... IIRC it was around 22000miles and 3-4/32 tread depth.

Not a Michelin fanboy but they do make some really good tires.
I'm not super fond of the blizzack dm-v2 on the cherokee. They are pretty good in snow and ice, and slush planing.

The wet and dry are ok in below 35f temps.. but just ok.
Pretty squishy. I was going to buy a different tire but everything was sold out when I was ready to buy except the blizzaks.

I feel like the ws-70 had better traction under certain circumstances.. but it was a different vehicle so hard to compare.
The main lack I find is their traction in bad conditions while turning. But its a jeep AWD system vs a subaru . so maybe its more the vehicle.

Overall they are good enough to run until worn out but I definitely wont be rebuying the same tire.

The worst winter tire vs all-weather debate.. I feel is true

Some of the newest all-weather beat the bottom barrel winter tires(in winter conditions).. Since we have 25 year old winter designs its not to hard to improve over some of the chinese tires or the oldest winter designs such as the cooper weathermaster+
 
Well I took them off for the season having travelled about 25,000km (15.6K miles) on them this winter and I have to say they handled extremely well. I also noticed that the Michellin all seasons the van came with are much noisier running down the road than these winter tires are. I was shocked.

The tread on the tire looks barely worn at all, although I didn't measure it I have a pretty good eye.

I would definitely buy these again for light/heavy snow, cold, freezing sleet/rain, wet conditions as they did extremely well and much better than my older X-Ice Michelin tires I owned previously.
 
Here is an interesting test of 7 studded tires (done by the Swedish magazine Vi Bilagare) that includes one studless tire, the Nokian R3.

http://www.tyrereviews.co.uk/Article/2018-Vi-Studded-Winter-Tyre-Test.htm

The R3 had the second shortest dry braking distance, but the longest wet braking distance.

The R3 ranked 1st on snow traction (acceleration), 2nd on snow braking, but second to last on the snow handling course

The R3 ranked next to last on the ice traction, braking, and handling tests (last place was a studded Nexen)
 
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