Snow Tires - Narrower or Wider?

[1sttruck]

"So what would you recommend as a good all-around winter tire? I can't predict exactly what type of road conditions I will see, but in MI they will issue you a ticket if you get into an accident."

I'd look at some Nokians. I tried to get some for the truck last year but no one had the tire that was advertised as being available (Hakka LT, studded). The various Blizzaks usually get good marks for traction but with the traction compound typically being pretty soft and only half or so of the tread depth, some people only get one season out of them. As mentioned above the Michelin Alpins don't have big enough lugs for deeper and/or slushy snow. If you look at what people use for 'rubber only' ice racing it's usually Blizzaks or Nokians. Get studs if they're allowed, as they do make a difference on ice. With a RWD vehicle experiment with weight in the trunk, places like Home Depot have 'sand tubes' for such use, get some decent chains for backup, Laclede 'Alpine ?' or something (square material for links, diamond pattern), and take it easy.

 

[metroplex]

I have the Arctic Alpins on my T-bird and they're no good in deep snow. They're mostly for light snow (2"-4" max) and the directional tread makes a turbine noise on wet roads. Tirerack no longer shows the Arctic Alpins are for sale. :***:

The Blizzaks are rather pricey for 1-season tires.

 

[metroplex]

My Vic is RWD, just like many 2WD pickups. I don't see them hauling extra weight. It's the tires IMHO. I have just installed a Traction-Lok limited slip differential and I'm fielding it this summer, or you can call it shakedown time, in preparation for the upcoming winter.

I had Dunlop Graspic DS-1s for 2 winter seasons and it got me in trouble during the post-winter thaw when I hit a patch of black ice. I'm not sure if it was the busted TrueTrac LSD or the tires, but those DS-1s had horrible dry handling and traction anyhow.

If the WS-50s are so mushy, I may have to go with the narrower Dunlop M3 snow tires.

 

[Horatio]

this is a good discussion!

A few years ago, I had a couple of new Blizzak tires on our Honda on the stock size (185/65R14) and I wound up in a ditch beside a secondary highway just after one of our freaky heavy-wet early spring snowstorms we seem to get here at least once. I attribute my loss of control partly to the square-shouldered design of the Blizzaks not being able to cut the slush and snow that was left in long track on the roadway, partly to the fact the I had winter tires on the front only and mostly to the fact that I was driving too fast for the conditions, acting like a macho fool with my wife in the car.

I realized afterwards that around here, most the stuff we have to drive in that's potentially dangerous is deep snow and slush and not so much the glare ice so the copmromise I chose was a snow tire. The difference is that I went for one that was much skinnier than the stock size (Kumhos in 165/80R13) in the hope that it would slice through the slush and snow. I think I may have overshot the mark a little on the size; 175s probably would've given me what I want but I think I was on the right track; the ability to stop and start on ice is nowhere near what the Blizzaks were but they handle snow and slush much better. .

When I go for new winter tires I'm going to look for a good studdable snow/mud/slush tire in 175/75R13 but brand names escape me right now. Even though the performed great, one big problem I have with Blizzaks is that the porous tread they rely on only runs through about 1/2 the tread depth which means that you end up with an all season tire after a couple of seasons

 

[chas3]

with the open diff in my old truck i needed chains and weight (100-150lbs over the rear wheels) in the back to get anywhere when there was more than 5" on the road.

the new truck has an LSD. its also a quad cab so there is a bit more weight in the back already. havent needed extra weight or the chains so far. the LSD helps quite a bit.

a locking differential is another story though. typically they are not biased so both wheels will break free at the same time. you will need to take it easy on the gas.

its a good idea to know your limits so screw around in a parking lot after the first big snow fall.

 

[metroplex]

chas3: +1 I ordered the van with LSD and unless you tear a$$ in the snow, it can move around nicely. The older van had an open diff and climbing a hill became a daredevil stunt at 5 mph.

Also I forgot to mention that I did an experiment:

00 Crown Vic with stock Goodyear Eagle LS tires (OEM equipped crap), open differential. It would fishtail and kick in the trac ctrl whenever you tried to take off in 1/4" of light dusting.

00 Crown Vic with the same tires, LSD. It was driving fine in 1" of snow, I was in an empty parking lot taking curves at normal road speeds, stopping, taking off, etc... and it was very controllable.

Lockers/Spools are NOT recommended for use in the snow!

 

[Rev440]

Tire Calculator:
http://www.miata.net/garage/tirecalc.html

For 8 years I travel 100kms/62mi each way to work and back on most terrible highway stretch in all of Canada.
I go for stock width or slight narrower tires. "cookie cutters" hahaha

I like open differential the best.
My experiences I see the upside to open diff is great ability to drive around objects without the vehicle yawing and oversteer. Constant feather push on throttle I find I can pull out and pass vehicles on slushy road without the car rear end breaking loose causing oversteer.
Upside if you are on a roadcrown many times you can drive away without vehicle yawing and rear end sliding into snowbank or ditch.
Downside is if you stop in certain situations, launching the vehicle is difficult. One way I've got myself out of this is to apply the rear parking brake at same time I want to accelerate, forcing both axles to have sort of a "clutch" then apply gas. Its worked a few times.

I find with posi/traction lock I have taken chances of side slip/yawing. Posi trac is great for flat surface but not for leaning angles. You are parked on near glare ice covered shoulder and try to drive away, if you apply too much fuel pedal, then the rear of the vehicle can be pulled down the crown of the shoulder making the rear end hit the snowbank or ditch. with open diff, one wheel will spin.
If the governor lock is not working properly and accelerating at higher speeds then take chance in oversteer if you are overtaking another vehicle.

Tires:
In the past up until 4-1/2 years ago I have used BFG/Dunlop/Goodyear tires.
A local ice racer told me about the Pirelli Winter tires.
I check the pattern and looks very aggressive. I used them for 3 seasons and very impressive in slush and accleration. Braking is good and gives confidence.
Last two years approx I try the Nokian "Hakkapeliitta" and most impressive for sure.
The Hakka's I use are recent discontinued so I'm disapointed. The new Hakka's are called "Q".
I think Hakkapeliitta is translated to "confidence" in english. heh heh...

I now run Kumho KW19 winter tires year round. I look at every brand of winter tire and this Kumho is near a twin to tread pattern to the now deceased Hakka's.

KW19 rubber seems good durometer for "gription" and steering to avoid moose/deer. I run winter tires all year round and would not run anything else for my location. Nice confidence that I can drive around road obstacles without under/oversteer.


http://www.tiretrends.com/catalog2.php3?tireID=415

 

[javacontour]

quote:

---

Originally posted by outrun:
Narrower is better.

One way to think of it is Force/Area...the wider the footprint the higher the weight distribution. Hence, with a small footprint the F/A ratio is more advantageous. In other words wide tires turn into sleds on the snow.

That is what I have learned both from experiance and from Michelin & Bridgestone/Firestone Engineers.

As far as optional sizes are concerned in your case since it is a Full Size Sedan I would keep the fairly common 225/60/16 the way it is.

Most customers with the 225/60/16 stay with that for the winter tires as well.

The Bridgestone WS50 is a favorite of mine....hard to beat w/out converting to Tank Treads

The Michelin Arctic Alpin is also a tried and true performer.

---

I read that for a given air pressure, the contact patch is essentially the same size.

What the width of the tire does is change the shape of that contact patch. So a wide tire is going to have a wide, but not very long contact patch.

Conversely, a narrow tire will have a narrow, but longer contact patch. So this tire should start and stop better than the wider tire in snow.

Of course, there are other variables, tire construction, how much mass of the vehicle is supported by the sidewall and not the air in the tires, etc.

But that's roughly whats going on.

If you have a 3000# car, assuming equal weight on each wheel and a tire pressure of 25psi (easy numbers for this example) then each tire will support 750# and have a contact patch of about 30" square. The width of the tire just determines how wide that 30" square patch will be.

IIRC,

TB

 

[metroplex]

quote:

---

I like open differential the best.
My experiences I see the upside to open diff is great ability to drive around objects without the vehicle yawing and oversteer. Constant feather push on throttle I find I can pull out and pass vehicles on slushy road without the car rear end breaking loose causing oversteer.
Upside if you are on a roadcrown many times you can drive away without vehicle yawing and rear end sliding into snowbank or ditch.
Downside is if you stop in certain situations, launching the vehicle is difficult. One way I've got myself out of this is to apply the rear parking brake at same time I want to accelerate, forcing both axles to have sort of a "clutch" then apply gas. Its worked a few times.

I find with posi/traction lock I have taken chances of side slip/yawing. Posi trac is great for flat surface but not for leaning angles. You are parked on near glare ice covered shoulder and try to drive away, if you apply too much fuel pedal, then the rear of the vehicle can be pulled down the crown of the shoulder making the rear end hit the snowbank or ditch. with open diff, one wheel will spin.

---

Most of my driving is in stop and go traffic, so taking off from a complete stop is a necessity.
Also I found that an open differential will easily allow for oversteer while turning on mushy surfaces (the rear swings around) while a LSD (or clutch posi) will tend to keep the rear axles rotating at similar speeds. Worst case scenario that I have experienced is the car continues to track straight even with the wheel fully turned.
Also the one wheel traction is very useless when you start to drive through thick snow and that one wheel gets bogged down in deep snow. Even with snow tires, I've managed to get caught up while experimenting in an unplowed industrial area with the T-bird (open diff, 3000 lb car, RWD).

I agree regarding taking off from a stop though, the LSD helps out a lot. My experience with turning in the snow and using a LSD is quite different: I find that it exhibits severe understeer if the axles remain clutched up. On dry roads, I can feel sudden understeer kick in when I'm on the throttle in a curve with a LSD. Once I let off, the understeer goes away.

 

[1sttruck]

My 4x4 truck has an open diff, which I prefer to a limited slip, but I would really like a selectable locker. Maybe a 'zero bias' limited would work ok too, one that doesn't engage until I engage it. A limited slip works great on 'mixed traction' surfaces, like one wheel off road and the other on, some mud, snow, etc., but the way they're designed they'll get you into trouble on uniformly poor traction surfaces like sheet ice, or even lots of standing water on the road with marginal tires. When a tires starts slipping, which will often be when both tires are at the edge of acceptable traction on ice, the limited slip will 'throw more torque' to the other wheel, which again is on the verge of breaking loose, so what do you think will happen ? Both tires will break loose and the rear end will come around. On dry roads with good tires when you punch it with a limited slip you tend to just go, in the rain you tend to break the rear end loose. On mixed traction it just engages and gets you to better traction so that both re-engage, and you keep going. A brother talked to a state trooper in Alaska who was surveying winter accidents vs vehicle type, and pickups were often bass ackwards off the side of the road. Not only are they light in the rear, but I'll guess that most up there were sure to get a limited slip rear axle.

If you aren't on ice often a limited slip works great, but as I recall in the midwest bridges were often a scene of accidents in the winter due to ice forming. I'll also acknowledge that I'm part of a small minority who think that limited slips do have a downside in some situations.

 

[Gary Allan]

As 1sttruck affirms, a LSD isn't always a good thing. It naturally depends on your weight bias a good bit and your total mass. If you know what you're doing ..then it can surely be a nice thing to have. If you're not prepared for some side effects, it can be more of a hazard than a help. Ideally you would have a traction control that would figure everything out for you ...and then you only have to provide the appropriate tire for the conditions. Selectable lockers are nice ..but except for ARB or Oxlocker ..the electrics also tend to be geared lockers when not engaged.

(Dynatrac's "Electrictrac" is a Truetrac with spool like capability).

My best FWD setup was 4 studded snows that were on the traditional type snow tire construction (narrow tread). I've never used studs on a RWD setup ..but I would imagine that I'd kinda want them on all four wheels too..this requires (typically) another heavy snow tread for the front ..which is going to have it's own set of consequences in the "go" dept. You'll stop much better ..but will have more drag as well.

 

[metroplex]

What is your opinion of running truck tires on a Crown Vic for winter driving?

I am unimpressed with snow tires: they compromise dry performance and wet performance by providing 1-2 seasons of winter performance at a significantly high cost.

How are BFG All-Terrain T/A KO tires in the snow on a light 2WD pickup (the closest truck platform that comes close to the Crown Vic)?

[ July 06, 2005, 10:28 AM: Message edited by: metroplex ]

 

[1sttruck]

BFG ATs work great in the snow, ok on hard ice, but as bad as most tires on soft ice. We live on hill so getting to the development can be tricky, we live a steep street, and have a steeper driveway. During ice storms part of the entertainment is watching who gets up the hill, and how they do it. Year before last I watched a 4wd Jeep with BFG ATs go up and down when the snow hit, he still managed when the cold, 'hard ice' hit, but on warmer 'soft ice' I watched him stall in front our house and start sliding backwards. He managed to back into a curb and get it turned around, so that he at least slid in the direction that he was facing. Coworkers with BFG ATs on full size trucks also said that they had problems on ice.

The BFGs have nice voiding for snow, but they don't have rain grooves so heavy rain can be a problem, and they don't have as much siping as other tires. More siping still won't help on soft ice, as some of the coworkers mentioned above had siped BFGs and still had problems. But, studded BFGs should work great, and you can buy studs and stud guns online.

 

[metroplex]

People were saying studs are illegal in MI...

How are the BFG AT TA KOs compared to Blizzak WS-50s on snow or any snow tire for that matter?

There's enough salt on SE MI roads to feed hungry Mcdonald's customers for 5 centuries so ice isn't necessarily my biggest concern.