Demystify winter tires

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I am considering purchasing winter tires for my Subaru. I live in northern NJ where snow tires are a "nice to have", but not an absolute necessity. Anyways, I have narrowed the choices down to the Altimax Arctic (studdable) and non-studdable Blizzak WS60, Conti Extreme Winter Contact, Dunlop Graspic DS3 and Michelin XIce Xi2. Many of the studless tires seem to have "wear indicators" when tread depth is at 50% and some have a high silica tread compound for the first half and and all season compound for the other 50%.

Do "studdable" tires require studs to be effective? Are snow tires useless when the tread depth wears below 50%? My goal is to mount them from Dec 1 to Mar 15 and to have them last 4 or 5 years. How is the treadwear on snow tires? I plan on "taking it easy" in turns to prolong tread life and my driving style is conservative.

Please help me make an educated decision.
 
Originally Posted By: Joe1

Do "studdable" tires require studs to be effective?

Not really. I asked a similar question a few months back when I was considering the Arctic.

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Are snow tires useless when the tread depth wears below 50%?

Maybe not totally useless, but their effectiveness diminishes significantly below that level. You may still be able to use them during other seasons though.

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How is the treadwear on snow tires?

Depends on the specific snow tires.

In my experience, their wear becomes accelerated if you run them on warmer days (like if you don't swap them out on time).
 
actually, most tires become less effective in snow and rain when the tread is below 50%. 2/32" is a joke unless you live in AZ or TX. IMHO
 
I had Blizzak's WS-50 for my wife's BMW for 5 seasons and they were great.

Being a snow & ice tire they were more agressive then a snow only tire. Look at tire rack, they do a decent job of showing the difference. THe Blizzaks had plenty of life after 5 seasons, and I sold them for 50% of my initial investment.
 
The main benefit of studs is on ice and icy conditions where a studded tire will typically outperform any other tire.

I got 50,000 km (30,000 miles) over 8 seasons on my last set of blizzaks. They were still good in winter conditions right up to the end and still significantly better than my new set of all season tires. There was approximately 1/8" tread left but the steel belts on one tire failed and I had a couple flats last winter.

In moderate conditions Blizzaks will do you fine and any winter tire with or without studs will outperform even the best all-seasons.

I just replaced my Blizzaks with studded Nexen 231 Winguards from Walmart. The Nexen's were significantly lower cost than anything else and have good reviews. I live in an area with 4 months of severe winter conditions and I have been wanting to try studs for a while. The studded Nexens are quiet but a bit squirmy handling wise. We haven't had any snow or ice yet.

http://www.bobistheoilguy.com/forums/ubbthreads.php?ubb=showflat&Number=1619034&page=1
 
Originally Posted By: tomcat27
... 2/32" is a joke unless you live in AZ or TX.


Or if you live in Southern California
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Since we don't have any rain from April/May till October/November you may be able to drive a car that has tires with less than 2/32" of tread with no loss of performance and control in summer here. We call those bald tires slick summer tires.
56.gif
 
Originally Posted By: Joe1

I am considering purchasing winter tires for my Subaru. I live in northern NJ where snow tires are a "nice to have", but not an absolute necessity. Anyways, I have narrowed the choices down to the Altimax Arctic (studdable) and non-studdable Blizzak WS60, Conti Extreme Winter Contact, Dunlop Graspic DS3 and Michelin XIce Xi2. Many of the studless tires seem to have "wear indicators" when tread depth is at 50% and some have a high silica tread compound for the first half and and all season compound for the other 50%.

Do "studdable" tires require studs to be effective? Are snow tires useless when the tread depth wears below 50%? My goal is to mount them from Dec 1 to Mar 15 and to have them last 4 or 5 years. How is the treadwear on snow tires? I plan on "taking it easy" in turns to prolong tread life and my driving style is conservative.

Please help me make an educated decision.


In your "optional" region, I have the following comments:

- I have heard and read amazing things about the Xi2. If they were made in my size, my snow tire decision this year may have been over long ago.

- I have heard that the Conti ExtremeWinterContact is a close match to the Xi2, but I haven't seen any written reviews so without proof I've taken this with a grain of salt.

- I would personally drop the Blizzak. If you're on dry they will wear quickly and I've heard many reports that they are the "squimiest" handlers when not on snow. They have a loyal and vocal fan base but many of those fans have never tried anything else and they may not be the optimum for what your need.

- I've heard that the Altimax are actually a previous model of Gislaved snow tire. This would make them EXCELLENT but if snows are optional for you, you certainly don't need studs. I'm in the same decision-making boat as you in terms of whether buying studdable tires without studs is worthwhile over buying purpose-built studless tires. I had a friend with studdable tires without studs and they were very noisy on the highway - partially because of the open stud holes in my opinion (no proof).

- I would add the Nokian Hakkapelliita WRG2 to your list. It's from Finland and of the same mettle as Gislaved. This is their "all season" tire for Finland but it still earns the severe weather snowflake for North America. They'll do very well in dry/wet conditions, give a fairly sporty feel, and still perform better than many full snows sold in the North American market. They're often used here as a "performance snow" too since they come H and V-rated. A friend of mine just put these on his Cavalier and despite not being a car guy he noticed improved wet/dry grip with temps in the high 40s than his all seasons.

- I strongly dislike my Dunlop WinterSport M3s despite them being top ranked by many, many people. This colours my opinion of the Graspics. They never even balanced very well, without even getting into grip. They do wear well and are very quiet, though.
 
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Originally Posted By: Craig in Canada


- I would personally drop the Blizzak. If you're on dry they will wear quickly and I've heard many reports that they are the "squimiest" handlers when not on snow. They have a loyal and vocal fan base but many of those fans have never tried anything else and they may not be the optimum for what your need.



The older Blizzak WS-50 was indeed a very "squirmy" tire. The newer Blizzak WS-60 has solved this problem by going to a different, less blocky tread design. On a heavy vehicle, I can tell no difference in squirm between the WS-60's and my summer tires. The WS-50's felt like you were driving on Jello.
 
Originally Posted By: Craig in Canada

- I would add the Nokian Hakkapelliita WRG2 to your list. It's from Finland and of the same mettle as Gislaved. This is their "all season" tire for Finland but it still earns the severe weather snowflake for North America.

Actually, the WR is marketed as a dedicated winter tire in Europe. Only in North America Nokian decided to market it as "all season", maybe because most people in here do only use one set of tires year round, so they thought they'd reach a wider target market. On the other hand, in most of Europe, all-seasons are generally frowned-up, so it makes sense that they didn't want to classify them as such over there.

Still, I agree with all your comments about them. Great winter tires. Had them on the Jetta in Wisconsin, and they were fantastic. Even during summer you could get by on them, as long as you didn't try to drive aggressively.
 
I have Continental Contivikingcontact 3 tires and after two seasons I'm extremely happy with them. They have the same rubber compound all the way to the end, so they will not become all seasons at 50% wear mark. They are also surprisingly quiet on the highway.

I would not buy Blizzaks, they are over hyped and were marked as dangerous by a Swedish review from few years back, they tested WS-50, so maybe WS-60 are different.

Tire review
 
Originally Posted By: tomcat27
actually, most tires become less effective in snow and rain when the tread is below 50%. 2/32" is a joke unless you live in AZ or TX. IMHO


Yes, even 4/32 tread depth greatly decreases traction on wet roads compared to a new tire, as demonstrated on this tirerack test:

http://www.tirerack.com/videos/video_popup.jsp?video=5

On a wet road, the tire with 10/32 stopped from 70 mph in 195 ft. The same tire with 4/32 did it in 290 ft, and with 2/32 it took 379 ft. The results with the pickup truck were even more dramatic: 255 ft at 12/32, 378 ft at 4/32, and 500 ft at 2/32.

Yet my buddy still thought I was wasting money buying new tires when I got to 4/32 on my RS-As.
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Northern NJ, I'd go with the Nokian WR Passenger tire they wear great for the traction you receive. And before I get jumped on by some people, yeah I know they are not a dedicated snow, but after 2 sets and 7 Michigan winters (I ran them year round therefore the two sets) I can recommend them as what I call a better wearing snow alternative. Keep them rotated and you can get 45-50K on them as a year round tire, and I replaced them befeore winter with one at 3?32 and the other 3 between 4 & 3. They are the Bees Knees in slushy rainy and snowy conditions, better that all season on ice, but not terriffic.
 
Originally Posted By: lobo11
Northern NJ, I'd go with the Nokian WR Passenger tire they wear great for the traction you receive.


A good compromise. A friend bought a Mazda3 last year. His plan was to use the factory RS-As until they were worn out. I told him that was a bad idea, and that he should get winter tires. If he didn't want to do that, I told him to get something like the WRs. I didn't even know he had been using them year-round on the Cavalier he just sold when I mentioned it. He said he was going to try using the RS-As, but the next time I saw him, in mid-winter, he had a new set of WRs and was happy with them.

I think he should run those year-round for the first half of the tread, then buy a set of winter wheels with dedicated winter tires and continue using the WRs as summer tires.

In cool weather conservative driving, I'd expect 30-40k miles out of winter tires before they're essentially all-season tires.

I don't believe studdable tires need to studded to be as effective as non-studdable winter tires. The studs are only effective in certain situations, so the rubber still needs to be good for a winter tire to function well. They do still achieve the winter snowflake rating without studs, though I don't know how difficult that is.
 
I believe that studable tires need to be studded to be effective on ice. Studless tires are a special rubber compound that stays soft when cold and molds to the imperfections in the surface to find grip.

Consumer Reports magazine just had a tire test which included winter tires. I'd use that as a guide. In any case, any real winter tire is far safer than the best all-season tire on snow.

Yes, all winter tires wear fast on dry pavement. That's the cost we pay for safety. I feel that winter tires give me an edge to get out of the way of some fool doing something stupid in front of me. The cost of a set of winter tires is about the same as one insurance deductable charge. I buy OEM take-off wheel on fleabay.
 
A problem is that many winter tires are so soft that at Interstate highway speeds in the dry there is no handling to get "out of the way of some fool". My Michelin Alpins (Q-rated) were like this. Above 100kph steering was a "suggestion". Local "Interstates" are usually flowing 120-140kph. I'm a little worried that Hakka RSis are going to be like this too (R-rated) and that's why I haven't pulled the trigger on a set.

It isn't ALWAYS snowy, especially in salt country, and completely losing composure in the dry isn't safe either. I can deal with some wear. My winter tires "dry out" before they wear, it seems.
 
There are a few of the new 'all weather' (as opposed to all season, which are really 'no' season) tires I've been reading good things about. The nice thing about these tires is that they can be left on all year, but still have the mountain/snowflake symbol, meaning they've passed whatever test the rubber manufacturers use to qualify a tire as snow/ice rated. This saves having to have a second dedicated set of winter rims (or the hassle of mounting and dismounting in the fall and spring).

Someone already mentioned the Nokian WRG2, I believe the others are the Yokohama W drive, the Goodyear Fortera (and regular) TripleTred and the Continental ExtremeContact DWS. There may be others I'm unaware of. No doubt the other tire makes will be coming out with a similar type of tire.
 
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Originally Posted By: Joe1

I am considering purchasing winter tires for my Subaru. I live in northern NJ where snow tires are a "nice to have", but not an absolute necessity. Anyways, I have narrowed the choices down to the Altimax Arctic (studdable) and non-studdable Blizzak WS60, Conti Extreme Winter Contact, Dunlop Graspic DS3 and Michelin XIce Xi2. Many of the studless tires seem to have "wear indicators" when tread depth is at 50% and some have a high silica tread compound for the first half and and all season compound for the other 50%.

Do "studdable" tires require studs to be effective? Are snow tires useless when the tread depth wears below 50%? My goal is to mount them from Dec 1 to Mar 15 and to have them last 4 or 5 years. How is the treadwear on snow tires? I plan on "taking it easy" in turns to prolong tread life and my driving style is conservative.

Please help me make an educated decision.


Blizzaks & the Graspics have the dual layer compound.
MIchelin Xice Xi2 are supposed to be really good, plus they are low rolling resistance---a plus for fuel economy.

I've had Nokian Hakapeliitta RSI, which the sipes do run deeper than others.

I've also had el cheapo Winterforce, non-studded, in NNJ, with many road trips to VT ski areas during snow storms, with little issues. They are fully siped down--- which causes more tread squirm.

This year, I am trying out the General Altimax Arctic (which is an old Gislaved Nord Frost 3 tire), of course unstudded in NNJ. Also, the sipes go all the way down, which also has more tread squirm on dry roads.

If you want to see what the Altimax Arctic looks like.... let me know. I am in NNJ

Treadwear: I get about 2 seasons, but that's about 15,000 miles per season.
 
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Nokian WR might be ok for occasional winter conditions like the OP mentions.

I tried the WR in an attempt to avoid buying dedicated snow tires and rims and I was not happy. They weren't great on ice even when new and the performance in snow dropped off dramatically as they wore out.

In winter conditions I rate them as one of the better all-seasons but not very good when compared to snow tires.

Someone please correct me if I am wrong, but I believe the snowflake rating does not mean much other than a specific minimum percentage of open area.
 
Originally Posted By: UG_Passat

I've had Nokian Hakapeliitta RSI, which the sipes do run deeper than others.


Was this on a Passat? How was stability at speed (ie. Interstates 60-80mph)? My Alpins went really floaty above 60mph and I don't want a repeat of that.
 
Originally Posted By: mva
Someone please correct me if I am wrong, but I believe the snowflake rating does not mean much other than a specific minimum percentage of open area.


The all-season "M+S" rating is based on percentage of open area. The snowflake rating is based on traction on hard-packed snow. It does not involve any ice testing:

"In principle, it guaranties (sic) that the tire conforms to specific performance requirements regarding grip in snow, and that the tire is specifically designed for driving in snowy conditions. The standard does not currently include a test for grip on ice."

http://www.apa.ca/template.asp?DocID=97

This article backs that statement up:

http://www.wheels.ca/Tire Talk/article/196342

"However, in recent testing carried out by Transport Canada, some tires bearing that logo had only as much grip as some all-season tires."

So I was probably giving the tire manufacturers too much credit, thinking that they'd optimize the tread compound on all their winter tires for all winter conditions, regardless of studdability. Really, test results and personal experience are the only way to know how well a winter tire will perform on ice.

I'd like to see a better winter-rating standard. UTQG ratings on winter tires would be beneficial as well.

Originally Posted By: Ken2
Consumer Reports magazine just had a tire test which included winter tires. I'd use that as a guide.


How did the rankings look?
 
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