The Winter's Coming Winter Tires Thread

[OutOfTheCube]

I needed new tires this year and decided to do All Weathers (with the mountain/ice rating, whatever it is) instead of Winter since I'm lazy and cheap with changing them over. Been pretty happy with their performance so far on a couple of dicey days, including Monday.

[kevman]

Originally Posted by Reggie28

Due to my current life situation, I might put 5-8K km/year on my personal truck. If I ran two sets of tires they would expire before they wear out.

Circling back on this, how long do people keep their tires before replacing if the tread wear is still fine? I'm definitely questioning the dedicated winters on our second vehicle for the same reason. Love the performance but don't love throwing out tires with 80% tread on them.

[CorsiHockeyLeague]

10 years is the limit. It's possible they'll show cracks before that but no matter what, replace them if they're 10 years old.

[PepsiFree]

If anyone is looking at Nokians and kind of put off by the price, you could also look at Nordman’s which are made by Nokian and are just older designs of Nokians tires at a discount. So, this year’s Nordman is equivalent to the previous 1 or 2 generation Nokian.

I think the numbers correspond, so a Nordman 9 is equivalent to a Hakkapelita 9.

[btimbit]

Originally Posted by TSXCman

Just picked up a set of Duratracs for my F-150 275/60 20inch. I was looking for K02 or Toyo Open Country, but the set I grabbed were so cheap.

I am now seeing that the tires I wanted are available for similar price. Would the K02 or Toyos be a noticeable upgrade over Duratracs?

Have run a ton of each

In my experience, the KO2's are a little softer, and better on ice. But there's not a huge difference. Certainly not enough to warrant swapping them once you already have the other

I'm mad at Toyo right now so no comment

[DeluxeMoustache]

Got some Nokian WRG5 a few weeks back. First time with all weathers

So far, so good. They are reasonably quiet on clean roads, and have handled well in this first dump of snow

[Andrew]

I have had several sets of Bridgestone blizzaks. Swear by them. New car 2 years ago went with Michelin x ice. Great on small sedan. New used car for spouse this year came with certified.... tread was good seems OK but I think go with name if I buy.

On all seasons. Had few new cars. Most came with general. One good year. From my experience you get what you pay. Bought some bf goodrich Goodyear Bridgestone Michelin Firestone. I find treadwear warranty better on Michelin and Bridgestone
They do repair if they wear out. Also if you hit curb lol hit a few back in the day expensive ones last.

[fotze2]

First time not having winters, not a fan of it, not at all.

[Weitz]

Felt shame having to drive in the back up vehicle on the all seasons today. Getting the winters installed this afternoon after having to cancel the appointment last week because of life stuff. I really should just get spare rims for it so I can do it myself.

Though I’d say this morning almost seemed better on the all seasons then Monday did on the winter tires on another vehicle.

[The Yen Man]

I actually think the roads were easier to drive on today than on Monday. I'd rather have snow than icy slush. Plus, it seems like people are at least more used to winter driving this morning. Not many strugglers, just slow and steady this morning.

[CliffFletcher]

It’s obviously better to have winter tires than all-weather. But from some of the comments in this thread, you’d think they were magical. They make an appreciable difference in traction, but it’s not night and day - lots of people slipping and sliding around in this weather have winter tires on. Traction is going to be bad in the deep, slushy snow we’ve seen this week no matter what kind of tires you have.

As for people not having them on yet, in mid-October the backlog for appointments was 4-5 weeks. More and more Calgarians are using winter tires, which means installation wait times are getting longer.

[bossy22]

Some Kal Tires have openings now. I ordered my sons tires on Monday, took the wheels in yesterday to get mounted.

[CorsiHockeyLeague]

I mean it also depends on your car, whether it's FWD, RWD, AWD, 4x4, how the weight is distributed, etc... so far this year I've been in my B7S4 with new Blizzaks and a 10 year old civic with new Blizzaks and unsurprisingly the Civic is noticeably less stable and more slidey.

[PepsiFree]

Originally Posted by CliffFletcher

It’s obviously better to have winter tires than all-weather. But from some of the comments in this thread, you’d think they were magical. They make an appreciable difference in traction, but it’s not night and day - lots of people slipping and sliding around in this weather have winter tires on. Traction is going to be bad in the deep, slushy snow we’ve seen this week no matter what kind of tires you have.

As for people not having them on yet, in mid-October the backlog for appointments was 4-5 weeks. More and more Calgarians are using winter tires, which means installation wait times are getting longer.

It’s been mentioned about a hundred times in this thread that the tire itself matters, and that not all all weathers or all winters are created equal.

[Fuzz]

Originally Posted by The Yen Man

I actually think the roads were easier to drive on today than on Monday. I'd rather have snow than icy slush. Plus, it seems like people are at least more used to winter driving this morning. Not many strugglers, just slow and steady this morning.

By this point in the week all the really bad ones are already in the ditch/repair shop.

[undercoverbrother]

Originally Posted by pepsifree

it’s been mentioned about a hundred times in this thread that the tire itself matters, and that not all all weathers or all winters are created equal.

101

[DoubleF]

Originally Posted by The Yen Man

I actually think the roads were easier to drive on today than on Monday. I'd rather have snow than icy slush. Plus, it seems like people are at least more used to winter driving this morning. Not many strugglers, just slow and steady this morning.

It was easier to slide the back out today IMO. and although traffic slow downs were worse on my commute, it seemed a lot more orderly with less people straddling multiple lanes than last time.

[DoubleF]

Originally Posted by CliffFletcher

It’s obviously better to have winter tires than all-weather. But from some of the comments in this thread, you’d think they were magical. They make an appreciable difference in traction, but it’s not night and day - lots of people slipping and sliding around in this weather have winter tires on. Traction is going to be bad in the deep, slushy snow we’ve seen this week no matter what kind of tires you have.

As for people not having them on yet, in mid-October the backlog for appointments was 4-5 weeks. More and more Calgarians are using winter tires, which means installation wait times are getting longer.

My wife disagrees and she barely knows anything about cars, let alone tires. She said our new winters were magical and amazing and far more stable than the previous set of winters. To her, it's more than just appreciable. It's absolutely night and day.

No one who knows their vehicles well are saying they're magical. Just that they know for a fact they can look at inclement weather like today with impunity. Some people's fear have them driving like ass on the road regardless of good or bad tires on their vehicle.

But perhaps studded tires is a slightly different argument than the wide range of performance in cheaper/expensive, older/newer and un-studded/studded winter tires.

[d00little]

Have a set of older (7 years), cheaper winters we are going to slap on the old Murano one last winter. Our main driver is a Volvo XC90 with new Hakkas.

After this season with the old winters, I was thinking of just going all year round with All-Weather Nokian WRG4's. How would those compare for winter driving versus older, cheaper winters? If the weather got really bad we could drive on the Hakkas.

[TorqueDog]

Originally Posted by PepsiFree

It’s been mentioned about a hundred times in this thread that the tire itself matters, and that not all all weathers or all winters are created equal.

All the Kijiji ads for winter wheel packages from shops like Good Tire that come with cheap Chinese winters are probably giving a ton of people who think they're all the same a good bit of false confidence on the roads.