The Winter's Coming Winter Tires Thread

[Fuzz]

I'm curious about the bleach...

[Amethyst]

Originally Posted by Fuzz

I'm curious about the bleach...

Old Saskatchewan trick. You pour it on the tires and it makes them sticky, to give you better traction on ice. Maybe not necessary if you have winter tires but I used some to help a lady who got stuck near work the other day and it got her out.

[Wormius]

Originally Posted by Fuzz

I'm curious about the bleach...

That stuff sounds like a list of items for disposing of a body, actually. The post is making a lot more sense now in that context.

[BlackArcher101]

Originally Posted by Amethyst

Old Saskatchewan trick. You pour it on the tires and it makes them sticky, to give you better traction on ice. Maybe not necessary if you have winter tires but I used some to help a lady who got stuck near work the other day and it got her out.

Ya... no way I'd do that. Racers do it, but it causes a chemical reaction and alters the tire rubber. You want to do that to your regular street tire?

[Amethyst]

Not on a regular basis, but it helps in an emergency.

[jayswin]

Originally Posted by Amethyst

That's the way I remember it, but I'm not going to waste a beautiful day checking.

Definitely not. Many rightfully claim that it's way better than all seasons, no one has ever claimed it's the same as driving in summer. That would be crazy.

[foshizzle11]

So is it better to buy winter tires just before winter to get good deals or can we find good deals now at the end of winter when they are hopefully wanting to offload some tires?

Any suggestions for buying rims for winter tires? I am doing research but I was just curious what the CP brain trust thinks. I would likely go with steel.

[Sliver]

Originally Posted by foshizzle11

So is it better to buy winter tires just before winter to get good deals or can we find good deals now at the end of winter when they are hopefully wanting to offload some tires?

Any suggestions for buying rims for winter tires? I am doing research but I was just curious what the CP brain trust thinks. I would likely go with steel.

Anything but steel. They look good for maybe half a season and will then look like trash forever more. Bad wheels ruin a car.

Look up Touren (my spelling may be off). They are barely more expensive than steel and won't look terrible.

[Ducay]

Tons of good options online from the local Canadian tire dealers for rims & tires. Agree, the $100 a wheel steelies save you is not worth it given they'll look like trash after a season.

Not sure winter rubbers are like other things where they get cleared out at the end of the season, almost feels like the better discounts and rebates are at the start of it (but just my guesstimate).

[btimbit]

Yeah better deals seem to be in October as far as I can tell

[DoubleK]

Originally Posted by BlackArcher101

Ya... no way I'd do that. Racers do it, but it causes a chemical reaction and alters the tire rubber. You want to do that to your regular street tire?

Soaking tires is the best way to get a DQ, and I guarantee they aren't using bleach.

[foshizzle11]

Awesome, thanks guys. I'll start saving my pennies for October!

Besides looking nicer on the car, is there anything else to buying aluminum or steel rims for the winter tires?

Anything wrong with spray painting them every odd year or is that not a great plan? Ie could put the rims off balance or something?

[Ducay]

Originally Posted by foshizzle11

Awesome, thanks guys. I'll start saving my pennies for October!

Besides looking nicer on the car, is there anything else to buying aluminum or steel rims for the winter tires?

Anything wrong with spray painting them every odd year or is that not a great plan? Ie could put the rims off balance or something?

Even painted steelies look like steelies, even ignoring the "best case" painted over rust and bubbling.

Back in the day when your option was $1000 a pop "MAGS" or steelies, sure, it made sense. With the internet and the plethora of cheap Chinese rims, it is a no brainer to skip steelies given the cost savings are now negligible.....

[81MC]

Steel wheels don’t have to look like ####. Personally I like the steelie utilitarian look much more than cheap, ugly, often ill fitting alloys, but to each their own.
If you want to prevent your steel wheels from rusting, it’s actually fairly simple and requires just a little bit of maintenance. Use a product like Fluid Film or similar, and coat the wheels when new. Maybe one or two more applications throughout the winter season. When you switch back to summers, clean the wheel properly, and apply a nice heavy coat of product.
Your wheels will stay very rust free for quite a while.

[Sliver]

Originally Posted by 81MC

Steel wheels don’t have to look like ####. Personally I like the steelie utilitarian look much more than cheap, ugly, often ill fitting alloys, but to each their own.
If you want to prevent your steel wheels from rusting, it’s actually fairly simple and requires just a little bit of maintenance. Use a product like Fluid Film or similar, and coat the wheels when new. Maybe one or two more applications throughout the winter season. When you switch back to summers, clean the wheel properly, and apply a nice heavy coat of product.
Your wheels will stay very rust free for quite a while.

Yeah nobody will do that. And all steel wheels look like ####.

[Sliver]

Look at these wheels for $99 each and compare them to steel wheels for $30 less per wheel. Why would you want to ruin the entire look of your $30,000 car to save $120? Makes no sense.

[WhiteTiger]

Originally Posted by foshizzle11

Awesome, thanks guys. I'll start saving my pennies for October!

Besides looking nicer on the car, is there anything else to buying aluminum or steel rims for the winter tires?

Anything wrong with spray painting them every odd year or is that not a great plan? Ie could put the rims off balance or something?

I decided that since looks are a big part of my car, I'd splurge and go for some sweet 'winter rims'. So I picked up some Braelin BR-O6's to go with the tires.

With my previous car, I didn't care overmuch, just had the winters and steelies. They got the job done.

IMO, there's no real noticable difference. My current set of winter tires look much better than my old ones did. Folks occasionally wonder how I can have such good traction with 'summer tires' ('cause they think anyone without steelies is only using summer or all-season/weathers, which makes for amusing conversations)

A buddy of mine spray painted and plasti-dipped his steelies to match his paint job. Looks decent, seems to wear well, and he hasn't noticed any difference from the 'unpainted' ones.

Basically, when it comes to winter tire setups...you do you, boo. If you are happy with steel rims, you do that. If you want to blow thousands on alloy, there are places that will happily help you with that.

[btimbit]

I find that cheap no name wheels like the ones sliver posted look worse than steelies

[Sliver]

Originally Posted by btimbit

I find that cheap no name wheels like the ones sliver posted look worse than wheelies

Hahaha what? There's no way.

[btimbit]

Originally Posted by Sliver

Hahaha what? There's no way.

Nothing compares to a nice set of wheels, but cheap no names or knockoff sets can make a car look absolutely crappy to me. I'd rather get steels because then at least it looks like 'it's winter, who cares' but also they're generally a much better quality than no name Canadian Tire trash that could crack hitting a pothole.

HOWEVER I say the best way to go is get a nice set of summer wheels and use your OEM wheels for the winter. No steels and no chinese knock off crap