Car magazine winter tyre test, all season tyre looked the best option - any views?

[Robson Valley]

Tungsten carbide studs work like ice skates.
100% false hope for an improvement in traction. Total BS.
The walnut shell is a million little sticky bits.
The tread blocks get you going and the fine sipes give you control.

Plus, TC studs were used here for so long that it's been easy to measure road damage.
The alpine tires are still built with stud holes and a big tire shop can add them for a price if you insist.
Check the legality in your region, first.

 

[demographic]

I've been self employed subcontractor working in building sites across Cumbria since 2003 and in all that time I think I've missed five days work due to bad snow.
Never had winter tyres, but also no stupid low profile things either, just normal van tyres.
I'd be utterly stunned if winter tyres would have made a significant difference on the days I missed as well

I think I can live with that work loss so doubt I'll ever bother getting any.

 

[Robson Valley]

What I describe is what we have to do. All 4 wheels.
There's a legal insurance requirement for alpine tires, October 01 - March 31,
for all of British Columbia highways and until April 30 where I live.

Truckers can get away without it by carrying and using chains for the hilly bits.
Special wide places are added to our mountain highways as chain-fitting bays.

Another bug-splat on the windshield of your life.

I'd suppose that I could run good all seasons patterns, all year, anywhere in the UK, and get along just fine.

 

[Janne]

Well, studded tyres work very well in Scandinavia, and I do not see why they should not work in Canada? Studs work beautifully on ice. Less so on dry tarmac of course.
Next time, get some studded Nokia tyres if you can get them in Canada.

Yes, the wear on the road surface is bad with studs, that is the reason the time we are allowed to use it is limited. During a certain period we have to use either studded or non studded winter tyres.
Also there is a maximum speed with studded tyres. In my days it was 100km / h.


It is well researched and proved that they work.
Having said that, I never missed a days work in UK during my 11 years there, I just drove very carefully and much slower than usual. All my cars, except the Defenders, had either Pirelli P Zeros or a Michelin, all low profile. Summer tyres.

 

[Janne]

As some of you Brits might travel to Sweden with your own vehicle for some real winter fun, remember that between 1 December and 31 March you have to have the special Winter tyres ( studded or not studded) of your vehicle. That is the law.
Should the Police discover you are breaking the law, the fine is heavy. Should you be involved in an accident, then you are in serious trouble.

Might be better to fly and rent a vehicle.

 

[Paul_B]

I've only failed to get somewhere once and the was up a compacted snow/ice covered hill to a national trust carpark. We turned back and went somewhere else. In a seat car with lower profile tyres than I'd owned before.

In my old astra and escort before that I drove in summer tyres in dodgy winter weather without serious issues. Very slow and scared stiff because of the blizzard conditions meant you could not see the lights of the car ahead unless you go closer than a safe stopping distance.

This current car is a seat and really is a dire car to drive on anything like winter conditions. Anything slippy on a hill I doubt the car would make it. I think a lot of it is tyre size and the car itself and winter tyres won't solve those points.

 

[Janne]

One trick I have used in UK ( sniw on summer tyres) is not to drive in the tracks other cars have compressed.
Drive just beside those, better traction.

For you that knows East Sussex, the hill from Jarvis Brook up to Crowborough can be difficult wintertime.
I drove there every day ( lived in Mayfield and then outside Five Ashes) and sometimes had to use that trick.

But the best tip (or hack as Daily Fail calls it) is to drive slow, on low revs and keep proper distance.

 

[Robson Valley]

I'll never buy studded tires, legal or not. They are skates, you can see the slippage on ice.
Can't in all conscience recommend them to anybody, not any more.

The fine sipe alpines with traction compound are far better.
Acceleration, braking and steering tests show that.
If not, they would not be a legal winter requirement for our mountain highways.
Less that 3% of British Columbia is flat.

I've spent a little time driving around inland from Whitby, NYorks.
Just summer mind you. If there was snow in there in winter, real alpine tires would do very well.

 

[Janne]

You do not see the slippage on ice with non studded tyres, but they do that too.

If they were no good, they would be banned, as they damage the surface of the road so much. But Scandi tests and research show the studs work.

https://www.autotrader.ca/newsfeatures/20170109/nokian-hakkapeliitta-8-vs-r2-first-impressions/
https://www.autos.ca/forum/index.php?topic=97949.0
Many of us rural swedes practice driving on tracks cleared on frozen lakes. Safe, fun. You learn how your car behaves.

Ps. The links above are Canadian as a link to a Swedish site is pointless!

For UK, for the normal driver, a quality all season tyre with at least 3mm remaining depth on the thread should be perfect!
For people driving lots of miles, a winter tyre is better.
Remember, the only extra expense is 4 steel rims and the mounting.

 

[Robson Valley]

I see that UK conditions change dramatically from south to north and can be wildly different over night.
Living there, I'd be researching wet condition rain tires before much else.

Tread depth is no use if the design pattern is wrong.
We have more paved roads that any Scandi tests.
Janne: Have you yet tried dancing along on 401 into Toronto in a blizzard?
Many people insist on doing it. Watch a You-tube of a 40-60 car pile up.

You won't notice any slip, driving some off-shore rice-burner.
TC studs are a very poor choice, given a choice = rubbish.
Idiots stand on the gas, spin their heated tires and melt holes in the ice.

I don't need ice racing, I have winter mountain highways to cope with.
My claim to fame is that I have been driving big, fast, powerful gas-guzzling rigs since I was 16 years old.
You learn fast to soft-pedal such foolish vehicles in winter. Might be some educational value in that.

 

[Paul_B]

Sounds like you're saying driver skills are most important factor in bad conditions.

Biggest skill is to know when to stop and use a hotel / motel. Just like it's a skill to know when to hole up or bug out in the hills. I can do that well in the hills but I still end up driving on our motorways, gripping the wheel tightly in fear, leaning forward like getting my nose nearer the windscreen will improve visibility but realising it's not the summer tyres you're most worried about but the fact you should not be driving on a motorway with truck drivers and 4x4 drivers and audi drivers who don't care they're in a blizzard with not enough visibility to see the vehicle ahead that's less than the safe stopping distance.

Long sentence but you can stop to breathe in the middle if you want to.

 

[Paul_B]

Aaargh! Fast fingers accidental press of the advert instead of post. A typically long post with uncharacteristically wise section and a funny bit to finish. And I can't possibly remember what I typed.

Something wise about skills being important. Knowing when to stop and hole up in dodgy conditions both on the road and in the hills. And a long sentence about how I have that last skill for hill trips when the conditions become dodgy but I end up driving on motorways on blizzards with truck, 4x4 and audi drivers driving along like they don't need to be able to see even as far as a safe reaction time sort of distance in a blizzard while I'm there gripping the wheel regretting not stopping somewhere earlier while leaning forward like having my nose nearer the windscreen will increase visibility.

And you can breathe in the middle of that last, shorter than it was originally sentence.

TLR
Driver skills v important
Driver stopping before it gets too bad
Winter driving similar to winter hill walking in that bugging out / homing up is very important skill too.

 

[Janne]

When slippery, start in second gear.
Can not get up a hill because wheels spin? Not even at lowest possible revs at higher gear?
Reverse up.
A trick we got taught back in the Paleo days.

Another thrick, outside the meaning of this thread is how to move a car that has stopped working and it is in a bad position ( road, crossing, roundabout)
Put in first gear. Use starter motor to move the car. Yes, it will behave like a kangaroo.

 

[Robson Valley]

You could have practiced here on hwy #16 last night in heavy wet snow and bad visibility.
Stop at my house and change your underwear. Apparently was 60kph and 4x4 if you got it.

 

[Janne]

In UK, bad visibility is the norm. I learned my lesson after putting a couple of sheep in sheep Nirvana on the way to work.

You should come down and practice aqua planning. Life becomes very interesting during a tropical rain
when you forget to slow in our roundabouts!

 

[Robson Valley]

Most of my vehicles would lift off and hydroplane above 110kph on summer tires. Ballistic trajectory.
Last time, I bought all seasons to chop the water and besides being new tires, I got the stability that I wanted.
I'd be very happy on those in the UK.

Our bitumen highways have to be hard enough to withstand loaded logging trucks.
Yet they have to be soft enough not to crack up from the worst of the cold in Jan/Feb/Mar.
The trucks do press channels, those fill with rainwater and off you go!

 

[Laurentius]

Surely no true bushcrafter has to worry about such things when they can cobble up something out of birch bark using there trust Ray Mears woodlore knife?

 

[Robson Valley]

Hell no, Laurentis. I'm sure that RM has a pattern you can purchase to carve your very own superior tread patterns
in baffed-out racing slicks from some long forgotten F1 tilt.

 

[Paul_B]

Plus a green , woollen smock to wear while doing it too. At a discount price of £550!

 

[Artic Bob]

i'm now on a set of Pirelli Winter Sotozero 3 winter tyres - only done about 1000 miles in them, but so far i'm very happy with their wet weather road handling.

i got them from MyTyres's ebay site - 316 for the 4 tyres rather than 500+ from blackcircles. they took 4 days to arrive and a local garage charged me 40 to fit the set.