Following discussion of winter tyres on this forum I decided to give them a try. I have recently been driving the business ford ranger 4x4 pickup and despite it being 4x4 its a bit of handful on slippery roads and i dont really like it.
Decided to use a seat Ibiza 1.4 runabout that we have instead. I managed to get a set of 15" alloys for next to nothing and cadged a set of vredestein snowtrack 3 tyres from our wholesaler.
I have had these on for a week and they are outstanding. Grip is excellent in snow and slush and good even on ice. Last night I had to drive the ranger and ended up sliding into a kerb on a corner and slightly damaging a wheel. Driven the ibiza again this morning and it is massively better and much more reassuring to drive. The only thing is to not become overconfident and also remember that other cars dont have the same level of grip.
I am definitelya convert to winter tyres now.
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Everything i have is parked up and only the wifes fiesta is being used,this car is 175/65/14 cheap new type rubber and ive had no problems ,i got stuck on a hill behind a corsa sxi that lost the plot and a vectra that just stopped dead but with a bit of left and right steering waddle managed to get round them safely.
I think the reason these cheap new are more than adequate mainly though is because they all have lots of visible tread grooves on them and so hopefully any compacted snow that gets in them is coming out again as slush (if that makes sense?)
Never ran a car on spiked tyres but never liked the old mud and snow tyres of yor either so have never bothered fitting them unless they were extra cheap in the summer months and the wholesaler was nearly giving them away so i fitted a few cortinas with them (i can hear the noise they made on a dry road even now).
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I used to have a Beetle fitted with XN(precursor to Michelin M&S) all round;it would go anywhere-even places where 4wd wouldn't go(but then so did my 2cv)-but it did make a lot of noise in the dry.
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Started to push a mondeo yesterday in car park at asda till noticed his front tyres were bald! & i mean bald told im so and left him struggling walked off in disgust!
Numptys should not have cars.
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My Alfa 156 is brilliant on snow and ice, it does not need snow tyres.
Even better is the Ford Probe owned by my parents
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Numptys should not have cars.
Or Children!
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Thanks for that WT. So if any of us decide to get a set of winter tyres. Without sounding thick is their anything we should specifically ask when talking to the tyre retailer. Also any idea on what they cost in relation to a normal tyre. Just expanding hopefully few questions raised previously on this forum.
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Interesting stuff, WT. I have another question. Like many here, I suspect, I'm considering winter tyres for the first time. Looking at Michelin's site and using its database search facility, if I ask it for summer tyres for my Volvo it recommends (among others) the Primacy HP in 91W rating that it has at the moment. If, on the other hand, I change the search to winter, it offers the Primacy Alpin but with an H rating for speed.
tinyurl.com/yhhwn5r
(Slightly messy view as I had to use the Print option to make the results appear in the link.)
Now I know (or at least hope) that no-one will be driving on winter tyres at 130 mph or more, and I certainly won't because my car can't even manage 130 in the dry; yet it came on, and must continue to use, W-rated tyres - presumably because of the T5 and R derivatives that can reach 150.
So what's going on? Do special rules apply that exclude winter tyres from the usual speed rating regulations? And if so, what's to stop me using the H-rated tyres on a warmer day and potentially exceeding their capabilities?
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Every car I've driven in winter in Germany has had a large sticker in the centre of the speedometer stipulating that the car MUST NOT be taken over 220 km/h (I think, might have been 230).
Apparently this is a restriction due to winter tyres not being able to cope with more.
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Yes, the winter tyres seem to be only available in lower speed ratings. I queried this with our supplier but was told that is all they supply and they are approved up to 130mph. I fitted the tyres to the rims myself and I did notice that they seemed thinner and lighter than a summer tyre. The rubber also is softer and felt almost sticky at workshop temperature.
The vredesteins are directional and have a deeper tread cut than a summer tyre. I dont know how much they cost because I got them free.
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Yes the winter tyres seem to be only available in lower speed ratings. I queried this with our supplier but was told that is all they supply and they are approved up to 130mph.
I've got Nokian winters on and they are V rated, as are many Vredestein winters.
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been driving the business ford ranger 4x4 pickup its a bit of a handful on slippery roads and don't really like it
Is that because its skittish without a heavy load WT? I know pickups can be a bit light at the back end. Interesting that you prefer a Seat Ibiza.
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I don't like it much with or without a load. I think it boils down to a high centre of gravity, very dead steering and oversensitive brakes. I find it a difficult car to drive smoothly. Its a pretty good workhorse, but rubbish in the snow. I actually had to take the damn thing out today and slid down a hill, more or less out of control with wheels locking and ABS trying it best to pull me up, but failing. Yesterday I slid across the road and hit a kerb with the offside front wheel and put a nasty ding in the alloy - was only doing about 5mph. Think it will be staying put tomorrow, my luck is running out.
I went around the same corner today in the Ibiza with the Snowtracs on and it was no drama at all, felt very planted.
Edited by WorkshopTech on 06/01/2010 at 18:51
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In Germany they say as a rule of thumb that winter tyres are defficent above 6 deg C ambient so they are not the ideal proposition for the average southern UK winter, though this is not the average southern UK winter.
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Driving in the Arctic circle one winter(north Finland)most RWD had studs all round but most FWD only had them on the front.
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And studded tyres rip up non-iced roads. We could not use those here. Not could you use ice-chains for long before needing to take them off.
When my brother went skiing often in Northern California, not only did you need snow chains to get to the destination but it made all the difference what you drove. So a Jeep with a 5.2 V8 was much more capable than a lowly 3.0.
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Here is a German AA (ADAC) winter tyre test result. Ill let someone else do the translation but a lower score is better (i.e. 1.0 is a better score than 2.3 and so on).
www.reifentrends.de/der-adac-winterreifentest-2009...l
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My Michelin Pilot Alpins have so much grip that it is actually great fun driving the car in snow. The grip is there, but if you want to have fun, give it too much right foot and the back steps out. Back off and it steps back into line - all nice and controlable. I can never have that much fun with 'normal' tyres!
My Merc has a speed limiter to set when using winter tyres, but my licence is too precious for me to be driving anywhere near 130mph!
My tyres are on a second hand set of Merc alloys off ebay, so I can swap them over when I want, and free of charge. The extra cost of using them is therefore minimal.
But the best bit today was wiping the smug grin off the 4x4 drivers' faces!
Edited by boxsterboy on 06/01/2010 at 19:17
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A colleague of mine has a ranger and he says it needs a couple of sacks of something in the back in these conditions.
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I have not got the space or the money to buy a spare set of rims so are Winter tyres ok to use in the summer or is that when they warm up and the rubber becomes sticky it will wear at an express rate?
Simon
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>>are Winter tyres ok to use in the summer?
Yes. I ran winter tyres over the entire summer (albeit only on one axle) in 2008. I had no problems. Yes, they may wear a little faster, and their grip level will not be as good as the best summer tyres, but IMHO, the difference is not significant.
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