All season tires that are good for snow and ice in mild winter conditions?

Hi everyone,

So I moved to North East Indiana last year from the Wisconsin and I am debating what I want to do for tires now that my current snows are just about on their last leg.

The reason I am not thinking dedicated snow tires (and I have generally always run them in worse winter climates), is that we generally get a dozen or so real snow falls all winter long, and we typically melt out within less then 2 weeks. case in point the 12" that feel a few weeks ago is just about melted off completely because it's a high of 50 degrees today.

So that puts me in a situation where yes I will encounter snow and ice, but generally speaking there are many more days where we have bare roads that would wear down an aggressively sticky winter tire compound.

I'm also at the point where the car has 175K miles, and since I also need new summer wheels and tires I'd rather do this all in one shot and make this the last set of tires I buy for the remainder of my ownership of the car.

So can anyone else from a mild winter climate (i.e. Indiana, Ohio, Iowa, etc) chime in here?

If you run all seasons what are they?

How have they held up in moderate snow and on ice?

Relevant discussion.

http://grassrootsmotorsports.com/forum/grm/another-winter-tire-question/75861/page1/

Continental DWS. They work very well in snow, at least 2x better than all-seasons, and probably 60-75% as well as dedicated snows.

Avoid the Kuhmo 4-season tires( don't remember the model offhand). They were out of the DWS in my size, and these are useless in snow.

What kind of car are you driving in the winter?

PS: I love the GTI in your profile...jealous!

JohnRW1621 wrote: What kind of car are you driving in the winter? PS: I love the GTI in your profile...jealous!

Thanks!

I have a 2002 Jetta Wagon with a VR6 and a 5 spd. Sorry I forgot that to begin with.

I know of a 1 year old set of Firestone Winterforces that are within an hour of you but they will be completely the wrong size. They are 15"ers from a Buick LeSabre, mounted on steel rims.

DWS would be my go-to all season as well.

JohnRW1621 wrote: I know of a 1 year old set of Firestone Winterforces that are within an hour of you but they will be completely the wrong size. They are 15"ers from a Buick LeSabre, mounted on steel rims.

What size?

I would need 195/65/15s to just slap these on the steel wheels I'm running right now. For a cheap enough set of winters I'd just do that to get me by this year.

If I were you, I would look at these.
http://southbend.craigslist.org/pts/4171825166.html
Does the A4 share the same bolt pattern as Jetta?

Edit: research says Jetta 5x100, Audi A4 5 x 112 Drat!
Oddly, Audi TT is 5x100

LaSabre's are 205/70/15

Shoot too tall. :( I might email about the A4 wheels and offer them $175 without wheels. Worth a shot anyway.

petegossett wrote: Continental DWS. They work very well in snow, at least 2x better than all-seasons, and probably 60-75% as well as dedicated snows. Avoid the Kuhmo 4-season tires( don't remember the model offhand). They were out of the DWS in my size, and these are useless in snow.

+1. I actually live in WI and have DWS on my Subaru XT turbo. Short of the insanely expensive (but very, very good) Nokian WR G2, the DWS is the only tire I have ever bought that even comes close to being a true "all season" tire. Both are significantly better in the snow than your typical all season, with the WR getting a slight edge; neither is really comparable to a real snow tire on ice, which is where the fancy silicate compounds (or studs) shine through.

Central Indy here. I've had great luck with Kumho Platinum LX and the 4X.

Driving in 50* weather on snows wont wear them out, actually that's about how cold it needs to be to bother putting them on.

You can even run them on the track http://www.roadandtrack.com/car-reviews/winter-tires-track-tested

Here's another vote from the Hoosier state for the Conti DWS.

Jeff

A "winter tire" has a tread compound that stays flexible in below freezing temperatures, unlike so called "all season tires. So they are more than just snow tires.

In a recent trip up to VT and their ice storm, I was able to drive 15 to 20 mph faster on the interstate than every one else with my Blizzaks.

Here in Mass I've had good result in both snow and ice with the Continental Pure Contact on my Hundai Elantra.

If you only want to think about no season tires, then I would get the DWS. I bought the RE970 AS last winter after debating between the Continental and Bridgestones (the Pilot Sport AS didn't exist then) and they are extremely hard in cold weather and almost dangerous in slush. The DWS has softer sidewalls and is overall less responsive, but that makes it a better winter tire. I put 20k miles on the Bridgestones since then and bought a dedicated winter wheel set with Dunlop WinterMaxx tires after the first snowfall. After 20k miles the 970AS' were terrible. I nearly rear ended a cop because it would not stop from ~5mph in rather mild slushy conditions.

I would suggest the DWS as well, but a good alternative that came on the P5 so far has been the Goodyear Eagle GT's

In reply to JtspellS:

I put those on my wifes 99 grand prix, I wasn't impressed, wore out too fast and traction was low. Never had them in the snow but from my experience I wouldn't recommend them.

In reply to nicksta43:

I had a set of the Eagle GT's on my Cooper S at one point, they were junk. I'd never recommend them.

Contradiction, The Nokian WRG3 would be ideal for you situation but they are fairly pricey. The Continental DWS was rated "poor" (big black circle) by consumer reports for snow traction but TireRack says they are outstanding.

In terms of dedicated winter tires, I've found that the Michelin XI3 wears much slower than the Blizzaks and is far superior on clear roads.

Next winter I am going to run Nokian WRG3s with Michelin Pilot Super Sports in the summer. If you PM me your e-mail adress I will send you the consumer reports tire ratings (with snow traction ratings).

Atomobile Magazine published an article on the DWS versus Blizzaks http://www.automobilemag.com/features/news/1211_rubber_matter_tires_test/

I have the X-Ice's on my Hyundai, and even in their 3rd year(probably 30kmi on them) they're still pretty damn good. And I drive hard, bad weather or not.

I've done 70+ through 5" of unplowed roads with the X-ice before. Their only shortcoming is they're not very good in slush. Still better than all-(no)-seasons.

Conti DWS gets my vote too. Best all-seasons I've ever owned.

I use DWS as summer tires on my Sienna. They aren't very good in West Michigan winters. The Tire Rack data says they have about half the traction of the real winter tires when new. They also seem to need some heat to grip. I wouldn't recommend them for a FWD car for any winter use. I also had some original X-Ices that never did well in winter, and Consumer Reports and others loved those. I always thought they felt more like a performance tire.

I am sure the Nokian WRG3 might be good, but they are expensive. Consumer Reports has them lumped in their Performance Winter category last time I checked. There are other UHP winter tires now with treadwear warranties that might be grippier alternatives to UHP all-seasons.