Gearheadotaku wrote: I'd give studs a try, but ask the locals what they use first.
I wouldn't. My proof are the local retards who think their all-terrain tires that are rated for mud and snow are awesome and they went back to them after trying winter/ice tires. 99% of drivers go to the local tire shop and asked to be hosed for all they are worth by the guy at the counter who probably can't afford to buy new tires.
Get studs. There's a reason in ice racing studs bump you up a class. I would never run them here because our roads are well plowed, but if I lived where you did, I wouldn't question it.
Used to have Studded tires on the back of our Aerostar (2wd), and it was great.
I have Genera Altimax's on the Miata without studs. They do a rather good job allowing the car to get up the hill at my moms in western MD without an LSD.
Up there, you are in the prime element for utilizing studs 95% + of the time in the winter. I would get studs in a heartbeat. Only reason I didnt get them for the Miata was the laws down here (dont think they are allowed even in winter downstate).
For Ice you cannot beat the traction of the studs. Think about it this way, they have separate classing for studded and studless in iceracing. They are worth your while.
For the road, the negatives are almost all related to driving on clear pavement. As you indicated, this does not apply to you.
I was up in the air between the B-stone WS70's and the Michelin Ice-X Xi3(or whatever it is), totally forgot about the Nokians. I'll have to do more research. Just going to stick them on the drive wheels this winter so I can get all e-brake dorifto everywhere with these crappy touring BFG's in the back.
FSP_ZX2 wrote: Nokian tires are the best of the best; they make studded and studless varieties. Where I come from, studded tires are illegal...but even the studdable Nokians left unstudded seem superior to anything else.
Yes they are the best but I do not wish to spend 550 dollars on 14" tires.
fidelity101 wrote:FSP_ZX2 wrote: Nokian tires are the best of the best; they make studded and studless varieties. Where I come from, studded tires are illegal...but even the studdable Nokians left unstudded seem superior to anything else.Yes they are the best but I do not wish to spend 550 dollars on 14" tires.
The link are for "R"s--their state-of-the-art studless tire. Others may be cheaper. For maybe an extra $100 over cheapies, its worth the margin of safety and averted frustration. IMO of course. You'll keep these for 3 seasons or so...so that money over time is barely negligible.
www.tires-easy.com has Noikan Nordman4 tires with free shipping. 16" for my car are $115 each.
What do the cops use up there? I watch the shows about Alaska State Troopers, and they seem to have those cars pretty much under control.
My personal opinion expanded...
Studs are slightly better on solid ice, but the actual amount of time you'll spend driving on solid ice are so rare. Getting a good set of blizzaks or i-pikes will be 90% as good as studs on ice, and FAR superior on snow and wet, which is what you'll encounter 95% of the winter.
Buying studs would be good if you had a lot of ice.... but after growing up in PA and ONT I can say that its very rare that you need studs.
We had studs for years on my wife's Tercel. Most of the reason they were good in the winter was because they were snow tread tires. The studs themselves made dry and wet performance downright dangerous.
Its like buying M/T tires for your jacked up SUV because you might take it offroad once, and then spending 95% of your time on the street. Studs are about as modern tech as tire chains. There is very little need for them, and good winter tires will do 90% as well, and during the majority of the winter when you're driving in wet, dry, or snow, the winter tires will outperform studs by a few million percent.
Put it this way... any diehard stud users that I've "converted" to Blizzaks have doted and thanked me for years after I introduced them to the more modern tech. There just isn't a comparison. Studs are for extreme ice only. A proper winter tire will outdo studs any day.
In reply to curtis73:
What about a proper winter tire, like the iPike or the General Articmax, with studs?
I grew up in Maryland, and traveled extensively in western MD and WV mountains in winter. The winter conditions in Alaska are completely and utterly different than back east. It's a lot drier here, so there's very little dense wet snow to drive through. For the most part the city doesn't plow side streets or downtown at all, parking lots are 4-6" thick hard pack or ice for the length of winter once the base layer gets built up, and while the main highways get down to clear pavement occasionally, they're still mostly two lane country roads with widely varying conditions vs the divided high speed throughways of the lower 48. It's also colder by 50 to 100 degrees here.
I wasn't overly happy with the Blizzaks I ran last winter. The plan now is to go with a set of the Hankook iPike W409's with studs (which actually cost more than the blizzaks, surprisingly), based on the recommendations here and from a local tire shop (Alyeska Tire). Modern snow tires, but with the extra grip of studs for all the ice and hard pack we get here. I'm going to wait until the middle of next month or the first snow to put them on so they spend as little time as possible above freezing.
Check Tire Rack - the highest rated non-premium winter tire is the General Altimax Arctic. Get them studded.
skierd wrote: In reply to curtis73: What about a proper winter tire, like the iPike or the General Articmax, with studs?
You can't escape the fact that on dry roads you are riding primarily on steel, not rubber. studs are a benefit ONLY on solid ice since they bite into it. On snow you want the design of the tread to fill, pack, and grab the snow. The slippery surface of the steel studs will do little or nothing on anything but solid ice. They will otherwise degrade snow performance. Since the studs will occupy a percentage of the weight load, and the traction between the steel studs and the snow will be next to zero, it will only hurt. If you anticipate driving a lot on ice, then get studs and deal with the horrific performance on every other surface. Otherwise, stick with a good snow tread.
There is a big misconception, too, that many people misunderstand. There are snow tires. They are designed with a block-ish tread that pulls snow in, packs it in the tread, and uses the friction of snow-on-snow. One such example is Firestone's Winterforce. Then there are ice tires with micro-sipes and a special soft rubber that tend to grip the ice like Michelin's X-ice. Tires like Blizzaks are a combination of both - ice gripping rubber with a tread that is designed to grip snow.
This website is a good comparison of that. This is Hankook's line of winter tires. The Novak line is a studdable snow tread that (in its own description) talks about a very hard layer of rubber for wear and for holding the studs. It will rely on studs for ice traction, but would be good in snow without studs. Then the I-pike shows the use of both; a snow tread that is studdable, but with a softer outer tread layer for ice if you opt not to use studs. The I-cept line is designed for dry, wet, and snow for lighter winters and is not studdable because of its soft compound.
Studs = ice traction. Nothing else. Tread design = snow traction. Soft compound and multiple siping = ice traction. It is my firm belief that a combination of tread design and soft compound (like Blizzaks) will provide you with 90% of the ice traction you would get with studs, but you would completely avoid the terrible performance that studs offer on every other surface.
One thing I will add... coefficient of friction between studs and ice tires is totally different. Slip with studs isn't a bad thing since steel retains its coefficient of friction by physically digging and grabbing. Ice-compound tires are more tradtional in that once you slip, you lose a significant amount of grip. Make sense? You have to drive studs differently than you drive ice tires. As long as you are comfortable driving ice tires like you would a race tire in the rain (staying within the grip threshold) you'll be fine. Studs you can drive with a little more force since the grip remains after spin happens.
Another winter tire tip that many forget.... get them skinny. PSI is your friend. Wide tires make a wide contact patch. Skinny tires make a long front/back contact patch which is good in the snow. To a very small extent, skinny tires also have a slightly smaller contact patch, meaning that you are sinking through the snow instead of floating on top of it.
In Ohio I worked a lot in new developments that never had the streets cleaned. With all the construction traffic throughout the day, over night the roads would become a sheet of ice. I was driving an Astro van and had a set of winter force tires mounted up. After sliding twice off the road I went and had them studded. That made all the difference in the world.
A couple weeks later on the interstate, I came around a bend and started noticing cars off in the median and off to the right. Traffic ahead of me in the right lanes were slowing so I dropped my speed a little and got over to the left lane. I slowed to maybe 40mph and proceeded on my way. As I passed the fifth or sixth car a lady in a mini van stuck her head out of the window and screamed at me to slow the berkeley down. It wasn't until then that I realized the entire roadway was a sheet of ice. The tires never even slipped. About a quarter mile up the road they had it shut down. It was shut for over three hours. Three people tried to get out and walk up the road and all three fell as soon as they let go of their cars.
I'm glad I had them studded, and would do it again.
The Winter Force is a snow tire, designed to be studded for ice use. It worked exactly as designed.
I was about to come in here and post to go studless. Then I saw that you live in Alaska. Yeah, I'd go ahead and get the studs unless I was driving something made by Abrams or Sherman.
Also, under aggressive driving, studded tires do not retain their studs very well. Re: ice racing Nokian 7's.
iceracer wrote: Also, under aggressive driving, studded tires do not retain their studs very well. Re: ice racing Nokian 7's.
I haven't loss studs in over 200kms of stage, including almost 100kms of gravel/ice mixture. Improperly broken in ones, sure.
Also, I'm on my phone right now, but I basically disagree with Curtis on a contextual basis for what the OP is asking. I'll reply in length this evening. TireRack has done extensive testing (and this has played out in my own anecdotal evidence) that studs are better. The traction of tires in all other situations people encounter on the road is so astronomically higher that handicapping yourself when you need the traction most is just dumb imo. Also, studs aren't THAT loud.
4 studded snows on the Porsche = drive it all winter 4 studded snows on the Porsche = Sloppy handling on anything other than Ice.
Most snow tires have really soft sidewalls (at least the ones I have used) When I burn this set out I am going back to regular snow tires. At least the ride on pavement will not be as scary and I can then justify a couple more snow days at home this winter.
I bought an XC90 a year or so ago, and it came with a set of 4 Goodyear Ultra Grip Ice radials. The combination of big fat Volvo, all wheel drive, an ignorant amount of traction control and those tires make me not even look at road conditions. Ice storm? What ice? Warm spring day? No need to worry about the shady patches. Need to drive down to Lacrosse Wi to a stock car race in October? 85mph on the interstates with no wandering or unusual tread wear.
Never in my 53 years have I driven on a better winter tire.
I use Cooper weathermaster ST/2 studded tires on my Mustang. The State roads here are salted so early morning commutes means lots of ice. I have no problem with dry pavement and braking seems better because on dry pavement the ABS doesn't engage in panic stops like it does on summer tires.
Last winter was the first time on a paved drive way and I did leave lots of spin out marks. I don't remember spinning out at all.
Don't forget the most important thing, weight in the rear. I run 2 to 3 hundred pounds depending on the storm.
Would Mushimoto ZX's do well in the snow? Heard they're very grippy.
In reply to pjbgravely: Adding that amount of weight
Only on a RWD car. disaster on a FWD.
In reply to iceracer: I know I was talking to the OP but you're right I should have added that warning. I have added weight to the front passenger side foot well of a FWD Saturn to keep it from riding up on the snow.
So in general:
1) have a dedicated set of real snow tires. Mount them on a spare set of wheels. Real snow tires make all the difference.
2) Are studs legal in your area? If not, problem solved. If so, what are your conditions? If you drive paved roads in flat or regularly hilly country, you're probably just fine with tires like Blizzaks or similar. If you drive where you're likely to encounter serious ice on hairpin turns with 100-foot plus drop-offs and no guardrails (like I do daily), I like the extra grip of studs - but they are noisy on pavement, stopping and cornering power are compromised, so like much of life, it's a tradeoff. I kind of cover the bases and use a real snow tire that is also studded, but I'm in an area that can really use them. If I lived lower, I'd probably go with unstudded. Both are good solutions, and way better than all seasons. Which to choose depends on your area, regulations and driving style.
Studs are great if your state allows them...but winter tire technology has come a long way and unless things are really bad outside, you can do OK without studs. Unless it's ice, of course. NO tire does well on ice.
The Nokian Hakkapeliitta R is a great winter tire...
http://simpletire.com/nokian-hakkapeliitta-r-tires
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