Swattie87
Well-known member
- Joined
- May 3, 2011
- Messages
- 5,765
Add one for the undercarriage washing. I don’t do it every week, but I do do it after every time it sees road salt. Wait a few days for the roads to dry, or it’ll be salty again by the time you get it home, but I think it makes a big difference.
As far as traction in snow, stopping and turning are more important than being able to accelerate from a stop, unless you can’t initiate forward motion at all. In that sense, traction, outside of initiating motion - yes AWD or 4WD is a big help for that, is otherwise largely a function of tires…
Summer tires are horrendous.
“All-seasons” are passable at their best - brand new, a relatively soft compound, and a tire with more aggressive siping.
All-terrains have a reputation of being good in snow, but this isn’t always the case. Some are quite good and can approach legitimate Winter tires. Others won’t perform any better than the better all seasons out there. These are a popular choice for body on frame trucks and SUV’s, for good reason. They cover a lot of different bases well. Just be sure to do your research if good snow performance is one of your priorities.
“All weather” tires are a bit of an emerging genre, and have a lot of pluses. Basically a Winter tread pattern, with a compound just hard enough to run year round, but not as hard as all seasons, or as soft as legit Winter tires. These have very good snow performance and are probably a good choice for many north of the Mason Dixon or so who don’t want to deal with swapping out tires. I had a pair on a Crosstrek and they did everything well. Were very good in snow, liveable in terms of noise and wet performance the rest of the year, and had good tread life.
Legitimate Winter tires. These are awesome in the snow. I’ve had them on three different FWD commuter sedans and the traction was unreal. It was difficult to even make them slide, unless you were being a real ***. Downside is if you run them in temps over about 50F you’ll melt them off, so you gotta swap em’ out. Bridgestone Blizzaks. Legendary status in the snow tire community. To illustrate the difference, on a Camry with Blizzaks I felt I could comfortably do 55 mph on a light snow covered road. Think highways that are being plowed regularly and the snow is continually coating them, but not really accumulating much. I once got into a good early snow on my all-seasons before I swapped to my Winter tires. I couldn’t do 30 confidently, in essentially the same conditions. Took me nearly 3 hours to drive to work (61 miles) that day.
Besides having good tires, the best thing you can do to help your tires is to only ask them to do one of the following three at any one time…accelerate/decelerate/turn. For practical purposes, this means if you’re turning, try to be doing it without your foot on either pedal. Slow down before the turn while still going straight, and wait to accelerate until your wheel is straight again.
As far as traction in snow, stopping and turning are more important than being able to accelerate from a stop, unless you can’t initiate forward motion at all. In that sense, traction, outside of initiating motion - yes AWD or 4WD is a big help for that, is otherwise largely a function of tires…
Summer tires are horrendous.
“All-seasons” are passable at their best - brand new, a relatively soft compound, and a tire with more aggressive siping.
All-terrains have a reputation of being good in snow, but this isn’t always the case. Some are quite good and can approach legitimate Winter tires. Others won’t perform any better than the better all seasons out there. These are a popular choice for body on frame trucks and SUV’s, for good reason. They cover a lot of different bases well. Just be sure to do your research if good snow performance is one of your priorities.
“All weather” tires are a bit of an emerging genre, and have a lot of pluses. Basically a Winter tread pattern, with a compound just hard enough to run year round, but not as hard as all seasons, or as soft as legit Winter tires. These have very good snow performance and are probably a good choice for many north of the Mason Dixon or so who don’t want to deal with swapping out tires. I had a pair on a Crosstrek and they did everything well. Were very good in snow, liveable in terms of noise and wet performance the rest of the year, and had good tread life.
Legitimate Winter tires. These are awesome in the snow. I’ve had them on three different FWD commuter sedans and the traction was unreal. It was difficult to even make them slide, unless you were being a real ***. Downside is if you run them in temps over about 50F you’ll melt them off, so you gotta swap em’ out. Bridgestone Blizzaks. Legendary status in the snow tire community. To illustrate the difference, on a Camry with Blizzaks I felt I could comfortably do 55 mph on a light snow covered road. Think highways that are being plowed regularly and the snow is continually coating them, but not really accumulating much. I once got into a good early snow on my all-seasons before I swapped to my Winter tires. I couldn’t do 30 confidently, in essentially the same conditions. Took me nearly 3 hours to drive to work (61 miles) that day.
Besides having good tires, the best thing you can do to help your tires is to only ask them to do one of the following three at any one time…accelerate/decelerate/turn. For practical purposes, this means if you’re turning, try to be doing it without your foot on either pedal. Slow down before the turn while still going straight, and wait to accelerate until your wheel is straight again.
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