Winter vs summer tyres - comprehensive review?
Discussion
There's plenty on the forums about the benefits of winter tyres in extreme conditions, but I haven't been able to find any independent tests that cover each of the following scenarios:
1. Â Â Extreme winter conditions - obviously the winter tyre will excel.
2. Â Â Intermediate conditions (normal winter, possibly damp conditions) - what are the actual benefits?
3. Â Â Fine winter conditions (dry roads reasonable temps) - how bad are winter tyres in comparison with good summer tyres.
Seems to me that everything focuses on the extreme conditions, but always ignores the "normal" conditions. Perhaps it's been covered before, but I haven't been able to find anything that covers the above.
1. Â Â Extreme winter conditions - obviously the winter tyre will excel.
2. Â Â Intermediate conditions (normal winter, possibly damp conditions) - what are the actual benefits?
3. Â Â Fine winter conditions (dry roads reasonable temps) - how bad are winter tyres in comparison with good summer tyres.
Seems to me that everything focuses on the extreme conditions, but always ignores the "normal" conditions. Perhaps it's been covered before, but I haven't been able to find anything that covers the above.
Dan Friel said:
Seems to me that everything focuses on the extreme conditions, but always ignores the "normal" conditions. Perhaps it's been covered before, but I haven't been able to find anything that covers the above.
You'll find, if you read a bit more, that the "winter" tyres work much much better then normal/summer when temperatures are below about 7 degrees - so basically mid-October through to March.In London it's above 7 degrees for much of the winter, so winter tyres here are about as good as normal tyres much of the time, worse for a decent amount of time, and a bit better for a small amount of the time.
There's no harm in fitting them here, but not all that much advantage either, and there's no way in he'll that they should be mandatory.
It'd probably be better in general to spend the money on some advanced driving lessons.
There's no harm in fitting them here, but not all that much advantage either, and there's no way in he'll that they should be mandatory.
It'd probably be better in general to spend the money on some advanced driving lessons.
HellDiver said:
NorthernBoy said:
In London
There is more to the UK than London.If I lived in Aberdeen I'd have likely posted instead about how useful cold weather tyres are for much of the winter there. Would you have posted a similar comment in response to that?
Edited by NorthernBoy on Monday 4th October 10:28
NorthernBoy said:
HellDiver said:
NorthernBoy said:
In London
There is more to the UK than London.I used to read the whole winter tyre thing from afar - and enjoyed the banter between the 'Tis all down to driver skill' brigade and the 'Optimum tyre for conditions' brigade.
Anyway, that was then. Nowadays I am truly converted. My friend and I took a drive from good Old Blighty last December (think frozen Eurostar trains stuck in tunnels - we got the last Shuttle out before the closures) to VW Wolfsburg, for a Factory Visit. He is a big VW buff and he decided he wanted to drive his 4WD R32 Golf to the factory from whence it came - so we set off...
Cue, massive snowfalls and temperatures as low as -18 degrees C in the Fatherland -
My point?
Simple, we were riding on the normal summer performance OEM tyre that ships with the 4WD R32 to the UK - and we could not go anywhere without major difficulty - how we ever got into the Town of Kassel without a major incident I am still amazed at to this day. I was astonished at the numerous BMW 1,3,5 series flying past us in the treachorous conditions and pulling to a controlled stop at every street corner - where, by way of comparison, in the 4WD Golf had to plan our every move about 5 minutes in advance. And we all know the RWD Beemers are crap in the snow - I have one.
With much head scratching - I asked one of the locals in his rear wheel drive 1 - series how the hell he was finding it so easy to get about - I drive a 1-Series in the UK and the slightest dusting of snow and you may as well walk - The German Local, who laughed at us 'Crazy Englishmen' the words "Winter Reifen"
Winter Reifen is German for, yes you guessed it, Winter Tyres.
So we booked an appointment in Reifen.com in the town of Kassel and had our winter reifen fitted to the car and the summer tyres stashed into the back of the Golf in tyre bags...
The rest is history as they say. The transformation from the Summer to Winter Tyres was like Night and Day. We could drive normally everywhere, pull-up at a junction without planning. Conduct lane manouveres without thinking of the Final Will and testament... and all that bum-clenching terror just dissapeared.
We returned from Germany - to a Snow covered Blighty. Where I tried to move my 1-Series BMW shod with Summer run-flats off of my mates drive in Tunbridge Wells - only to find the car would not get off the drive due to lack of grip. It stayed there for another week.
So there you have it.
I have ordered my Winter Reifen/Tyres already for my Beemer and they will go on - in a few weeks time when the weather has chilled a bit further.
Optimal tyres for conditions should always be on your car. Below 7 Degrees C - Winter Tyres are better suited. Not to mention Snow and ice.
Anyway, that was then. Nowadays I am truly converted. My friend and I took a drive from good Old Blighty last December (think frozen Eurostar trains stuck in tunnels - we got the last Shuttle out before the closures) to VW Wolfsburg, for a Factory Visit. He is a big VW buff and he decided he wanted to drive his 4WD R32 Golf to the factory from whence it came - so we set off...
Cue, massive snowfalls and temperatures as low as -18 degrees C in the Fatherland -
My point?
Simple, we were riding on the normal summer performance OEM tyre that ships with the 4WD R32 to the UK - and we could not go anywhere without major difficulty - how we ever got into the Town of Kassel without a major incident I am still amazed at to this day. I was astonished at the numerous BMW 1,3,5 series flying past us in the treachorous conditions and pulling to a controlled stop at every street corner - where, by way of comparison, in the 4WD Golf had to plan our every move about 5 minutes in advance. And we all know the RWD Beemers are crap in the snow - I have one.
With much head scratching - I asked one of the locals in his rear wheel drive 1 - series how the hell he was finding it so easy to get about - I drive a 1-Series in the UK and the slightest dusting of snow and you may as well walk - The German Local, who laughed at us 'Crazy Englishmen' the words "Winter Reifen"
Winter Reifen is German for, yes you guessed it, Winter Tyres.
So we booked an appointment in Reifen.com in the town of Kassel and had our winter reifen fitted to the car and the summer tyres stashed into the back of the Golf in tyre bags...
The rest is history as they say. The transformation from the Summer to Winter Tyres was like Night and Day. We could drive normally everywhere, pull-up at a junction without planning. Conduct lane manouveres without thinking of the Final Will and testament... and all that bum-clenching terror just dissapeared.
We returned from Germany - to a Snow covered Blighty. Where I tried to move my 1-Series BMW shod with Summer run-flats off of my mates drive in Tunbridge Wells - only to find the car would not get off the drive due to lack of grip. It stayed there for another week.
So there you have it.
I have ordered my Winter Reifen/Tyres already for my Beemer and they will go on - in a few weeks time when the weather has chilled a bit further.
Optimal tyres for conditions should always be on your car. Below 7 Degrees C - Winter Tyres are better suited. Not to mention Snow and ice.
Edited by nbetts on Monday 4th October 11:06
Where does this 7 degrees actually come from? I was looking for tyres online the other night & noticed the site I was on said 5 degrees. Surely, as with anything tyre related, there are too many variables to pinpoint a temperature, & what are the percentages of lost tyre performance under that temperature? Also, I was always lead to believe that the temperature of tyres increase when driving, probably not by much on your daily commute in traffic, but still, I've never seen anyone comment on this in the many winter tyre threads & I am interested in what the experts opinion is.
As I've said in other threads, I have nothing against winter tyres & I understand the safety aspects of them, but I do think there's a lot of daily mailish, we're all going to die under 7 degrees, type of attitude going on.
As I've said in other threads, I have nothing against winter tyres & I understand the safety aspects of them, but I do think there's a lot of daily mailish, we're all going to die under 7 degrees, type of attitude going on.
NorthernBoy said:
In London it's above 7 degrees for much of the winter, so winter tyres here are about as good as normal tyres much of the time, worse for a decent amount of time, and a bit better for a small amount of the time.
Not correct. It is indeed above 7 degrees during the middle of the day for much of the winter, but in the mornings, it is 7 degrees or below on most days from late November through to mid-March. Yes. I'm working on converting the autobild all season tyre test which included a summer and winter tyre, I'll link it once it's done but here are the headline stats you're after.
Snow: Summer tyre offered 48% braking and 51% of the cornering of winter
Warm wet: Winter tyre offered 90% braking and 95% cornering of the summer tyre
Dry: Winter tyre offered 83% braking and 97% of the cornering
Snow: Summer tyre offered 48% braking and 51% of the cornering of winter
Warm wet: Winter tyre offered 90% braking and 95% cornering of the summer tyre
Dry: Winter tyre offered 83% braking and 97% of the cornering
jon- said:
Yes. I'm working on converting the autobild all season tyre test which included a summer and winter tyre, I'll link it once it's done but here are the headline stats you're after.
Snow: Summer tyre offered 48% braking and 51% of the cornering of winter
Warm wet: Winter tyre offered 90% braking and 95% cornering of the summer tyre
Dry: Winter tyre offered 83% braking and 97% of the cornering
It's interesting that the winter tyre didn't outperform the summer tyre in warm wet conditions. The summer tyre obviously does enough of a good job of clearing water off the surface to allow the softer rubber to take effect.Snow: Summer tyre offered 48% braking and 51% of the cornering of winter
Warm wet: Winter tyre offered 90% braking and 95% cornering of the summer tyre
Dry: Winter tyre offered 83% braking and 97% of the cornering
IMO for 99% of the UK it's a better plan to buy one really good quality set of tyres so you don't have to,
- fiddle about changing wheels when the sun comes out
- find somewhere to keep a very large pile of unused wheels all year round
- spend a great deal of money buying two sets of wheels and tyres.
Oviously doesn't apply if you live in a frozen wasteland....
- fiddle about changing wheels when the sun comes out
- find somewhere to keep a very large pile of unused wheels all year round
- spend a great deal of money buying two sets of wheels and tyres.
Oviously doesn't apply if you live in a frozen wasteland....
NDT said:
jon- said:
Yes. I'm working on converting the autobild all season tyre test which included a summer and winter tyre, I'll link it once it's done but here are the headline stats you're after.
Snow: Summer tyre offered 48% braking and 51% of the cornering of winter
Warm wet: Winter tyre offered 90% braking and 95% cornering of the summer tyre
Dry: Winter tyre offered 83% braking and 97% of the cornering
It's interesting that the winter tyre didn't outperform the summer tyre in warm wet conditions. The summer tyre obviously does enough of a good job of clearing water off the surface to allow the softer rubber to take effect.Snow: Summer tyre offered 48% braking and 51% of the cornering of winter
Warm wet: Winter tyre offered 90% braking and 95% cornering of the summer tyre
Dry: Winter tyre offered 83% braking and 97% of the cornering
NDT said:
jon- said:
Yes. I'm working on converting the autobild all season tyre test which included a summer and winter tyre, I'll link it once it's done but here are the headline stats you're after.
Snow: Summer tyre offered 48% braking and 51% of the cornering of winter
Warm wet: Winter tyre offered 90% braking and 95% cornering of the summer tyre
Dry: Winter tyre offered 83% braking and 97% of the cornering
It's interesting that the winter tyre didn't outperform the summer tyre in warm wet conditions. The summer tyre obviously does enough of a good job of clearing water off the surface to allow the softer rubber to take effect.Snow: Summer tyre offered 48% braking and 51% of the cornering of winter
Warm wet: Winter tyre offered 90% braking and 95% cornering of the summer tyre
Dry: Winter tyre offered 83% braking and 97% of the cornering
The summer tyre also did a better job of aquaplaning than the all season or winter.
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