The Tire Question. . .

[OWC Jamie]

I found great reviews for similar vehicles as mine at TireRack and Toyota forums for Cooper tires.
I have Coops on one Toyota and Michelins LTX M/S on another.
I initially preferred the Michelins, but with some age and some hardening rubber on the Michelins I prefer the Coopers.

If users of your same vehicle at Subura forums recommend Coopers I'd use them.
I'd stick to your same model and year car though.
A tire test on a vehicle with different steering and road characteristics than your own has little value.

I'm in Eastern Mass, too and an all season tire is usually enough unless you're going to drive in heavy snow or on unplowed roads. I do and have Cooper Winter tires. Actually I prefer off road tires with decent siping to help shed packed snow in heavy snow but they can be rather noisy from the big aggressive blocks .

[Article Accelerator]

I like the Continental Extreme Contact DWS. I've owned them for a year (16,000 miles).

http://www.conti-online.com/generator/ww...ws_en.html
http://www.tirerack.com/tires/tires.jsp?...ontinental&tireModel=ExtremeContact+DWS

http://www.tirerack.com/tires/tests/test...p?ttid=124

• What We Liked: Exceptional snow traction
  
• What We'd Improve: We always want more of a good thing
  
• Winter Conclusion: This is a tire that delivers class-leading snow traction that's in a league above the other tires in this test.
  
• Latest Test Rank: 1st (winter)
  
• Previous Test Rank: 2nd (June '09)
  

[M A V I C]

I've heard good things about the Continental Extreme Contact DWS, but there are several other lines with a similar name and some of them suck. Just be careful to get the right ones and not assume that a similar name means similar performance.

[mrlynn]

FWIW, Tire Rack doesn't carry (or review) either Nokians or Coopers.

This forum thread has some interesting comments, pro and con, about Nokian WR G2s, which Nokian bills as 'all-weather' rather than 'all-season', because they bear the 'extreme' snowflake rating, while still claiming good results in summer.

http://www.snowtire.info/forum/viewtopic.php?t=440&postdays=0&postorder=asc&&start=0

There's there eternal debate over separate sets of winter/snow tires vs. all-seasons. Since I stopped putting dedicated snow tires on my full-size van (back in the '80s, I think), I've run all-seasons on all my vehicles. The only problems I've had is getting my RWD van going when there's light snow on top of pure ice. The FWD and the AWD cars generally have no problems.

On the other hand, it would be nice not to wear down the winter-deep tread in summer.

Here in the Metrowest area (west of Boston) the roads are generally pretty clear within a day or two of a storm, except maybe for some of the side roads in developments.

I'm trying not to spend many hours (days! weeks!) researching tires, but opinions are wildly mixed. Read the Triple-Tread reviews on Tire Rack, for instance. Some love them, some hate them. What to make of it all?

/Mr Lynn

PS What do the tire experts think of the 'asymmetric' philosophy of tire design, using different parts of the tread for different types of road conditions, e.g. on the WR G2:

Nokian wrote:
The asymmetrical tread pattern gives Nokian WR G2 the diverse properties needed to be an outstanding tire in any driving conditions. The shape and siping of the outer shoulder make the tire easy to handle and stable to drive on all surfaces, even at high speeds, while the inner shoulder ensures superb grip in winter conditions. The tire’s center rib features new 3D siping for better handling and stability on wet and dry roads.

[davester]

That Nokian quote is pure marketing fluff. There's no way to judge the performance of a tire based on whether or not it has assymetrical tread. It's just one of many design characteristics a tire has. To use that as a measure would be about the same as using the numbe of megapixels to define camera quality.

As to the diversity of Tire Rack (or any) reviews of any particular tire, it's blindingly obvious that you'll get a wide spectrum of opinions on any tire (and indeed any item where opinions are asked for). As noted by SteveO, separating the wheat from the chaff is relatively easy if you read with a critical eye, and if you look at the aggregated review results it is pretty obvious which are the good and which are the lousy tires.

[mrlynn]

davester wrote:
That Nokian quote is pure marketing fluff. There's no way to judge the performance of a tire based on whether or not it has assymetrical tread. It's just one of many design characteristics a tire has. To use that as a measure would be about the same as using the numbe of megapixels to define camera quality. . .

That wasn't my question. What I'm asking is whether dividing a tire tread into two—or three, or four—different zones, each designed for different road conditions, is a viable and valid approach to tire design, and can really accomplish what the manufacturer intends. Or is that just a marketing ploy?

Obviously any approach, zoned/asymmetric or uniform/symmetric can be done well or badly. The question is: Does asymmetric make sense? It would seem to, but then it's not as if in, say, slushy conditions one-third of the tread takes over and the other two go away—wouldn't they be compromising the first?

I expect that, marketing aside, there is an art and science to tire design. I wonder what the designers think.

Tire Rack is limited. Anyone know of a site that reviews more brands?

/Mr Lynn

[mrlynn]

FYI, this is an interesting tire/tyre review site, in the UK. Seems to be fairly new, so not a high number of user reviews yet, but they also summarize magazine tests and reviews, and they cover a lot more brands than Tire Rack:

http://www.tyrereviews.co.uk/Article/tot...-guide.htm

(Close the "Looking to Buy?" popup, which messes up scrolling.)

Here's their summary page on winter tires:

http://www.tyrereviews.co.uk/Article/201...-Guide.htm

Interestingly, they classify the Nokian WR G2 as a 'winter' tire. Nokian itself lists it in both 'winter' and 'summer' categories.

I am going back and forth on buying a separate set of wheels and winter tires, versus sticking with all-season (or the Nokian 'all-weather') tires. It has been recommended to me that if I do that, it might be best to use 16" rims rather than the standard 17s, as they will give the winter tires a narrower profile, which would be better in snow. Comments?

/Mr Lynn

[davester]

There's always consumersearch which does a comprehensive review of all available review sites. I imagine they're going to rely heavily on Tire Rack, which is probably the most comprehensive source of info out there.

[DRR]

M A V I C wrote:
[quote=DRR]
FWIW Hankook Icebears are a good winter tire at a great price. A big drawback though is treadwear which is relatively poor.

Keep in mind they made some big changes within the last year (I think.) Most people I know who used to like them no longer do. IIRC, that's because treadwear got a lot worse and they were running them year round.

I had a set of the "old ones" a couple years ago and still found the treadwear to be poor. Can't imagine how much worse it could be. They lasted a little over a season.

Running winters year round is a whole other issue...