Snow Chains

[Shaun]

^^ I'm going to rush out and take mine off right now !! LOL

[Caput Mortuum]

If there's no soft stuff, they do precisely nothing for you and give you worse grip in the wet and on dry surfaces as there is less rubber in contact with the road.

So let me get this straight, according to your "tyre guy", winter tyres actually hold worse on wet and dry Icy roads than summer ones? He obviously knows nothing about winter tyres. Firstly, winter tyres are made of softer rubber compounds, thus having more grip in cold weather - regardless of humidity or other tarmac conditions. Secondly they grip better to any surface because of the small zip cuts in the thread surface, the biggest difference obviously is on hard packed snow and icy surfaces. The zip cuts will wear off quickly if used in high temperatures, so winter tyres should be switched off as soon as possible in the spring. Although, I believe the Central European type winter tyres are made of harder compound than the ones we use up here in the Scandinavia, so they can probably take the warmer weather better and will not wear out that easily.
Here in Finland most people still use studded winter tyres. Traction types were getting more common every year, but unfortunately last winter, and the start of this one, has shown that there really is no need to ditch the studs just yet.

[sicinius]

Where does it say they are worse on icy roads?

They ARE worse on dry and wet roads in normal temperatures because they put less rubber on the road due to the walls being less flexible and having throats and sypes cut into them and the winter tyres you buy here in the UK will be made of a harder compounds than the expensive low profile tyres fitted to Rocs though probably not harder than the average Kwik Fit Bargain.

[Shaun]

Where does it say they are worse on icy roads?

They ARE worse on dry and wet roads in normal temperatures because they put less rubber on the road due to the walls being less flexible and having throats and sypes cut into them and the winter tyres you buy here in the UK will be made of a harder compounds than the expensive low profile tyres fitted to Rocs though probably not harder than the average Kwik Fit Bargain.

OK, you have made your point and passed your opinion , dont buy any winter tyres and move on , now for me today i got up the hill on our road that i could not get up with the summer tyres on, that for me is a win and worth every penny.

The way i see it i use them while its cold and when its not i take them off (i have a spare set of rims for my winters), i then store these till next winter, then the same over the next few years, when i sell the car i either put them on the new car if they will fit, if they will not fit then i will sell them and get back a few quid of what i paid for them, all in over the next few years they wont cost me too much when all said and done , trust me .

[stuaz]

So glad to be living in Buckinghamshire atm, not snow at all, so don't have any problems lol.

[b0rk]

They work by giving you an alternating sipe and throat. The sipe is a sharp edge that bites into the soft stuff and the throat is designed to throw the soft stuff you've picked up away from the wheel.

If there's no soft stuff, they do precisely nothing for you and give you worse grip in the wet and on dry surfaces as there is less rubber in contact with the road.

You would be thinking about snow tyres not winter tyres. A winter tyre is formulated to improve grip in temperatures below 7deg C.... which is on average between 8 and 12 weeks of the winter season (nov - mar).

The basic tyres available are:
Summer tyres = designed to maximise grip in warm weather on dry roads
Rain tyres (very rare in this country, v. popular in tropical countries) = designed to maximise grip in warm weather on dry roads
Snow tyres = designed to maximise grip in cold weather on snow/ice covered untreated roads
Winter tyres = designed to maximise grip in cold weather on snow/ice, rain or slush covered treated roads
All season tyres = jack of all trades offering decent all weather performance that will generally be less good than a specialist tyre

[Caput Mortuum]

Where does it say they are worse on icy roads?

They ARE worse on dry and wet roads in normal temperatures because they put less rubber on the road due to the walls being less flexible and having throats and sypes cut into them and the winter tyres you buy here in the UK will be made of a harder compounds than the expensive low profile tyres fitted to Rocs though probably not harder than the average Kwik Fit Bargain.

Why would anybody use winter tyres in "normal" (summer?) temperatures?
My argument is, whether dry, wet or icy, winter tyres give better traction during winter months, even in GB.

[RoccoScientist]

You would be thinking about snow tyres not winter tyres. A winter tyre is formulated to improve grip in temperatures below 7deg C.... which is on average between 8 and 12 weeks of the winter season (nov - mar).

The basic tyres available are:
Summer tyres = designed to maximise grip in warm weather on dry roads
Rain tyres (very rare in this country, v. popular in tropical countries) = designed to maximise grip in warm weather on dry roads
Snow tyres = designed to maximise grip in cold weather on snow/ice covered untreated roads
Winter tyres = designed to maximise grip in cold weather on snow/ice, rain or slush covered treated roads
All season tyres = jack of all trades offering decent all weather performance that will generally be less good than a specialist tyre

Just to further clear up the terminology, here's a Finnish point of view:

Summer tyres = Designed to give good grip on bare asphalt, wet or dry.
Winter tyres = Studless or studded. Designed to give good grip on snow and ice.

And that's in practice the options we choose from. We do know of the European "winter" tyres designed for colder conditions, but since these are in practice only marginally better on snow and ice than summer tyres, nobody in their right mind would buy them for driving in Finnish winter. The term "snow tyres" in not used around these parts, since winter more or less equals snow, and as for all season tyres... Frankly, it sounds like a bad joke to me. You can either have good grip on snow and ice, or good grip on bare asphalt (wet or dry), but not both. Even the best winter tyres (as defined above), whether they're studdless or studded, perform notably worse than summer tyres on bare asphalt - even in temperatures around zero degrees Celcius.

[yellowplum]

A good resource (my German ins't that great hence the translation) - Also interesting how they rate cheap Chinese tyres as very bad. http://translate.googleusercontent.com/ ... bjwyDr8dtg" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;