Hey gang, need help.

I know you are all busy w/ FC this weekend, but I'm stuck to cover the weekends at Bethesda Naval Hospital.

Got some tire questions.
I've contacted Jim, but wanted local's advice for this winter.

1. With the type of winters we have in DC Metro (unknown, but usually low snow/ice), how are the all season tires? performance? grip? etc? Anybody have these?

2. I'm not crazy w/ the idea of spending almost $1,000 for set of four snow tires, tax, shipping, mounting, balancing, etc. I can get it a little cheaper (- tax, - shipping) via military exchange tire shops, but it's still alot. Is it worth it in Arlington, VA commute to Bethesda, MD or should I just ride the bus/metro combo and just get up 30-60min earlier for about a month???

3. How about these used tire stores? I even saw one on the ad Universal Used Tires or something like that located off downtown Rockville. I called them and they quoted me $40-60 per tires w/ $15 for both mounting and balance, so that's significantly cheaper. But is it reliable? What should I look for in a used tire?

Any advice would be greatly appreciated.

Thanks in advance,

LT

 

I am going through the same mental gymnastics trying to decide what to do about tires as well. That is one of the things that I hope to learn by talking with others at the FCT2003 this weekend.

I am in the process of having a garage built and now that I would have a place to keep them, in a perfect world I would get a set of 18" aftermarket wheels and mount some "sticky summer sneakers" on them (perhaps a 30 or 35 Aspect ratio) and then mount a set of Bridgestone Blizzaks on the stock wheels and then when the weather was threatening go out to the garage and swap them out. That plan seemed great until my wife found out that it would be over $3K to do that.

I'll post what I learn when I return (assuming I learn anything).

BTW, you may want to surf around some of the other clubs that have simular climates and see what their members have to say. That is how I found out that in the New England Club Blizzaks seem to be the tire of choice. However, if we have a winter like last year with 4" of ground clearance tires are NOT going to be the issue.