jetrep

Winter tires are probably optional in Detroit. Certainly most people around there will be driving on all-seasons. If you want the best possible performance and a better driving experience winter tires are best.

Say Chi Sin Lo

I've had Dunlop Winter Sport 3D. 90% San Francisco driving, 10% Lake Tahoe driving. They were amazing in Lake Tahoe, warmer SF weather... ehhh. (they're winter tires, can't expect much here). I think all winter tire will feel gummy.

I highly recommend them if you don't like Blizzaks.

I've spun out with all-seasons before, and I know it's probably overkill to have winter tires in San Francisco when I only go up to Tahoe maybe two weekends/month during the snowboarding season. But to me, it's well worth it. Because when you've realized you needed winter tires, you're talking in past tense already.

vader1

I am gonna be the dissenting voice here. On your RWD car, get some good winter tires. On the front wheel drive car, all seasons will be fine. Could you get stuck in deep snow? Yes. Is that a really rare event ? Yes.

I have Continental Pure Contact all seasons and they are just fine on snow on both my AWD car and my wifes FWD car. She is from Hawaii, so she is not the greatest snow driver, but the all seasons are just fine.

Drive slower when it snows, be very careful until you get used to it. Avoid driving during storms when you can, let a few hours pass, roads get plowed, everything is cool. If you are new to snow and you are passing people, you are doing it wrong. Go as slow as the slowest until you know what you are doing.

No sense spending the extra grand for a set of snow tires and swapping them out twice a year on the FWD car if it is not an issue. Sure, winter tires would be better, especially on ice, but if you drive a fwd car on all seasons in snow like a sane person you should be fine. I have done it for over 30 years and never had one accident in snow. 30 years in crappy, Minnesota blizzard-from-hell frozen-wasteland winters. Get em for the RWD, then if you want them and have the extra coin you can put them on the FWD car. And if you are driving all seasons on snow, just make sure you have decent tread depth, if it gets low replace them.

And good tires on any car beats bad tires on an AWD car. Big heavy SUVs on bad tires will slide that weight a lonnnnnng time before coming to a stop.

zeroptzero

if your vehicles have exterior temp displays always keep an eye on the outside temp, particularly in evening hours as you get ice melt and thaws in sunny daytime temps on many days , and then that snow melt freezes as the sun goes down. In early evening hours you can also get a dew/condensation forming on clear roads after a warm sunny day, that can freeze and form black ice which is often unexpected.

Get a weather app on your cel phones and watch for freezing rain alerts, freezing rain can cause havoc on road travel. As I said earlier fluffy and grippy white snow is not usually an issue, it's ice that you need to worry about. In 35 years of driving in all sorts of winter conditions I've never had a vehicle go off the road, we get a really good laugh when ice hits Georgia some years and they have a state of emergency.

On my weekly drive towards the Detroit region I've driven through some big snow storms, 2+ hours each way at highway speeds. On my drive I might see 10 vehicles in ditches who were over-driving for road conditions, I'd say 6 out of 10 vehicles might be rwd pick-up trucks, and 3-4 vehicles might be awd cars and SUVs, I rarely see fwd vehicles in the ditch. One phenomena that happens on highways is that rwd and awd vehicles will downshift as they approach a bridge or incline to maintain vehicle speed, and if they hit a patch of ice at the base of a bridge that sends them spinning into the ditch. I see that consistently in every snow storm. People with big pick-up trucks and awd cars and suv's also tend to over-drive for weather conditions as well as they have a false sense of security.

Canadian144

When I DD'd my STI in the winter up here, I was always on all-seasons, and thought it was "fine". When I was working in Boston and needed a car down there, I bought an FRS and a set of four winter tires, and it was just as good, if not better, than the STI on all seasons in the snow. After experiencing the difference winter tires make, I started buying dedicated sets for anything that sees snow. It really was a night and day difference in handling and stopping compared to all-seasons.

Chuck S

If you have a "proper" car you'll never need snow or winter tires. By proper I mean no high horse power RWD cars like a Mustang (etc.) or pickup truck. Neither I nor my family needed snow tires nor even considered them in the past 30 years in the NE Ohio snowbelt (I recall the average is 12 feet of snow per year) or the same conditions in North Country New York. Missed them maybe one or two days every couple of years. Wimpy snowfalls in Detroit and the west shore of Lake Michigan shouldn't require anything at all. And even in Cleveland, Buffalo, and Watertown (AKA Snow Town) NY they're a tiny minority. Roads are clean within hours after snow falls.

Roads are clear 'cuz they dump tons of salt and brine on them as soon as snow hits the prediction level. Don't drive any car you care about when that happens. Get used to the idea of buying a real Subaru (with 4WD) and wash the undercarriage every week. There's a reason Subaru sells lots of cars "up north." I know, we have three (3) of them. Just moved to Virginia last year and the university where my wife and daughter teach had 3 or 4 snow days last winter. Daughter had none in 4 years teaching in North Country, New York -- and never had snow tires on her Outback.

-- Chuck

NNY S2k

Get snow tires...I've had excellent luck with General Altimax....cheap, long lasting and great in the cold/snow.
Levi

darcyw

+1. I've had several sets over the years on multiple FWD vehicles and really like them
darcy

Say Chi Sin Lo

I don't understand why people are debating whether you need winter tires or not, especially those who live in regions with actual seasons throughout the year.

And what are you risking here, being able to tell people "Pssssh, I don't need no winter tires", or your live? You never know you needed winter tires until it's too late.

These are consumable goods, and you'll just end up with 2 dedicated sets of tire. You're not losing money by running dedicated sets. My old Bridgestone Potenza S-04 Pole Position lasted me 3 summers, and my Dunlop Winter Sport 3D has lasted me 4 years (with a potentially risky 5th year due to age). There's no way my S-04 would have lasted me 3 years had I ran them year round.

If your region approached 40F for a good part of the year, snow or not, use winter tires! It's not worth the risk to me.

It's better to be able to say: "huh, turns out I maybe could have gotten away with not having winter tires" or "Oh man that was a close one!"
...
Then to not to be able to say anything afterwards.


Sorry if this may come off as if I'm berating people, but I don't mess with safety. Sorry guys.

Mr.Matchbox

In this forum is a lot of talking about the right tyres for use on racetrack or best performance on Street, so i really wonder that a discussion about the benefits of winter tires came up?
If it snows, use winter tyres. So easy.

Here in Germany, use of Winter tires is finally mandatory by law since a few years.
Ale these cheapskates that came to the mountains in south germany in winter with their summertires ... Finally gone.
A set of two tires, wintertires on cheap steel wheels or alloys, change it two times in the year. Done. Easy. Cheaper than a new fender and bumper!
And, changing tyres with a impact driver is fun. You could feel like a race mechanic in Formula 1 and the sound of the air compressor annoys your neighbors.

My winter beater is a VW Golf MK III with Nokian winter tyres. Great. Tyre reviews, tests and ratings - Tyre Reviews