ruexp67

The key, as pointed out many times above, bears repeating: GET SNOW TIRES.

The stock tires are summer performance tires and only work well when they are hot. When they are cold, and the ground is cold they turn into hockey pucks. They get hard and have very little traction. They are dangerous in cold weather. Add in precipitation like snow, or even rain and they are even worse. Ice? and you might as well abandon the car on the side of the road.

"All-season" tires are a compromise between SOME decent summer performance and some decent winter peformance. They are "OK" but FAR from ideal. In a light, RWD car that tends to be tail-happy they are insuffient for use. gfunk said he used them, but keep in mind he was driving primarily in the downtown area where speeds are low anyway. In the suburbs speeds tend to be a little higher. I would strongly reccomend against going with all-season tires.

Good snow tires are an amazing thing. They WILL make a HUGE difference in the handling and stopping performance of the car.

That said, you can't fight physics and higher speeds and higher RPMs will lead you to trouble, even if you are rockin' snow tires. So keep the RPMs low, a good rule of thumb is that you should NEVER see VTEC between November and March. Drive like a granny, and you should be OK.

Keep in mind that even if you are OK, there are a LOT of morons on the road around you, so solid insurance is also great advice.

I'd also reccomend undercoating for the car to help protect it from the salt.

patinum

To add to that, I don't recommend all seasons on an S2000 in any weather. The S is awesome with summer tires in the summer, and decent with winter tires in the winter. All-seasons are a compromise year round.

K1ngfunK

Pete and Pat are right. Just because I used all-seasons doesn't mean I recommend them to everyone. I only had them because it was the only way my dad would buy me new tires for my birthday. Now that I have summer tires on my aftermarket wheels, I realize what I've been missing the majority of the year. Just take it easy, and remember in a few months you can go back to summer tires with far better performance than all-seasons year 'round.

jjost15

alright thanks and what do you mean by undercoating my car?

Almostlude

I'd highly suggest a beater... I just got mine..... If you can't swing it.... Snow tires are a must!

TRM04

I've driven my current S and my old one through Chicago winters. You really only need 2 things:

1. REALLY GOOD winter tires
2. A LOT of common sense.

Maybe one more than the other.

My cousin has a 96 SC300 5sp with no traction control and drove it with some low quality snow/winter tires and had nothing but trouble. I am running the new Blizzak WS60 and they are amazing. Often this past winter I was over taking SUV's.

DO NOT cheap out on winter tires!

Mountain-man

I've driven my S through 4 winters. Two winters with all-seasons, and two with Blizzak WS-50 dedicated winter tires. I will swear by the Bizzaks as the best winter investment I have ever made, and I will be puting the next model up the WS-60 on my dayly driver come winter.

One thing to keep in mind with dedicated studdless snow/ice tires is that you will want them OFF the car when the PAVEMENT is consistantly over 40 degrees F. If you don't swap them, you'll burn them out in a couple weeks. If you put them on in good time and take them off in good time and drive responsibly, they should last you three -four seasons. Another thing about winter tires, is they are speed rated very low. My WS-50s were rated to no more than 90mph on dry pavement.

The S will handle ok in light snow, but as soon as you start plowing the road with your front bumper, you've got problems. As some people have pointed out before, keep the RPMs low. Below 3k I've found is best. Dogging the engine and shifting early helps keep the wheels from spinning. Spinning the wheels, as fun as it is, will just make things worse as this just packs the snow into solid sheet of ice. Another thing that I would usually do is take the car out when there is minimal traffic like at 3:00 AM or something. Then play around with it and test the limmits at very low speeds. Test acceleration, see how long and far it takes to stop when slaming the brakes (ABS will kick in instantly) turn the car hard at about 10 mph or slower in a parking lot. . . . be creative and try different things. This will, in a sense, "calibrate" your mind to KNOW where the limmits of the vehicle are before finding out at the wrong time and place.

Underbody coating is great and effective way to help prevent rust, but there are some things you NEED to be very careful about here. First of all, if the car has been driven in rain for a few years, then there is a strong chance that water/moisture has already gotten into the chassis. Applying the underbody coating now, will only trap that moisture and water inside, therefore creating an internal rust problem that you can't see. Therefore Underbody coatings are only best applied to new cars, or cars that have rarely been driven in rain. My recomendation is to take the car through a touchless car-wash that has an underbody flush componant about once a week. This will take a good share of the salt grime off the car. But you need to be persistant. Have a bottle of touchup paint handy so if you get any chips, you can have them taken care of ASAP.

IBMcpa

if you insist on driving in the snow try and be extremely sensitive to any input you're giving that may influence the rear wheel rotation speed vs your actual rate of speed. brakes, throttle on AND throttle OFF will do this. if you feel your rear start to get squirrely, don't panic and just lift off the throttle - compression braking will increase the problem. make sure you feather the clutch as you lift off the throttle.

and like the others have said, don't be penny wise and pound foolish. a good set of dedicated winter tires mounted, then unmounted in the spring so your summers can go back on is going to run you the same as a 3 generation-old beater civic.

winter beater FTW!

Ike 2.2

A true beater can cost less than a set of good snow tires.

rustywave

snow tires, like everyone else said. dunlop wintersports are great.

des plaines and mt prospect...i wish i could remember, my commute used to take me through there everyday for over 3 years. from what i remember, mt prospect sucks really bad. des plaines is okay. however, if in your post you were suggesting you were hoping to drive w/o getting snows, then the answer is you definitely can not drive on your summer tires (if they are summer tires) during the winter.