Good all season vs. winter tires

We've had our first big snowfall here and instead of the little amounts that we usually start out with, it all came at once leaving close to a foot of snow with little of it packed. This is our first winter with our car and I'm finding the all seasons it came with to be really inadequate, especially since we park the car on the road and have to get over that nice "hump" to get out of where we're parked...

Unfortunately our car takes a size of tires that is pretty expensive, so I'm seriously considering getting an all season tire that gets good reviews for traction in snow instead of dedicated winter tires. Main roads don't usually have much build up of snow in the travelling lanes or intersections once plows are out, or else there is a lot of sand down, so it's mainly immediately after snowfalls and then our side street that is the biggest problem. We've also never had dedicated winter tires, so it's not something that I've experienced before to compare.

The all seasons I'm looking at are the Goodyear Assurance TripleTred tires. I've read reviews on a few sites and they seem to have pretty good reviews as a whole with a few Canadians in areas similar to mine giving it good reviews with the caveat that they're good, but not as good as a winter tire...

So while I know that winter tires are going to be the best, is a good quality all season that has good grip in snow going to be adequate? Is there a better one than the TripleTred?

If winter is 100% the way to go, what brand is the best? Our tire size is 205/55/16 if that makes a difference.

Thanks in advance for any help. I'm a bit overwhelmed by the choices and reviews and while I've developed a few tires I know I wouldn't buy, narrowing it down further is more difficult.

All-weather by Nokian, maybe?


first thing that came up on google
http://www.canadiandriver.com/2003/07/15/tire-test-nokian-wr-all-weather-plus.htm just so you get an idea...

it was a hard blow, but we opted to get winter tires for both of our cars. i dont even want to think how much they cost us. but i can tell a big difference. luckily dh put mine on a few days ago.

is your car AWD? 4WD? if not, i would absolutely get winter tires. my car is AWD and we still got the winter tires.

its hard financially at first, but if you think about it, your regular tires will last longer b/c of less use.

You're up north, in Canada, with regular inclimate weather.
Get snow/winter tires. Hands down, they are superior in winter weather to the best "All Season" tire.

I had Goodyear as stock for my (new at the time) 1994 Dodge Dakota. I was NOT impressed. :thumbsdown: I had to replace them with 60% usable tread left b ecause they slid all over the road whenever it rained. I"m sure they improved, but it did leave a sour note with me. So you can take that into consideration when you read my opinion too.

Some things to consider.

Germany classifies All season tires as "summer tires". If they have M+S stamped on them, then they're still legal to use after a certain date in Nov. for GERMANS. Otherwise, they MUST switch to Winter tires.
"All Seasons" no matter what thanks to the SOFA, are legal for Americans, but it doesn't make the vehicle traction any safer. Purely a political/financial decision, not a safety requirement.
It's really scary how high the percentage of American driven winter accidents are in Germany.

DH just switched his M+S All Seasons over to winter tires last week. He already notices the difference on wet pavement between the two.

I think of all season tires as the same as a birth - convertible - booster all in one child seat. Okay for the different s tages, but not "great" for anything.


I had US All seasons on my Passat until last month. Switched over to the winter tires. Night and day when it's pouring semi-freezing rain. They're 'sports' tires, so the speed rating are identical to my other tires. I can't believe how well they brake & stick to the roadway on curves.

My mechanic located both sets of tires. 350 euros for the Passat. (BTW -- they were 205/55/16's also. )
150 euros for dh's BMW. Tires, wheels, & balancing included. Used, not new.

For the amount of driving and unknown weather conditions, its worth it to make our vehicles road worthy for anything that pops up. DH MUST make the drive to work if called in. 7 miles of windy snow covered roads. Sure, the autobahn is priority for clearance, but we've been in German snow storms where inches are falling in minutes. And if there's accidents, then it's B-50 for him, either coming home or having to head in.

That would be my suggestion. Go for the winter set o' tires. ... ask around. Call to 'vehicle recycling yards' or different mechanics' locations, check CL -- look for wheels that you can put winter tires on. The rims/wheels is where it gets pricey. Tires aren't too unreasonable.

It will save on your overall tire wear to split use between seasons. So you won't have to buy summer tires anytime soon either.

Be safe.

Trudy,

We have all seasons on the SUV and it's fine. It's not amazing, but I've yet to crash or spin... I drive to conditions, and I get there everytime. When I need some 'help' I put the truck into 4x4high and it gets me through drifts.

But with the car... dh's little car... we have good winter tires. And I can honestly say we'd go no where without them, literally.

I guess my point is that on an Astra you might actually need good winter tires, whereas on the Outlook you might get away with good all-seasons.

good luck!

Tripletred's are great for all-season tires. The only drawback I found is that they were noisier than the tires they replaced. A good quality snow tire will still be a lot better on snow and ice, though. I think the Michelin and Nokian snow tires tend to be the best ones, but also most expensive. Tirerack.com and Consumerreports.org are about the only places I know with reasonable ratings and tests, but they aren't foolproof. I bought top-of-the-line Yokohama tires that got top ratings on both those sites and find them to be very mediocre in all apsects. So have a lot of other Odyssey owners, apparently.

Trudy - it's your lucky day! I have much same-city, same-tire-size, SUV vs car, brand-you-are-considering experience to relate to you! I will try to keep my post semi-brief, but call or e-mail if you want to discuss further.

My current car (2001 Neon) and future car (2010 VW Golf Wagon) will have winter tires. Current winter tires are Goodyear Ultra Grip Ice. These are the best (after reading several reviews and talking to others) that Goodyear has to offer in winters and I honestly did not research further than what Goodyear/FountainTire had to offer when I bought them.

For my future car winter tire search, I have broadened my criteria. In my size (also 205/55R16), I have narrowed it down to (in no particular order):
- BRIDGESTONE Blizzak WS60
- MICHELIN X-Ice Xi2
- DUNLOP Graspic DS-3
- GOODYEAR Ultra Grip Ice

Also important to me is to get them at a place that will swap the (mounted) summers & winters for free each spring & fall and let me book an appointment to do so. So if I can't find that elsewhere, I may just go with the Dunlop or Goodyear, as Fountain Tire carries those. (I heard that Costco, who carries the Michelins, started charging $6 per tire per switch and you can't even book an appointment, so have to line up @ 6am!)

The Goodyear Assurance TripleTred you mentioned is what DH has on his 4x4 (2008 Jeep Patriot). Please note they are actually "all-weather" tires as opposed to "all-seasons" (you can google this). Their SUV/truck brother, the Goodyear Fortura TripleTred actually has the little mountain & snowflake symbol that all winter tires have.

Another "all-weather" that gets good reviews and has the mountain & snowflake symbol are the Nokian WR (only avail. from Kal Tire).

Now based on all of the above practical experience, I agree with those above who said that for a car, definitely get the true winters! This past weekend, even DH with his 4x4 AND his all-weather TripleTreds had a little spin and almost got stuck in front of our house. But my little car plowed right through!

I really wanted DH to get winters, but he had an unfortunate encounter with a tomato sauce jar in the Safeway parking lot, requiring immediate replacement of his first/stock all-seasons and he choose the TripleTreds, along with an upgrade to 17". I am still working on winters for him though, given that he now has 16" rims for his Jeep, just sitting on the shelf in our garage!

Using all seasons in our region during winter is comparable to forward facing at 1 year. It's legal, most get by, but you are less likely to end with disaster if you make the right choice (winter tires/rf). As the temperature gets colder the rubber hardens on all seasons, and your traction is compromised (even on dry pavement). Winter tires are designed with softer rubber that will maintain traction when cold. Once you use winter tires you'll never go back to all seasons :twocents: .

beeman said:

Once you use winter tires you'll never go back to all seasons :twocents: .

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So TRUE!!!

Get the winter tires. Last year was the first year that Quebec required winter tires by law and I recall reading that the amount of accidents during the winter went down because of it.

i drove out today after a snowstorm we had..there were about 8 cars off the road..i had no issues whatsoever and attribute that to my winter tires. they were awesome..i never even slid and inch.

I didn't read the other replies yet so forgive me if I am repeating, but a good all season is NEVER the same as a winter tire! You live in Edmonton, you need TRUE winter tires. The only tire I would say you could get away with that isn't a true winter tire but is a winter rated all-weather tire (meaning it actually has the snowflake symbol) is the Nokian WR-SUV. I've had them on my last SUV and although they were FAR superior to any all-season we've had, they have nowhere near the stopping capability of a true winter tire. Looks like Nokian has WRG2 SUVs out now as well, although I haven't looked at those so am unsure if they have the snowflake symbol like the WRs do.

My preference for SUVs is Bridgestone Blizzaks or a Nokian Hakkapeliitta winter tire. Personally, I am not a fan of the Michelin's.

Thanks for the thoughts. I never thought of checking used sites. I did a brief skim and see that people are getting rid of some tires that are almost like new. Of course I haven't found any our size yet, but looks like it's much cheaper that way at any rate.

I'm admittedly still somewhat on the fence. I think it's a case of 2 things - one I'm not missing something I've never had, and despite having had mostly small cars in the past - our Outlook being the exception, we've never had problems. The second issue is that I don't really think our tires are that great for when we get rainy weather either. And despite the reputation our area has for the cold, we get severe thunderstorms and sometimes rain heavy enough to flood streets. The actual bad road days are probably only 10% of the year if that... Obviously if we can end up getting tires cheaper this way, it buys some time to import some better all seasons from the US... looks like it saves at least $100 that way even after accounting for shipping and mounting etc... We don't drive enough km's that we've ever worn out a set of tires. Our Outlook is 3 yrs old this February, and we still have something like 60% tread remaining. So I don't know that we'll ever appreciate savings in terms of not having to replace the other tires as often.

Of course I know it all sounds like justification to just go with an all-weather tire. Which as it turns out the ones I'm considering as an all season are actually classed as all weather anyways so have the different types of rubber in them. Still, I realize it comes down to good enough vs. best, and I obviously have some talking to do with dh who has really been railroaded in to even changing the tires we have on the car now... But he didn't drive the car the 24hrs after we had the first big dump of snow. Which gives me some leverage.

Shauna - I might email you once I get through some more links and stuff.

Darren - Thanks for mentioning the reviews. I've been looking mostly at the tirerack.com ones, so it's good to know that they're reliable. I know you used to post a lot on an Ody forum - do you think it's worth asking on a Saturn forum as to what other people have put on their Astra's since it sounds like some tires have a large variance just between different kinds of vehicles?

Thanks for the thoughts. I am still entrenched in research, but hoping to make a decision ASAP. The longer I wait the closer we get to spring.

We've had the Hakkapeliittas and those are amazing. The Blizzaks are great too...right now I have all-seasons and I am really wanting my Hak's back.

Question about tread wear on winter tires - there is a used set in the right size and on rims for $250, ad says 50 to 70% treadwear left. What would that equate to in seasons? And are they going to be less effective with less tread wear on them? Some reviews on some of the winter tires say that they are less effective in subsequent winters.

Personally, I wouldn't buy used winter tires. Winter tires are often directional (can only swap front to back not left to right) and if someone hasn't been rotating them properly, there can be improper tire wear. Also, if they have a set of cheap rims (by cheap, I mean poor quality), it could compromise your safety.

A set of 4 tires for $250 seems dirt cheap which leads me to believe they don't have much life left or they are poor quality tire/rim set. I bought a set of winter tires last year (Nokian Hakka 5's) and they came to $1600 for JUST the tires, then I had to buy rims on top of that. Granted, our tires are 18" so they are going to be more expensive than 16", but still, you can see that $250 is cheap.

50-70% sounds like they aren't quite sure, and I'd bet it's closer to 50% which means half to more than half of their life is gone.

ETA: if you do decide to buy used, make sure you check the date code on the tire (check all 4 just in case). You don't want to end up buying a tire that's be sitting in someone's garage or outside in their yard unused for the last 5 years AND has several years of use on top of that. http://www.tirerack.com/tires/tiretech/techpage.jsp?techid=11

I've used winter tires ever since I started dating my husband, when he insisted on them. I love them and will never use all-seasons in the late fall/winter again.

I spun out in my 2001 Subaru Forester with my all-seasons a couple of years ago. My husband hadn't gotten a chance to put the winter tires on yet. Now we do it in November. He hasn't put his on yet and it worries me. He needs to buy a new set this year. Without AWD plus winter tires, most cars can't make it up our driveway once the ice starts. 2WD, forget it -- this is why I lose my babysitter each winter.

I've found a site within Canada that has some decent prices, so I think we'll probably just go with winter tires for now and then look at replacing the all seasons come spring.

From what I found on a Saturn forum, the Altimax Arctic seem to do well on the Astra. I also found that the Astra just does rather poorly in the snow because the engine is heavy and the car is quite a lot heavier in the front. So maybe some sand bags are in the future too. At least those are cheap.

We'll probably wait to buy rims, but that will happen eventually since the rims end up paying for themselves over the course of basically 2 or 3 change-overs.

Thanks for the thoughts. Sometimes it's hard to think "best at the moment" when repeating dollar signs are hanging in front of me.

Trudy, we just got winter tires, and they aren't bad...
I've always had all seasons....
They seem to be doing their job.
Bought them from CT and just had them mounted on out reg rims....

Shanora said:

Trudy, we just got winter tires, and they aren't bad...
I've always had all seasons....
They seem to be doing their job.
Bought them from CT and just had them mounted on out reg rims....

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What kind of tire did you get? And which CT did you use and how was their service? I know they can be so hit and miss...

Looks like we're getting our tires put on tomorrow. More than I wanted to pay, but this way we get them now instead of waiting on shipping and then getting in to get them installed. And we have a local shop who will honor the warranty. I had strongly considered ordering from tirerack.com, but I don't know that saving $100 is worth having no easy to deal with warranty and having to spend another 2wks minimum driving on the roads the way they are right now with tires that are horrid. And with the snow falling again and the weather getting even colder, they're only going to keep getting worse in the next few days.

So end result we're ending up with probably one of the more expensive options, but they seem to be rated well enough and it looks like this year isn't going to be forgiving in terms of the roads.