amir was here

were pretty damn good??

they are both made of the softer compound....

Last year i drove around for a whole month with my nitto 555's (summer tire)...and the ONLY thing u gotta watch out is, leaving enough space for stopping..

while with the Toyo's, you cannot even drive STRAIGHT without wiggling around feeling like your about to lose control at ANYTHING above 20miles/hour

Plus the nittos were on my fwd acura, and the toyos are on my awd...

i just looked it up, and noticed my Toyo's are W rated, while my Nittos were Z rated...

Does this have anything to do with it?

The tread design on the toyos are much more aggressive than the nittos, but i thought that tread design had nothing to do with snow

thats all, just bored and wanted to make an observation, wonding if anyone would know why this is.

i have winter tires just too damn lazy to put them on, been telling myself to do it for weeks now.

amir was here

on the other hand, the nittos were plain SCARY on the rain, nonstop hydroplaning...while i've only hydroplaned once with the toyos in the rain

fuzzy02CLS

iTrader: (2)

I attempted to drive around last Christmas in NYC in the snow. I skidded about 50 feet, then parked it. The Toyo's Just are not for snow. I heard some summer tires can work ok. but not the Toyo's

ChadT

Even though Audis are all wheel drive they can be kind of jittery in the snow without good tires. Seems like you never know what the car is going to do.

r10apple

I have the same issue now with my Nitto's in the rain. Dry traction is great but after 5k miles, the VSA flashes often over 70mph on the highway, and from a stop, gotta baby her....

EricL

Tread design, rubber compounds ALL influence the ability of a tire to operate in the snow.

I've had good luck with the Toyo's in "moderately" cold temps over "patches" of snow in the local mountains. (Road temp down to approx. 40-degrees F).

Also, some tires have only one uniform tread compound, others have non-uniform tread compounds, and so on.... (For example, some tires change the type of compound based on wear, other will change the type of compound depending on WHERE it is located relative to the inside or outside of the tire, and so on).

IMO, the Toyo T1S should not be driven in a few inches of snow.

That tread design is basically used for good performance in wet weather (great for high speed driving in wet weather; it pumps out a lot of water).


Finally, the speed rating (W, Z, H, T, S, etc) has nothing to do with snow performance.

ex-prelude

"The tread design on the toyos are much more aggressive than the nittos, but i thought that tread design had nothing to do with snow."

I don't know where you got that idea about tread design. It's a very important factor in determing grip in snow.

Rock2534

the tread pattern is everything, you need the channels to pump out water on the high performance tires because they can not compress water, and the teeth to bite down, compact, and push off of the snow in the winter. Plus, the summer tire rubber get rather hard in the cold and become like plastic. Using those toyos or any summer tire in the snow is a risky bet in my opinion. Good luck though.

EricL

I don't know where you got that....


The compound is VERY important. You could have the world's best "snow" tread design (whatever that is), and if the compound generate a Cf (coefficient of friction) of 0.0, you're not going to be moving.

The Michelin Pilot A/S is a perfect example of an all-season tire that was "morphed" from a 3-season tire:

PILOT SPORT (No siping, no mix of "special" compounds):




PILOT SPORT A/S (All-Season)

"On the outside, the Pilot Sport A/S features a “three compound tread” that is made possible by the extremely precise capabilities of Michelin’s innovative “C3M” tire manufacturing process. The Pilot Sport A/S uses three distinct tread compounds. The first places a special high dry grip tread compound in both shoulders. The second is a balanced dry, wet, snow and cold tread compound that is used between both shoulders and the tire’s center rib. The third tread compound used in the center rib, has been developed to provide wet traction confidence"

EricL

Do you have listening devices installed in my place...

Rock2534

by the way, this has nothing to do with the thread, but how do you get the avatar picture to show under your name? i have been to the profile options and nothing works? any advice would be appreciated.

darrinb

eric l

do the toyos need to be warmed up to get sticky when its cold out side??

amir was here

thanks for the replies...

Eric, i considered "tread design" to be the "grooves" of the tire...i think i have misunderstood something about what "tread design" means, cause when i say it, again i refer to the design, the grooves, the lines of the tire...and last night, i ran into this post you made:

http://www.acura-cl.com/forums/showt...ht=toyo+winter

"The tread blocks are not that deep. And the basic “groove” design has NOTHING to due with how badly it is designed to work in snow. Give me any of the 3-season tires and some snow and you will be missing season #4 (WINTER) The compound just doesn't work on snow and ice -- period!"

From reading that, and thinking that groove design and tread design are the same thing...i came to the conclusion of saying " i thought that tread design had nothing to do with snow "

i thought it was just compound (material of tire) that made a tire perform better or worse in the snow...like you stated in that thread.

EricL

They actually work pretty well up in the local mountains (at least for me) even with patches of snow on the ground. The local mountains can have 40- to 60-degree F air temps, and colder temps on the ground with ice, water, and snow on various parts of higher elevation roads (Angeles Crest for example). There is NO hope on black ice, but the car will track -- with VSA ON -- over small patches of snow.

With the conditions mentioned above, I can get some heat into the tires – and it definitely helps. The minute there is a significant amount of snow, there is no way to get any "decent" amount of heat into the tires (my opinion). IOW, they will NEVER be all-season tires.

EricL

My basic point was: If you are trying to use 3-season tires in snow, you are going to be in for some trouble. IMO, the compound is more important than the grooving/siping.


Tread design has "something" to do with snow. However, if you took some tread design that was straight off some Blizzak or other winter-only tire and paired it with a warm weather compound that was really hard and slippery at 32-degrees F or lower, you would still have a widow-maker tire!!!!

I was trying to make a slightly different point in the earlier thread and you probably noticed the same comparison between the Pilot and Pilot A/S (all-season) that are in BOTH threads.

The "regular" summer/3-season Pilot has the same "basic" V/W tread patern to evacuate water that is used in the Pilot A/S (similar to a host of other tires like the Toyo T1S, new Goodyears, F1 intermediate rain tires, etc, etc, etc).

Read the "blurb" again that is sitting above that picture of the Pilot A/S; it clearly mentions the MIX of compounds *and* mentions the cold/snow compound used.

Final example: you could have a tire that had a million and one sipes in it with a shitty warm weather compound that wouldn't compare to a tire with a special cold weather compound with a few groves in it.

Does that help at all?

DaInFaMMuS1

i have yokohama a550V's on my 1st gen and they work pretty well in snow...dont really know if theyre and all season tire either

AgentDSS

Can summer/performance tires be ruined when used in bad weather (low temps/snow)? Can the rubber harden permanently and affect future performance when warmer weather returns?

ChadT

Don't think it will hurt them. Just not the best performance in low temps. Summer tires shouldn't be used in the snow at all but it won't hurt them as long as you can keep the car on the road.

ex-prelude

I also can't see how you can do any damage to the tires. But, you may experience temporary flat spotting, especially if you let the car sit in the cold for any length of time. However, after you drive for a few miles the tires will become round again and you won't notice anything strange.

EricL

They were/are an all-season passenger tire.

soopa

my nitto 555s are good in rain & snow. but they were terrible in rain for the first 2-3 months i had them

Bluto

When I bought my Sumi HTR Z II the dumbass sales person said the "A" temperature rating would be fine in cold weather.

The rating is the tire's resistance to the heat, not heat & cold.

I have not had any problemes with my 3 season tires in cold weather yet (low 20s). I did fine with 28 degrees and patches of snow.

EricL

Depends on the tire...

If you’re talking about leaving the tires sitting in a very cold, unheated garage, certain 3-season tires (and other tires) can have "flat spotting" problems. If the car sits for days and/or weeks, certain brands of tires will develop really bad "flat spots". The "flat spots" generally go away with a few miles of driving. In some cases, they will have to replace the tires; it depends on numerous factors.

As for destroying tires just by running them in the snow ... well, if you’re worried, call the manufacturer...

YMMV

EricL

I'm stating to think that it's now a prerequisite to have a list of "sinker"/"bait" questions to positively identify sales-ass clowns.

Add your own test/bait questions/comments here:

For example: "Hey, I heard that those heavy chrome rims you got for sale help to keep the car glued to the road..."


Another water pump: