mrdeeno

Hey, anyone know a "rule of thumb" to gauge the life of studless snow tires?

I don't want to wait until the treadwear indicators show up because I'm planning on selling them after this season, which is why I want to estimate the life left. I don't think the penny-lincoln head trick works because snow tires have deeper grooves even when worn.

BTW these are Bridgestone Blizzaks LM-22.

Simba91102

I think it may depend on the tire. I've still got my Dunlop Wintersport M3's on because they're just about toast (I'll be on the wear indicators soon) and I'll toss them after this season. The thing is, they still have allot of meat on them and it seems a shame, but I think it's basically due to the design of the tire. I had LM-22's on my TT and if I remember correctly, they're probably wearing pretty evenly (across the tread I mean), so when it's time to, it's time to go. If it's time before the wear indicators are exposed, then you'll know it (you'll get the weeeee scared out of you some time, and you'll arrive at home (or work) saying to yourself "it's time to replace those tires".

mrdeeno

i hear ya. this is the 3rd season they've been used, about 3k per season (actually a little less since I don't put on 1k per month).

I bought them used (1 season) including rims and tpms sensors for $500, which i think was a steal considering the rims actually look good and the tpms sensors are several hundred bucks (I remember checking tirerack and for the rims and tires, they were about $1000 plus $400 for the tpms). My lease runs out the end of this year so I will have no use for them (going to an MDX most likely after), so I just want to get rid of them. I think I can get rid of them just for the rims and sensors for $300, but want to estimate how much life is left for the next buyers in case they want to use it for another winter season.

GreenMonster

Yeah, wear indicators are to show the legal thread depth of 2/32's, but I've read that you need at least 4/32's for tires (any tires) to be effective in snow...

Use a quarter instead:

http://www.tirerack.com/tires/tirete....jsp?techid=51

You might just want to get a cheap tire thread gauge, and then you can list the tires as having x/32's left and be done with it...

fsttyms1

snow tires start becoming less usefull alot sooner than standard tires. they had a different tread depth indicator thats higher up

Simba91102

You may have better luck selling just the wheels, since the buyer will most likely have to pay to remove the tires (if they're as worn as you've implied, the tires will most likely be no good the next guy), and they'd be cheaper to ship. I change wheels often (too often; it's a curse) and I've passed on wheels for just this reason.

Rock2534

I ran my mz-02(or 03, can't remember) down to 4/32 and they worked great in the snow/ice, no complaints.

Street Spirit

Instead of estimating how much tread is left (which will likely be inaccurate), why not just explain it the way you did here: How many seasons they've run and how many miles.

Snow tires will wear much faster than all-seasons due to the softer rubber compound. Once you wear the tread to a certain point, they become a less and less effective "snow tire" and behave more like how an all-season would.

mrdeeno

knowing how many seasons or miles they've been through doesn't tell you how many seasons or miles are left.

According to the tirerack website, they start with 11/32 tread depth, with the "multicell" tread compound comprising the top 55% of the tires tread depth (i'm reading this to mean the top 55% of the complete tread, not the "useful" tread).

I'll measure it and see how many 32nds i have left and calculate from there. The website also says to expect 12-15k miles, so these tires have at least 1 season left in them if not more since I only put 6k on and the previous owner only used them for 1 season.

mrdeeno

took off the snow tires and measured the treads at 8/32nds.

I had new summer tires put on my summer rims (Repair shop that sells exclusively Firestone/Bridgestone tires) and ask the guy there when the Blizzaks should be considered worn. He said there's no official set mileage because of the rate of wear, but they should be replaced at 4/32nds definitely, but after 6/32nds they are more or less like all-seasons tires.

If I average the usage per season, that would come out to about 1/32nd per season based on 2500 miles per season (based on my records). So these tires have at least 2 more 2500mi winter season on them, but only 1 season left if someone averages 3-4k each winter on them. But the tires will still be decent for at least 2-3 seasons until needing replacement, even if they are more or less like all-season tires towards the end of their life because all-seasons are still better than summer tires in snow.

mattg

this is correct. most studless snow tires have two indicators. one that shows when the soft rubber compound is gone and one that shows when the tire is worn down to the legal limit of use.

rp_guy

blizzaks are slightly different from other winter tires; their multicell tread only goes to half (about 6/32"), and the rest is a regular winter rubber, but is still better than most all-seasons. (apparently not all of them have winter rubber underneath, only the ws-60 i know for sure does)

the reason is that after 6/32", winter tires lose their ability to move larger amounts of snow. i'm pretty sure that other brands use multicell throughout the tread.

you can still use the penny trick to measure it, though

mrdeeno

i used the penny trick and it was well past lincoln's fro. I used a ruler with 32nds on it to measure the actual treads then, and it was slightly past the 8/32nds line (probably 1/4 of the way between 8/32 and 9/32), so saying 8/32nds is playing it safe.

moda_way

A buddy and I use the number of seasons they see. I would've been on my 4th season had my passenger front didn't find its way to a very deep crator on I75 here in Ohio. Running the Blizzaks WS-50, so those aren't made anymore in my size and I'm not going to run 2 WS-60s and 2 WS-50s on their 4th season. Age seems to get my snow tires before wear (~250 miles/wk) with my normal daily runs. So I make sure #1 the tires are in good condition (no cracking) and #2, how are they performing in the snow. I wasn't ready, based on those rules of thumb, to get rid of my Blizzaks.... of course until that pot hole got in my way.