The temperatures are falling. The ground is cold and hard. Your lovely ultra high performance tires have become effectively useless. It’s that time and you know it, but have you made the switch yet? I’m not going to insert a WINTER IS COMING joke because winter is already here and that means it’s time to swap on your winter tires.
How many of you live in a place where you need to do this? How many of you have made the switch? How many of you stubbornly cling to the notion that all-season tires are good enough?
Sound off below!
Hooniverse Asks: Have you switched to your winter tires yet?
By Jeff Glucker
Oct 30, 2018
By Jeff Glucker
Jeff Glucker is the co-founder and Executive Editor of Hooniverse.com. He’s often seen getting passed as he hustles a 1991 Mitsubishi Montero up the 405 Freeway. IG: @HooniverseJeff
Winter tires aren’t until November, which I realize is quickly approaching. I might swap out as early as this weekend, but it’s not an immediate need. I can manage with the all-seasons if a flurry catches me off guard before I get a chance to swap out for my Hakkapeliittas.
Changed to studded tires right before fall vacation about a month ago. This week, the first spell of cold hit Southern Norway and, reliably as always, news sites fill up with pictures of all sorts of wheeled contraptions in ditches.
Not going to. I live in Georgia, if it snows or ices, I stay home. I do need to add a few pound of air to the tires in the Volt to make the warning light go off.
Winters have gotten much milder in Kansas City over the last decade. I will not swap tires, but will drive one of the pickups with all terrains when conditions warrant.
I did winter tires on the Town Cow for a number of years, but no matter how late I waited to put them on, Kansas City’s fairly regular mid-winter temperature spikes always caused the full-winter compound to wear alarmingly fast. Now, the Kizashi wears Pirelli Cinturato P7 All Season Pluses year round. These turn and brake great in the dry and actually get surprisingly good traction in snow. The only drawback is that they don’t handle rain as well as they could.
At 4000′ we don’t get snow until December.
The only storage I have for my winter tires is at my in-laws’ place, about an hour away – I think we intend to head up this weekend for the swap. That said, we haven’t gotten snow yet (although some of the surrounding areas got a dusting recently). Plus, in the event I put it off too late, I have a couple back ways to get to work (bus, even if it triples my commute time, or bike if I’m willing to work through the freezing temperatures), and can work from home as needed.
About a month ago.
How about an old school winter tread? Nearest snow would be at least a five hour drive away, this was on an old speedway car that used to run on a sand track. It went out for an historic race on the track which is now clay, and which really ripped up the tyres. It’s a 1930s Dodge powered by a 225 https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/437c1214a3b970562eb344539ba90a0aaf36b5c23b8e31c24cbe6ebd621da732.jpg slant six
Nope. I’m just glad I can still get chains that fit 145R13 tires.
Yep, two weeks ago. Of course it snowed the week before and it’s been fairly warm out since.
Put them on two weeks ago. Temperatures are hovering around the point where summers/all seasons lose flex, but I work about 50 miles north of the city in which I live – small town = reduced snow removal in extreme conditions. It has snowed twice already at work, but it has been rain at home.
Also winters are mandatory here in Quebec as of December 15th. I usually put them on by mid-november at the latest.
Mandatory winter tires are a very good thing in climates that need them. There will otherwise always be people trying to skimp on them – and none of us wants to meet them, at speed, at any angle.
Nope.
Trying to refrain from thinking about winter until it really is winter here in CT. It snowed for a good 2.5 hours on my drive home from Rochester a couple weeks ago, and has dipped into the low/mid-30s overnight here a few times since, but I don’t even want to think about real snow until it happens.
No. I consider it every year, but I live in central Ohio, which isn’t exactly “northern” enough to really worry about it. Yes, we get snow (sometimes a lot of it), but I haven’t used dedicated winter tires since college in the mountains of northern WV.
Chains do wonders to my 14.5R20 tires…. I also haven’t seen snow tires in that size….
No, because we are in spring is nearly here in the Southern hemisphere. I’ve just packed my skis away.
Lol… you’re in NZ, right?
Yes, we’re off down to one of the local beaches for a swim tomorrow.
I once had a very pretty Aussie friend tell me the first time she went to a topless beach was on Christmas Day. The clash of mental responses nearly blue-screened my brain.
Yes, we have occasionally made our Christmas lunch a picnic on a beach.
Down here it’s right near the longest day. In NZ’s far south, where Burt Munro of Indian motorcycle racing fame came from, it doesn’t get dark till about 11.30ish pm and dawn is at 2.00ish am.
I have family in Juneau, Alaska. Pretty much the same hours there at the summer solstice.
Yes and no. I need to find a set of Focus 16″ wheels to put winter tires on my wife’s C-Max. I decided to forgo winter tires on the MKZ as I just put a set of Michelin Pilot Sport AS 3+ and it really isn’t a DD and the winter tires are already on the Mountaineer and Crown Vic. I do need to make sure the winter tires get on the kids vehicles.
No, Ireland is just Autumn all year round and we reserve the right for the country to have a national crisis at the first sign of snowflakes.
Such is the beauty of Ireland. Autumn (my favorite time of year) is regrettably brief here. It feels as if we go from hot, humid summer to f’ing dead of winter within two weeks. I want to live somewhere that stays between 50F and 65F year-round.
Nope. I’ll wait for a forecast of snow before I do, otherwise most drive of any length drops 5000′ in elevation, and that really chews the winters.
I’ll wait until the last possible moment (like sometimes hours before the first major snow event) to throw the snows on the cars that see snow. That time usually varies anywhere from late November to the first days of January in my part of the midwest USA. On one of my cars I have a set of Nokian WRG-3s on it, which takes care of needing snows, but that car got sidelined on tire swap day with major mechanical issues (needing a long-distance tow truck ride, followed by an engine swap). Good way to save the car from rusting and making the tires last longer, right? Once I got home with the car, out came the set of snows for the LS400 and a full winter of rear-driving pleasures.