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Good Snow tires?

FrancisPennysac

Veteran CEG'er
Joined
Dec 13, 2014
Messages
502
Location
PA
Anyone have anything THEY PERSONALLY have experience with ON A CONTOUR??

I am in Pennsylvania, and I happen to have access to all the tires I want dirt cheap.. :) let me know guys..anyways..

Anybody have a specific tire they would recommend and yes I mean a Dedicated SNOW tire, a tire with the little Snowflake stamp/emblem..

I am not worried about studding the tire, or putting chains on it...

My wheels can be either 14"s, 15"s or 16"s

For those that do not know, Snow tires are great because they do not get hard as rocks when the temps go below 32degrees F..and the Sipes in the tires help to pack and bite into snow better than a regular tire.. Now running them above say 60degreesF would cause them to wear very VERY badly to the point of "melting" off the car from heat.. Today in PA its, 32.9F to be exact :D

I am currently running a set of 205/55/16 Goodyear Assurance, triple tread all seasons, and I have heard Cooper CS4's are suppose to be great.. But anyone have anything on a SNOW tire??
 
The Conti snows are real good on a contour...and so are the Generals. Really depends on how much highway versus in town driving you're going to do. On my highway cruiser BMW 530i i run Michelin X-Ice3s.
 
I personally have run General Altimax Arctic's on my Contour and my wife's old Mercury Tracer. Over the years, we had the occasion to compare Blizzaks, another snow tire brand I've forgotten the name of, and the Altimax Arctics, and for cost, snow and ice performance, and good dry road behavior, the Altimax Arctics win the prize.

Some snow tires are very good performers on the snow and ice, but tread design and compound softness can lead to squirmy behavior on dry roads at highway speeds, and I never liked Blizzaks due to this behavior.
 
Pretty much any snow tires is going to be better than an all-season tire, the tread pattern and compound will be better. Blizzaks are highly regarded. However I have not happy with how fast my WS80's I got last year are wearing. I have used Dunlop Graspics before and they did well.
 
The problem with my area MA, CT and RI is that we do not get snow but most of the time. Normally 3-4 good size storms but we also have had very mild winters with warmer temps and can cause more wear to super gummy tires but they cannot be beat for ice and snow. Great for the north and mid west in areas with alot of storms. There are winter tires that have firmer tread blocks ( hankooks comes to mind ) I've used them in the past but even though they don't wear as fast and ride much better when the roads are dry and are great for my area but they give up grip in extreme conditions and ice but much much better than all seasons so they fall in the middle. If i lived in an area like upper N.H. , VT etc. I would absolutely go with Blizzaks. I have snow emblem tires on my F150 ( Hankook AT-M )which has awd and 4 wheel drive. They are great for deeper snow and what they are designed for but not so good in light/wet storms and act just like a normal all season and not great on ice either but with proper driving adjustment for the conditions they are great but I still would rather a dedicated snow. I had DMV1's on one of previous explorers and didn't really need to switch into 4 wheel drive they gripped like crazy in awd but you had to pay attention on dry days due to tread squirm.
 
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