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All season tyres

rbrown said:
Aren’t “all season” tyres just tyres?
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Assuming this is a real question; then what we knew and thought of as "just tyres" in the past are a harder tyre compound that had good longevity and good grip in essentially warm (above 7 deg C typically). They wear somewhat slowly and have enough tread pattern to dispel water to cope with normal wet conditions. These are now regarded as summer tyres as they perform best at higher temperatures. When it gets cold the summer tyre rubber stays hard and inflexible so all the movement in the tread that keeps the tyre gripping fades away and the tyre is no longer working the way it did when it was warmer. Colder climes have used winter tyres for many years that have a very soft rubber that stays pliable even when the temperature drops to minus numbers and deep tread patterns with fine "sipes" that move around generating tyre heat to maintain traction on ice and snow. This gives a massive improvement when it is cold as well as when it is icy or snowy.

As awareness of these winter tyres grew, companies and car makers encouraged owners (especially of rear wheel drive cars) to swap tyres in the winter much as our continental cousins are mandated to.

This does come with a cost so some folks have realised that there was a market for a half-way house tyre that was softer that the traditional summer tyre but did not wear excessively when hot and offered some of the performance of a winter tyre when it was cold. Like all compromises it is not as good as either tyre in their proper operating zone but work OK in most.

It may be that all season tyres become the std fitment to all cars and therefore become "just tyres", I guess time will tell.
 
cutting42 said:
It may be that all season tyres become the std fitment to all cars and therefore become "just tyres", I guess time will tell.
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They are in the US and have been for some decades. Summer tires are only fitted to some performance cars.
 
Bananahead said:
Anyway, isn't this a thread that gets rehashed every year?
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Not exactly. I have been a happy tyre changer for about 4-5 years but my Summer tyres are near the end of their life and I had been contemplating all season tyres for a while so wondered what the collective feelings on PFM were about the latest generation of these beasts. I am not a tyre expert or snob but know enough about the things to understand how they affect how a vehicle feels/works. These differences are not always subtle but once you have bought the things, unless money is an irrelevance, you are stuck with them. I think there have always been multi function tyres, when I was younger there was a type of tyre called 'Snow and Mud' or something like that. From memory this was a chunky looking beast that was sometimes fitted to Land Rovers and Morris Minors by country folk. The current 'All Season' tyres seem to be a world away from the aforementioned Snow and Mud but I have no experience of them so was interested in others experience, which on the whole seem fairly positive. As I have already mentioned, I may put off the decision till next spring but the experience and information here is useful and will probably inform future choices.
 
The Cross Climates have a higher silicon content in the rubber, which keeps them more pliable in the cold but still gives good wear characteristics in the summer.
 
And importantly they are labelled with the Mud & Snow symbol, so they are literally 'summer' tyres that are labelled for 'winter' use too. The Cross Climate is a very clever product and I am sure we will see many of this type as time goes by.
 
Snufkin said:
I think there have always been multi function tyres, when I was younger there was a type of tyre called 'Snow and Mud' or something like that. From memory this was a chunky looking beast that was sometimes fitted to Land Rovers and Morris Minors by country folk. The current 'All Season' tyres seem to be a world away from the aforementioned Snow and Mud but I have no experience of them so was interested in others experience, which on the whole seem fairly positive..
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My Pirelli Scorpion All Season tyres are rated M&S & my understanding that this rating is a mandatory winter requirement in Germany, Switzerland etc. To emphasise what others have said, there is no comparison between good All Season tyres and normal summer tyres once the going gets cold, icy & especially snowy - and even very wet in summer - there have been many tests showing that a 2WD car with winter tyres has far more grip in snowy conditions than a 4WD on "normal" tyres and this has also been my own experience. So All Season M&S rated seems a great compromise.

Btw, I exaggerated my mileage : I'm getting about 40k miles per set, albeit mostly motorway miles, but this is double what I used to get in UK on mostly performance vehicles (driven somewhat faster in my youth and middle age). What longevity are others getting from their tyres, I wonder ?

From JH :"And importantly they are labelled with the Mud & Snow symbol, so they are literally 'summer' tyres that are labelled for 'winter' use too." M&S rating is definitely not allowed for summer tyres; like my Pirellis, CrossClimates are not full winters , but they are very different from summers.
 
I thinhk that what's becoming clear is that tyres are a compromise. Ask a farmer or anyone who drives a vehicle in wet off road conditions. What works off road isn't going to be much fun on a dry or dampish bit of tarmac. I think that this is partly driven by the desire for ever wider tyres on cars. Back in the 80s I used to drive a Fiesta with 145/12 tyres. I know, sounds like something off a wheelbarrow these days, doesn't it? This car, fitted with standard issue Firestones of the day, performed better in snow than most cars of today. Snow/mud tyres need to be narrow to cut through the crud to something solid, and a square shoulder helps. Look at tyres on a Land Rover. Not a poncey pony club special in a Waitrose car park, a proper one used as a working vehicle.

I think the manufacturers of today are working hard to get tyres that perform better and better in a wider and wider envelope of conditions, while wearing slowly and remaining quiet. I think that this is what the current "All Seasons" tyres do. Mud and Snow tyres in the 80's were shocking things, I remember a school minibus had a pair on and you could hear them droning at all speeds above 50, the teacher who drove the thing used to curse the guy who'd fitted the M&S tyres every time he got in it, because of course the things were on until they wore out. So yes, All Season tyres are, erm, tyres, but just as you would be mad to take Uniroyal RainExpert tyres to a dry track day in June, and a drive on cold greasy roads on Yokohama 032Rs is going to be exciting (this I know at first hand!) all tyre design is a compromise, and one would hope that the latest All Season versions perform better in cold, wet, and snowy conditions than most, while remaining good in dry conditions, wearing slowly and being reasonably quiet.
 
Another vote for Michelin CrossClimates - they are fitted to our Passat Estate and have been great. The car is a bit of a boat anyway with 'comfort' suspension, but it handles surprisingly well with the CrossClimates - much better than the cheaper tyres that were fitted when I bought the car. I'm definitely going to continue fitting them in the future - prices can vary wildly however, I've found the best prices from online sites.
 
Bananahead said:
Anyway, isn't this a thread that gets rehashed every year?
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To some degree yes. Maybe with the new fancy pants forum software we are enjoying will allow for a merged winter tyre thread to be popped up as a sticky on around the 5th November or so and dropped off around Easter?

;)
 
jtrade said:
my understanding that this rating is a mandatory winter requirement in Germany, Switzerland etc.
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Not in Swizzieland. There is actually no obligation here to fit winter tyres, but should you have an accident in winter on summer tyres, expect the local constabulary and your insurance company to be somewhat less than understanding. I don't know what is the local attitude to all-weather tyres, but the law stipulates that a driver must be in control of his/her vehicle at all times, and that the car be properly equipped for the winter. Given that even the best all-weather tyres are a compromise, I suspect that the local attitude would be negative. Personally, I have no problem with the tyre change (O bis O (October to Easter) as they say locally), and, as someone else has observed, your summer/winter tyres last longer.
 
Bananahead said:
The whole of the US?
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Tires on offer here are all-season by default, except for a small minority of max-performance and ultra-performance summer types. This includes the aftermarket as well as the rubber fitted to new vehicles.
 
tones said:
Not in Swizzieland. There is actually no obligation here to fit winter tyres, but should you have an accident in winter on summer tyres, expect the local constabulary and your insurance company to be somewhat less than understanding. I don't know what is the local attitude to all-weather tyres, but the law stipulates that a driver must be in control of his/her vehicle at all times, and that the car be properly equipped for the winter. Given that even the best all-weather tyres are a compromise, I suspect that the local attitude would be negative. Personally, I have no problem with the tyre change (O bis O (October to Easter) as they say locally), and, as someone else has observed, your summer/winter tyres last longer.
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My understanding is that in Europe all season tyres meet the harmonised standards for winter/cold weather tyres, but do not have the same drawbacks as using more hardcore winter tyres in the summer. They are marketed at temperate climate customers where lesser extremes of temperature make them an ideal compromise, e.g. in the UK our coldest month January averages 5C and our hottest July averages 19C! In climates with greater seasonal variation in temperature naturally changing tyres makes far more sense.

Depending on mileage lower tread wear and keeping the tyre longer might not be quite such a great thing, depending on environmental conditions, materials, construction and compound car tyres have a shelf life of around 2 to 5 years.
 
For a winter tyre to be properly effective you do need to allow more tread depth when considering changing. By the time you get to the wear bars they are not going to be so good in wintry weather.
 
JensenHealey said:
For a winter tyre to be properly effective you do need to allow more tread depth when considering changing. By the time you get to the wear bars they are not going to be so good in wintry weather.
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Be careful not to think "snow tyre" when you think "winter tyre" - some winter tyres, effective in cold, damp conditions, are pretty hopeless in snow. The TCS (Switzerland's AA) does quite a good review of winter tyres:

https://www.tcs.ch/de/testberichte-ratgeber/tests/reifentests/winterreifen.php

What is sehr empfehlenswert is clear.
 
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I've had Cross Climates for two years. Absolutely brilliant winter and summer in the UK. Had Mich Energy Savers before. No comparison. Check prices at your local branch of ATS, not online (I got mine at trade prices).
 
Personally I find it easier to have a separate set of smaller/worthless alloys with winter tyres on for my daily BMW 530i; rather than all season tyres

For example; I currently have on 18" staggered sized alloys with Nexen N'Fera SU1 tyres on the car, they'll be changed later this week or Sunday onwards to the standard 16" alloys and Michelin Alpin A4 tyres in readiness for winter and our yearly jaunt up to Dunkeld in Feb :)

Tried them a few years back on a previous 7 series; very good, but not better than dedicated winter tyres and then decent summer tyres for the warmer months etc :)

However, it's horses for courses and other people will want the simplicity of one set of wheels & tyres etc
 
Winter tyres in winter for us, 4x4 without winter tyres could not get up our very steep hill. Uncle in Scotland swears by winter tyres, he has proper weather.
 
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