Hybrids - The New Winter Tire

[nay]

Ok I’m good with the STT Pro now for all CO winter conditions - did well on glaze ice, on par with the best all weather tires I have tried.

Which of course means screwing around. Could hardly walk on this stuff.

 

[cantunamunch]

Anyone using the Pirelli Scorpion AT Plus (not type R) on black ice?

I know it's not really a heavy duty AT tire - I'm really looking to improve upon Geolandar G015.

 

[Ken_R]

Ok I’m good with the STT Pro now for all CO winter conditions - did well on glaze ice, on par with the best all weather tires I have tried.

Which of course means screwing around. Could hardly walk on this stuff.

Only studded tires work best on that stuff, it was insane. The Blizzacks on my Subbie actually did well on this.

 

[tball]

^^^ Yeah, I was annoyed at the noise of my studs on my first long drive of the year last week. Then I drove on that stuff and was reminded why I have them.

No proof, but I think studs may also help on mag chloride treated roads. Feels like they dig down to the asphalt through the lubricant.

 

[pete]

Ok I’m good with the STT Pro now for all CO winter conditions - did well on glaze ice, on par with the best all weather tires I have tried.

Which of course means screwing around. Could hardly walk on this stuff.

dork! but I like it .. looked like a lot of fun. Hope any neighbors aren't pricky and took offense at the exercise to evaluate and report to a large crowd.

 

[cantunamunch]

dork! but I like it .. looked like a lot of fun. Hope any neighbors aren't pricky and took offense at the exercise to evaluate and report to a large crowd.

I should think they know him by now and don't even begin to buy into his altruism narrative

 

[nay]

I should think they know him by now and don't even begin to buy into his altruism narrative

Certainly true.

I did also take my son who is home from college and his girlfriend out in his ‘99 4Runner (also no traction control system) - perfect conditions to work on how to control a slide where the rear end kicks out. We had ABS off by locking the center diff, so that was straight 4wd.

Altruistic, maybe. Also...jackass.

We did put a karma deposit back in the bank after our afternoon withdrawal. My son who drives the Tacoma - also now on STT Pro - was on his way back from work and stopped to help a family from Arkansas who had slid off the road in their Honda Odyssey.

He needed a smaller d-ring for the Odyssey side tow strap attachment and came home to get it so we both went back out - I had him do the extraction since it was his good deed to stop. The Taco was outweighed by the Honda by a good half ton and it took a lot of effort, but he was able to pull it out and up the hill on this ice and get them to their destination.

All good so far .

 

[nay]

^^^ Yeah, I was annoyed at the noise of my studs on my first long drive of the year last week. Then I drove on that stuff and was reminded why I have them.

No proof, but I think studs may also help on mag chloride treated roads. Feels like they dig down to the asphalt through the lubricant.

Personally I think studs help in most conditions. I’m a huge fan of using mag chloride to create ice while making windshields opaque, and studs help when u can’t see.

 

[nay]

Anyone using the Pirelli Scorpion AT Plus (not type R) on black ice?

I know it's not really a heavy duty AT tire - I'm really looking to improve upon Geolandar G015.

Looks like a good tire and is winter rated. Here’s a decent review - seems Pirelli gets that they needed to be more truck centric with this tire. The comments from Pirelli sound to me like exactly why the hybrid market is booming: truck tire buyers don’t want car based tires and so the design challenge is having heavy duty look and features while retaining good NVH scores and traction performance.

https://www.offroadxtreme.com/engin...ire-review-pirelli-scorpion-all-terrain-plus/

 

[Jersey Skier]

So without having to read through two years worth of posts, what's a good tire for a '17 Suburban with 18" rims? Good for snow through highway speeds too.

 

[nay]

So without having to read through two years worth of posts, what's a good tire for a '17 Suburban with 18" rims? Good for snow through highway speeds too.

Falken AT3W in LT size. The larger sizes in that tire start at 20/32 tread depth and it eats highway slop accordingly. I’ve been able to haul up the unplowed slush lane in my ‘04 Sequoia on I-70 as storms worsened and people congregated to a single lane - stable passing like that in a couple inches of transitional conditions is money.

I’m at 47K now and still have 10/32 tread - will easily get to 60K through another summer and I paid $194/tire for a 285/75R17, which is a 34” tire.

For overall performance, cost, and lifespan this tire has about been worth 2 full sets. 10/10 would buy again.

 

[Plai]

@nay just want to say "Thanks". I put on Falken AT3W a couple of weeks ago. I can only atest to the dry road conditions so far, due to the dry CA winter so far. The highway road noise is different, but not that noticeable compared previous set of to the Bridgestone Dueler AT. Can say the drive feel is softer and more confident, so that's a plus.

Now just waiting for some "Hero Snow" for both the road and hill....

Should you ever come out N Lake Tahoe way, let me buy you one.

Finally had some hard packd snow to drive in. I'm definitely drifting, sliding more than hoped for.
The hero snow performance was good. Just the scrapped off glazed is scary even at low (<15mph) speeds. The other time was on narrow highway at maybe 30mph, rounding a curve. Came closer to the guard rail than expected.
Not sure if there's anything reasonably better. FWIW, I'm driving a 2008 4Runner and both instances, the vehicle was relatively unweighted and in 4WD. For those keeping track, these are 1.5yo tires with maybe 10K miles.

Now I feel like taking a snow+ice driving lesson.

 

[tball]

Not sure if there's anything reasonably better.

Um, yes, some dedicated winter tires.

The mountain snowflake symbol doesn't mean they are good winter tires, just 10% better than the average all-season tire.

So, I raced a Raptor with my old Tundra yesterday.

0-35 on a fairly steep uphill from a stoplight on icy roads during a snowstorm. Lots of cars with FWD and all-season tires get stuck at this light in these conditions. We were on a major road that must have been treated, but it was a typical CDOT half ass job on a secondary highway. I didn't see any sand, so probably just the liquid crap.

I've got my studded Hakka's. It looked like the Raptor was fairly new and I'm pretty sure it had the stock KO2's (it was dark and they were covered with snow).

Wow, that Raptor makes a lot of noise! That is until I was two truck lengths ahead of him in a matter of seconds. It wasn't even close. My truck accelerates almost like it's on dry pavement even in terrible winter conditions. It's all about the tires!

 

[Andy Mink]

stock KO2's

I didn't find KO2s to be very confidence inspiring on my 06 Ram Megacab. They were ok in actual snow but didn't do much for me on the typical tire-packed/plow scraped ice that we see in Reno and the surrounding areas. Unfortunately, the surrounding areas are where the skiing is!

A lot of marketing goes into getting people to believe KO2s and that type of tire are the bees knees across all conditions. Not so. And then you see them on jacked up trucks and way wider than stock. If I could get a 195 for my current truck instead of the 235s they'd be on there in the winter. Skinny is better.

 

[Plai]

Not sure if there's anything reasonably better. .

Um, yes, some dedicated winter tires.

That may be in the absolute, but my reality is one set of tires. I don't have storage for another set.

 

[Andy Mink]

Short of the full blown snow tires, I still think these are some of the best and at a reasonable price.

 

[sparty]

A lot of marketing goes into getting people to believe KO2s and that type of tire are the bees knees across all conditions. Not so. And then you see them on jacked up trucks and way wider than stock. If I could get a 195 for my current truck instead of the 235s they'd be on there in the winter. Skinny is better.

And the Raptor OEM tire size is substantially wider than a normal F-150 tire, as well.

I've gotted studded Hakkas on my F-150 (not a Raptor), and while I haven't tried a 4Hi launch, judicious throttle application is important. I can't see the additional 75 horses in a Raptor being particularly helpful in most winter conditions.

 

[cantunamunch]

Finally had some hard packd snow to drive in. I'm definitely drifting, sliding more than hoped for.
The hero snow performance was good. Just the scrapped off glazed is scary even at low (<15mph) speeds. The other time was on narrow highway at maybe 30mph, rounding a curve. Came closer to the guard rail than expected.
Not sure if there's anything reasonably better. FWIW, I'm driving a 2008 4Runner and both instances, the vehicle was relatively unweighted and in 4WD. For those keeping track, these are 1.5yo tires with maybe 10K miles.

Now I feel like taking a snow+ice driving lesson.

Are you running door-sticker pressures?

 

[tball]

Finally had some hard packd snow to drive in. I'm definitely drifting, sliding more than hoped for.
The hero snow performance was good. Just the scrapped off glazed is scary even at low (<15mph) speeds. The other time was on narrow highway at maybe 30mph, rounding a curve. Came closer to the guard rail than expected.
Not sure if there's anything reasonably better. FWIW, I'm driving a 2008 4Runner and both instances, the vehicle was relatively unweighted and in 4WD. For those keeping track, these are 1.5yo tires with maybe 10K miles.

That may be in the absolute, but my reality is one set of tires. I don't have storage for another set.

Do you need an all-terrain tire? With more sipes, a more highway oriented SUV/light truck tire is going to do better in icy conditions than an AT tire with big blocks.

If you can give up off road usage altogether there are some SUV tires like the Michelin Defender and Premier that do very well in icy conditions, or a Michelin LTX can do light duty off-road. I'm a Michelin fanboy and would pick from one of those.

Maybe Michelin will have the new CrossClimate SUV available in your size by the time you need tires. That would be ideal, as long as you don't go offroad. It's only in a couple sizes now, with more hopefully coming soon. I'm hoping to put that on our SUV that only makes occasional trips into the mountains in a year or so.

 

[Monique]

There was some snow on the Boulder roads Monday morning. Somebody in an ancient pickup truck (of the generation where they were painted that weird light aqua) made a left turn and crossed three lanes, just feet in front of me, to make a right turn. Then somebody in a newly minted Dodge Ram decided to merge into the narrow space between me and the car in front of me - and didn't even bother to turn on their blinkers. And performed a mini fish tail. They repeated the fish tail performance shortly thereafter on a simple right turn.

I'm grateful for my AWD, my X-Ice tires, and my modicum of common sense and awareness.