winter tires

[Tihol Tiholov]

It's nice to know whether you like to have long--lasting tires or best
traction with more frequent tire purchase.

What kept me away from Nokian in the past is their soft sidewalls.  A tire
shop owner explained that soft sidewall provides more traction by allowing
the tread to flex over frozen longitudinal ice strips on the road.  I buy
that but still ... being a rally fan has to do with it.
Now I have a set of Hankook and a set of Cooper, happy with both.  Cooper
seems to be the best combination I've seen of snow and ice traction with
siped and open tread, good price, too.

Longest lasting were Yokohama Gardex 600 I had on the Typ 89 since 1998 with
1 flat only.  Almost got tired of them ;o))  Last spring my wife drove
through a bad pothole and both right-side tires developed bulges in the
sidewall, still remained drivable - very important as she was far from
civilization.  The tire shop gave me pro-rated warranty even after all that
time.