Snow tire help

[Ed Kellock]

When I look at TR reviews, I user a couple of their sorting methods.  The
most relevant are lowest rated, highest rated, most miles driven, and then I
look at most recent and then sort by Audi.  I always keep in mind that
anybody can post and they don't necessarily really have a clue what they're
talking about, may not have aligned their car since they owned it, no idea
what the tire pressures are, etc.  After awhile you can get a feel for
what's really going on with the particular tire you're considering.

In this case, the first thing I did was hit lowest rated.  There was on
really bad sounding review, but the rating was still only down to 3.7.  The
very next one is almost double that with a really rather positive write-up
based on 5000 miles experience.  The lowest compained of noise and snow
grip.  I immediately figure that the alignment if fubar or there's some
serious damage somewhere because it just doesn't sound right compared to the
rest.

Anyway, my point is that these come out rated pretty darn highly in
comparison to others I've checked out at TR.  And the General tires are
consistently shown to be lighter than most any other, which has become my
obsession for some time now about tires and wheels, weight.  

I've run other winter tires year round here in CO where it can crack 100
degrees in the summer.  The only ones that ever really scared me were some
Blizzacks which were really gummy in warm weather.  I've run Hakka Q's all
year and more recently my Hancock Winter iPike W409's and you never really
forget that you're doing it, but they didn't seem dangerous.  Fortunately I
had no real chance to test their grip in a panic maneuver.

Ed

-----Original Message-----
From: quattro-bounces at audifans.com [mailto:quattro-bounces at audifans.com] On
Behalf Of Dave C
Sent: Thursday, October 22, 2009 10:09 AM
To: LL - NY
Cc: quattro at audifans.com
Subject: Re: Snow tire help


Hi Larry,
That's what I would expect, but the survey results at TireRack caused me to
wonder ...
http://www.tirerack.com/tires/tires.jsp?tireMake=General&tireModel=Altimax+A
rctic
Check out those results.  They show the General Altimax snow tire as being
an outstanding year round tire.  But maybe I'm mis-interpreting the results.
Maybe the "dry handling", cornering, noise, etc, is based on a comparison
only to other snow tires.

thanks,
Dave C.
On Wed, Oct 21, 2009 at 11:07 PM, LL - NY <larrycleung at gmail.com> wrote:

> My assumption is that the General Altimax Artics are more of a typical 
> full snow, IOW, the compounds (and high tread blocks and siping) would 
> be a poor summer season tire. The compounding needed to keep the tires 
> soft and grippy at low temps would make them mushy and eraser like at 
> summer temps. The tread design would only make the problem worse.
>
> As for Nokians, I'm sure Greg can pipe in, but according to the Nokian 
> website, there are actually two choices of winter biased All Seasons. 
> The "W", which is the old WR, the WR-G2. I've had the WR-G2 which are 
> okay as 3 season tires, but a bit sloppy, which wasn't unexpected.  As 
> snowies, if you were okay with NRW's, they are probably (never had 
> them, so I don't know) pretty equivalent. IMHO, the WR-G2's weak 
> points are in the sticky wet stuff (thicker than slush, they were fine 
> in that) and pure powder. In both cases, stability was less than it 
> was when I had RSI's. Hydroplane resistance in rain wasn't as good as 
> my RSI's either. They were not bad, but again somewhat sloppy in the 
> dry.
>
> Try the Nokian website for more info, but Greg could pipe in as to 
> availability in the US. In spite of the price, I'd venture that the 
> the Nokians are the only real snow capable All Season As point of 
> reference, I did try BFG Traction T/A H's on 1st Gen Scoob Legacy 
> beater. For local snow driving, they were adequate, at best. I 
> wouldn't want to depend on them for a longer distance highway run. 
> There the WR-G2's were notably better.
>
> LL - NY
>
>   On Wed, Oct 21, 2009 at 9:29 PM, Dave C <dconner at gmail.com> wrote:
>
>>  What would the General Arctic Altimax be like as a year-round tire?  
>> Would they be acceptable in the summer in a northern clime like 
>> Michigan or Toronto?
>>
>> I've been >very< pleased with Nokian NRW as a year-round tire here in 
>> Ohio. I still have a set on my 89 100, but they are fading and will 
>> need to be replaced someday.
>>
>> I know Nokian replaced the NRW with WR awhile back, and now I 
>> understand they've replaced the WR with soimething else.  I never 
>> tried the WR's but heard they were also quite good, similar to the 
>> NRW.  What does Nokian have today as a replacement for the WR?  Is it 
>> as good as the NRW for year-round?  I know the prices are >much< 
>> higher now.  But the benefit of not needing to swap tires/wheels with 
>> the seasons makes it worth paying something extra for the tires.  Is 
>> there anything else out there comparable
>> to the NRW?  Anything even close?
>> - -
>> Dave C
>> Columbus, OH
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>
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