Winter Tyres

flashbang

There are clearly two+ sides to this as the now developing spat shows.

I work for one of the emergency services in a rural area of the North West of England. Not a winter goes by when there is not snow fall here it just happens that the last two winters have been unprecedented, certainly like nothing i have seen in my lifetime.

We had persistant snow and ice from the start of december 2010 to mid january at which point the temperatures remained extremely low. If you the taxpayer truly knew how much of our time was spent recovering people stranded in ridiculous places in farcical conditions, treating 999 like a taxi service and drawing resources away from where they are needed. Much of this however comes down to the neccesity of the journey taken. Many of them taking drives in the snow to just take a look at it or to take photographs.

All i can add is that to many in rural area's in particular there is a need to travel and winter or snow tyres are a real consideration because staying at home for such a period of time is just not realistic with weather and geography dictating that the added grip is the difference between getting off the driveway and not. There are those who can sit it out but again it depends on everyone's individual circumstances.

We may not have full blown Continental winters but there is absolutely nothing wrong with being prepared and i applaud those who take the extra measures to stay safer.

Lum

Out of interest do you run winter tyres on your emergency vehicles for when you have to go and rescue the people who got stuck during their day trip?

As an aside, can you get winter tyres for wheelchairs?

ventureuk

What I see when I read a post by SHIPSHAPE.

Cash-Strapped.T32

grizzly1911 wrote: »

It is highly likely that a micra or a corsa could be perfectly OK if driven with due care and attention. Narrow, section wheels/tyres to cut through the snow/slush, low power to allow more control, front wheel drive.

Fair play to ya' grizzly I'm not being needlessly horrible to potato cars (I call them that because when they're abandoned by the side of the road they look like a row of upturned potatoes in a field) - In fact our current family car is a Corsa, and the one before that? A Micra..



Me, I used a small 125 scooter for winter (even smaller & weenier than any spud-car) & I'm sure many people won't believe me but honestly, I was far more confident & sure "footed" on that thing than any car out there just about - My winter boots were just that, literally, a pair of toecapped rigger boots.

I was able to keep both feet down all the time and just brute-force the bike upright at all times even when you could feel that neither wheel had any traction at all, and bounce my bum up & down on hills like off-roaders do to maintain a modicum of grip or bite.

Ok, by the end of winter I'd worn the soles down so badly I looked like Wurzel Gummage and I lived my life with wet feet (trenchfoot! :eek: ), but at no time did I come a cropper, end up on the wrong side of the road or any of those horrible things that you saw happening to cars, actually the driveway in my pic was the hardest part of the daily ride (going back down it at night was even more fun ).


My point would be that for the money, it seems daft not to use the right kind of tyres on your car if you know you're going to have to use the roads in prolonged snowy conditions because as said, you can re-use them, or keep them on for the inevitable icy patch you get in Jan/Feb.
And let's not forget that the dramatic pics might have only been during that week long blanket of snow in early November '10, but the blizzards & general snow marlarkey lasted all through November, into December and came back again in Jan/Feb.

Personally I can afford to run a winter-bike purely for snow (I'm thinking about fitting the scoot with proper motocross knobblies ), because it's so cheap as to be almost free to run a scooter if it's a second bike (insurance, etc..).


I totally appreciate that many people will resent or not fancy shelling out cash for tyres that might only get a month's use, but that month might be very expensive indeed if you need to hit the late-night chemists, or your kid breaks an arm & needs casualty, or any number of reasons to force you out on the roads unprepared..

Might it not an option to pick up 4x cheap steelies & fit those with winter tyres, and just keep them in your back pocket so to speak?



Ps: Other than that guy calling the other poster an idiot I don't really any kind of spat, just a healthy exchange of views..

mikey72

So anyone used

Toyo Snow Prox S942

or

Vredestein SNOWTRAC 3

choice for mine this year, both seem good prices.

Anyone love them or hate them?

missile

I have chosen Dunlop SP Winter Sport, to be fitted soon.

ventureuk

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=clSC7APitaQ

I think this video is the most informative of many on Youtube.

mikey72

Less than a car length either way.
To be honest I use them so I can move, the summer tyres on my car used to give up halfway up a hill, without a good run. Now I can actually move off on snow and ice. I see enough of it each year to more than make it worthwhile.

I got a spare set of rims off ebay, one set was a tenner, the other twenty, and the winter tyres are the same price as the summer tyres, so apart from a couple of hours each October and March, they cost me nothing compared to summer tyres.

SHIPSHAPE

ventureuk wrote: »

What I see when I read a post by SHIPSHAPE.

Get lost ya freak show.

grizzly1911

mikey72 wrote: »

Less than a car length either way.
To be honest I use them so I can move, the summer tyres on my car used to give up halfway up a hill, without a good run. Now I can actually move off on snow and ice. I see enough of it each year to more than make it worthwhile.

I got a spare set of rims off ebay, one set was a tenner, the other twenty, and the winter tyres are the same price as the summer tyres, so apart from a couple of hours each October and March, they cost me nothing compared to summer tyres.

AFair points and as you need them being a "quasi" emergency service - no doubt the premium rates help pay for them too;)