All-season tires?

I've had great wet-weather performance from these two types: Bridgestone Potenzas Firestone Firehawks Granted, I've never driven my Mustang in the snow. I'm talking rain.

I live in Chicago with really nasty winters. I am looking into buying tires more winter-friendly then my current Goodyear tires. I know that they make tires designed for winter handling, but how do the all-season tires work in severe winter weather??

thanks! Brian

I have BFG g-Force KDWS, they seem to do alright. I live in south east Michigan, we plow fairly well here and salt like the county owns a salt mine, but even on the muckiest roads I've encountered, I've never had a problem.

Jim S.

I am in chicago as well, and really the winters of the last few years haven't been nasty at all. Nasty were the late 1970s winters and the brutal cold of the mid 1980s and then again in 1993. Anyway...

All seasons I have had on my mustang worked fine. I used pirelli P7000 supersports and then dunlops (I forget the model) The dunlops were probably the better tire, but weren't as good towards the end of their useful life as the pirellis were.

These are supposedly great tires. This tire was OEM on the SVT Contours which a friend of mine had and althoug the tires really performed well, he complained that the tires were extremely "noisy", almost deafening at times. Have you had any problems with "noise" on these tires?

I live north of Toronto and we might have comparable weather in the winter with Chicago (maybe a bit more snow and a bit colder...)

The problem with a lot of "all season" tires or summer tires for that matter is that the tread blocks literally freeze in cold weather - we're talking below freezing and colder. I've had some scarey experiences with my summer tires - FireHawk SZ50's once the temp's get low in November and December. They just don't grip at all...

My tire shop owner basically scoffed at "all seasons" for Canadian Winter saying that there ain't no such thing - get Winter tires for Winter (at least when there's snow...

A few years back I bought a second set of wheels and now have a set of 15" (you could use 16's) with 4 Bridestone Blizzaks for winter, and a set of 17" wheels with the FireHawks for Summer. I usuallu change over to the winter wheels by mid/late November.

This setup has kept me on the raod in Canadian winter for the last 4 years, and is way more drivable than the all season Goodyears that were on the car before.

Hope this helps

Cheers Keith

Brian Ober opined in news:SoZ9b.279039$ snipped-for-privacy@rwcrnsc52.ops.asp.att.net:

Check out Yokohama Avid or their successor.... stay away from "Competition" or Performance type treads.

The Avid is quiet and really good in rain and up to about 1.5 inches of snow.

Have your new tires "road-force" balanced... there is always a tradeoff and there's an epidemic of assymetrically built tires in the last few years.

The stock goodyears 'froze' up in the winter. The all seasons I had got soft in the summer, they were more normal in the winter.

I live in Minnesota, bad winters here. Why don't you get a beater and drive that in the winter - I leave my gumbos on the cars, don't rust my good cars out, pay cheaper insurance, etc. etc. etc. - SAVE YOUR MUSTANGS - winter makes them unusable up here. My beater is an SVT contour, but.....

Andrew

Brian Ober wrote:

I'd say they have a greater presence than the average tire. However, I have done some things to reduce NVH - I keep my car light by exercising regularly. So perhaps on a stock car they would produce more noise. My only issue with them is they seem to be wearing at a pretty substantial rate.

Jim S.

It may not be what you want to hear, but driving a Mustang in the winter in Chicago, you really should consider dedicated snow tires for at least the back. Even a cheap set of rims and tires is less than a deductible for an accident costs, and the tire wear is split since they are only on for a few months of the year. If you have a place to store the other set that's not one the car, it really is something to consider.