Winter tires: Everything you need to know, but never cared to learn

I mean, first of all, I think you're very brave for not running winter tires where you are. winter's coming. For most of my coworkers, that means swapping out tires, which I don't. So I thought I should talk to some experts to see if that's an enthusiast thing or if I'm really missing out. Also, this plays into it somehow. They're around and black, they smell they go flat. Do they cost too much? They're a pain. Right? That's what consumers think a lot of times people will call it a distressed purchase because like you said, it's Wow, I've got to spend a fair amount of money on something that I don't think very much about. And it's either because they had a problem or it's worn out to the point where it has become unsafe. Tire purchase is like going to the dentist. Nobody really wants to do it, but it's one of those things you've just got to do. Now that our spirits are up, let's get a few other things out of the way. No, I'm not Brian Cooley. I've met him very nice person. I'm also not any of the other knowledgeable roadshow staff that you've all come to know. But like most of 2020, we're going to get through this together. So let's get down to it. I've lived in Michigan my whole life, I haven't had an issue. I was always raised that if you have all wheel drive, you're pretty good. Clearly four wheel drive is better than two wheel drive in any circumstances in windy conditions because you the idea of having traction across all your axles is much better than having traction just on the front or the back. Feel but coming up, you've got to have good tires and it's true. Yep to have good tires and there seems to be this. People are getting all wheel drive or four wheel drive, I think they do anything. And of course that's not correct. A tire provides the traction, the vehicle just has to try to use it in the best way that it can And so if you don't have that traction To start with, there's really not a whole lot you can do in that situation. In our area that first snowfall. Typically the first vehicles that you see off the road are all wheel drive or four wheel drive crossover SUV. Just because there is there is such a disparity between what the vehicle is able to do accelerating versus what it can do braking or turning. The reality is that all wheel drive if you get stuck in a snow bag, all wheel drive is definitely gonna help you get out of that snowbank. What it's not really gonna help you do is brick. So if you're in a snowstorm or if you have icy roads, all wheel drive does not help you break and arguably it doesn't really help you turn in those types of conditions either. There is some You know, small benefits to handling by getting an all wheel drive vehicle, but it's not nearly the amount of benefit that you could get by having a dedicated set of winter tires Those brakes on your car, they stop your wheels, the tire stops Okay, so my entire life I've been wrong And I'm starting to second guess that whole bravery quote. I think better just dive into what they're saying when they say winter summer offseason There are very few if any, I guess like Regulations or industry standards that separate one from the other. It's kind of colloquial, kind of just understood type things. I mean, no manufacturer would produce a summer tire with a winter compound on it because it would fail on the marketplace, and what's the point? But in theory, they could- [UNKNOWN] Our temperature performance stability. Winter specifically, as this temperatures start to drop the compound comes into play, and then an all season that basically covers both spectrums. But I have to say is optimized between the spectrum not at the extremes. You know in general terms your winter tires quite square and and the shoulder of your winter tire helps to dig into the ice for better cornering your all season in summer tires tend to have a rounded shoulder profile that helps with you know, water evacuation and it almost works like that the bow of a boat that If you have water, that rounded shoulder is able to sort of cut through it and move that water to the sides. To that make sense, even though there aren't regulations, they all kind of have similar guidelines on what they want for each tire. You'll typically see consumers buying winter tires in areas where There's severe winter conditions in a prolonged period of time. So when you get without going 40 degrees is when you should be really looking into fire. That's why we don't call them snow tires is they're really cold and cooler weather tires to where they're designed to operate in. That half of the year or that third of the year. Your winter tire will typically be a softer compound and more able to remain flexible in colder conditions. Typically highly blades Did lots of cuts those blades keep the tread elements soft and pliable cuz that's the secret they have soft and pliable, low temperature tread elements. Once you get into winter tire you will see you know a heavily, Saved tires lots and lots of cuts. And basically what this allows you to do is as the compound, and as the temperature drops will allow the grooves to mov, and not let the floss becomes solid as it begins to cool down. Okay? Snow will also go in these grooves. And it goes on practice. Now, first thing for traction now is now the idea that these sides Well, in practice know the group's practice now, and they trashing off each other. Okay, that makes sense campaigns to keep the tire from going completely solid and extra grooves and slits that help with grip. Things also got interesting because even though there aren't regulations to call a winter tire or winter tire Did seem to be a certification you could look for. So this certification is actually a certification that's enforced by the Department of Transportation for three peak mountain snowflake that really describes what the pictogram looks like. You know, it's it's a mountain range three peaks with a with a snowflake in the middle. You'll find that on the sidewall of tires it essentially represents the tire has passed the certification for severe winter and that is actually based on a test. Tires have to achieve a certain performance standard in order to be branded with that. That's based on spin traction in medium packs No. And it's it's compared to the the SRTT which is the standard reference test tire. Okay, winter tires. I think I got it. Let's look at the other tires just to kind of compare, First of all, if you think about a dedicated summer tire, it's typically a very blocky tread pattern or really tight tread pattern with a minimal number of sites or blades. You know, what I'm referring to there is a void ratio is much higher. summertime to give the maximum three page book print the form on the maximum grip. summer tires are our tires that offer typically superior performance in wet and dry conditions. works well and works at its optimum when it gets that dynamic temperature range. It's just soft enough to grip that dry or wet pavement and it provides excellent wet and dry traction. But as the temperatures go down 45 degrees of bloat, those compounds get more brittle and the traction goes away and then you come to all season tires and all season tires leverage compound advancements that can provide grip both when it's cold. And when it's worn. Those as I'm sure they need to straddle the line. They can't be as specialized as either a summer tire or winter tire. And as a result, they often end up being compromised or they're almost always end up being compromised at both ends of the extreme. They're the classic jack of all trades master of none type scenario.>> I consider myself a jack of all trades, master of none. Anyway, follow the different compounds and trade patterns I get a little curious about longevity. Typically, a performance oriented compound isn't going to have the longevity that you know and i'll see some tire does it is softer as they say and winter tires are kind of the same way except they're at the opposite end of the spectrum they have tread blocks that move a lot due to the high site density and the winter compound is, Softer and so it wears faster as well. You can think about it as you know an eraser while you're erasing your pencil marks in a paper. If you have a soft eraser, you'll have more material on the page. It'll help you grip better, but it won't last nearly as long as it would if it had a harder compound. Okay, so all season tires did still seem to be the happy medium, but there's still the whole issue of it not being that good in winter conditions. So there's been pressure to improve the tires especially their winter function and then they're all season capability. And this is the new class of tires that are called all weather tires. And this is coming out with compounds To actually work well in snow and cold weather, but still get the longevity and the wet and dry traction that people want. The idea is they have the three big mountain snow flake that you find on a winter tire but you can use them to your round. Your permit for consumers that will see wintery conditions from time to time. But don't necessarily wanna change out summer and winter tires every year. They wanna have that winter capability at times.>> All right, bigger question. What about price? If you are going to have two sets of wheels and two sets of tires, that's typically going to be a more expensive proposition. So, you know, there's a lot of talk about well, winter tires cost me that much more money, but If you have two sets of tires and your one set would normally last for three to four years, but now you have two sets that would last for seven to eight years. I mean the, the real incremental cost over the life of your two sets of tires assuming that you're not leasing for three years and you're keeping it for a longer amount of time. That incremental cost isn't really that much greater than you would if you just had a single set of tire and the safety benefit that you get by going with two sets. Certainly offsets the incremental cost that you would have from having two sets. Yeah, the paper thing. Yeah, I think it has. There's one theme it's it's that they do matter. They're the only part of the vehicle that touches the road. If you take an eight by 11 sheet of paper, that's about the surface area of tire touching the road. So if you divide that in four, that's the footprint of one tires. That's kind of the visual that we like to remind people is that this this piece of paper is all that connects you to the road. ->> So I get it tires are important when your tires are gonna make a huge difference. But I have to assume that lifestyle would play into your decision. Do you go off road? Do you use it in bad weather? He talked on the phone a lot. Do you use your navigation system? Because you might need a tire that's very quiet.>> And then what do they like about the current tires and what don't they like? If obviously, on their original equipment tires, there's something specific they don't like. You take them to a product that will address them. Okay, so confession time. I normally drive an SUV, all wheel drive all season tires never really had an issue. I also don't drive much. For the last four years, that's been my morning commute. So I just recently turned in a two year auto lease with less than 5000 miles on it. Very embarrassing. Hope it's not a fireable offense. With that said, I'm not sure if I'm going to make the decision to now start getting winter tires, but at least I have all the knowledge I need. And hopefully some of it helped you make a better decision because I have to assume you have more fulfilling lives that involved a lot more driving than I do. Now if you're really interested in swapping out your tires, we have a separate video with everyone's favorite Brian Cooley who can show you how. And as always, for more information from people a lot more knowledgeable than me, go to D rojo COMM And subscribe to our YouTube channel.