Piecing Together the Winter Tire Puzzle

A good swath of the country is currently in the thick of winter’s frozen grasp, icy tentacles clutching deep into the heart of every gearhead who’d rather be enjoying a healthy round of burnouts in a deserted parking lot.

OK, maybe that’s a tad dramatic. But our point stands.

Nearly everyone reading this post is dealing with some level of snow and slush on their way to work. And as any good driver will tell you, having the right tools for the job is important: a proper set of sockets to perform an oil change, a good set of headlights to see (and be seen) at night, and a stout set of winter tires to get you through the season.

The crew at TDot Performance, in addition to knowing the best way to tune your car for speed, have a team whose sole focus is tires and wheels. They’re of the opinion that what goes around in the winter oughta have good tread on it, and since we’re of the same mindset, we’ve partnered with them to create the following guide to winter tires.

Cold Comfort

You’ll notice we’re calling them winter tires, not snow tires. It’s an important distinction, and it’s thanks to properties baked right in to these rubber hoops that make them useful when the ambient temperature drops below a certain level — generally agreed to be around 7 degrees Celsius. When the mercury falls past that number, the gummy compounds in a winter tire are better able to stick to the road than all-season (and especially summer) tires.

In other words, that set of performance rubber which allowed you to exit VIR’s notorious Oak Tree turn at tremendous speed will simply turn to Teflon when temperatures drop into the thermometer’s nether regions.

There are two factors at play that make a winter tire uniquely suited for the task before it. One is molecular, the other is mechanical. What’s the difference, you say? Glad you asked.

Compound Interest

Molecular features are contained in the special formula of compounds that a tire manufacturer bakes into the composition of its winter tire. If one does much research into the issue, they’ll find themselves reading a lot about silica and natural rubbers. These ingredients, and others, help the tire remain flexible when the weather turns cold, permitting better traction in wintery conditions.

Not all compounds are created equal, though. It shouldn’t be a surprise that exact compositions of the various brews are closely-guarded secrets on the same plane as how they get the caramel inside a Caramilk bar. However, do know that mainstream winter tire makers — like BFGoodrich, Michelin, Goodyear, Nokian, et al — almost always have a leg up compared to knock-off brands. While the tread patterns on these off-brand tires may look similar to the Big Guns, the invisible compounds found inside are often vastly inferior. This means less traction when you need it most.

Don’t Tread on Me

This also segues nicely into our next topic: the mechanical features of a winter tire. These are found in the tread and, unlike the above compounds, are easy to see. A good winter hoop should have lots of sipes, which are those little (often zig-zaggy) lines embedded into each block of tread. When pressed into a surface, these sipes open up to provide extra traction surfaces. Saw-toothed shaped sipes will also bite more aggressively into snow.

Not convinced? Try this experiment. Grab a block of Styrofoam from that mountain of recycling you’ve got out in the garage. Place the flat edge of it face down and push it across the kitchen table. Slid pretty easily, right? Now cut several shallow lines across the Styrofoam’s flat surface and try to push it across the same expanse of table. We bet it took a bit more effort to move the stuff this time, don’t you think?

That’s what a series of well-designed sipes can do for drivers when their car is scrambling for traction. It’ll help with both acceleration and braking, while some really good sipes will also help with lateral grip. This aids in traction duties while turning.

What a Flake

While shopping for winter rubber, it’s important to look for a notation that’s become known as the “three-peak mountain snowflake” symbol (or 3PMSF). Looking exactly as described, this icon is molded into the sidewall of any tire that passes the rigorous litany of requirements needed in order to be considered a true “winter tire.”

It’s worth noting that rubber showing this symbol has passed an acceleration test on medium packed snow. Braking and turning on snow, however, along with ice traction, are not components of the test. Recently, your author has even noticed a few off-brand tires that are clearly not designed for winter use bearing the vaunted 3PMSF logo, suggesting a few knock-offs are gaming the system by finding ways to make a bare-minimum grade in the test. So shop carefully, and always do your research before buying.

Still, all-season and all-terrain tires – yes, even those with the 3PMSF symbol – cannot match the traction of dedicated winter rubber in all winter weather conditions. We feel such tires should not be considered as a suitable replacement for occasions when a dedicated winter tire is truly needed.

Brand Identity

Winter tires are one of the few consumer products in which one truly does get what one pays for, meaning rubber from the top name brands might be more expensive but are generally worth the extra outlay. Remember, just because those cheaper tires look like the Big Guns doesn’t mean they have the bark to match their bite. After all, we technically can’t see the rubber’s compound—at least not without breaking out a scientific microscope (and your author was banned from chemistry labs back in high school after an unfortunate incident with cadmium and benzene).

That’s why TDot Performance made sure to team up with major brands like BFGoodrich, Michelin and Goodyear in order to offer customers a wide array of sizes and styles of winter tires. With free shipping plus a 30-day no-hassle return policy, TDot can hook you up with what your car needs to stay shiny side up this season.

Get a Grip

If you’re still on the fence about making the investment in winter tires, consider this: a study by the Transport Research Institute in Sweden (where they know a thing or two about driving on winter surfaces) suggest these tires have an advantage of about 25% on dry roads compared to non-winter rubber when ambient temperatures drop close to freezing. On slippery or snowy surfaces, that delta only increases.

That 25% could mean the difference between stopping just short of the vehicle in front of you and having to place an unhappy call to your insurance agency. As for those burnouts in a deserted parking lot you’ve been pining for, I think we finally found a use for those el cheapo off-brand winter tires…

For more info, visit TDotPerformance.ca.