<VV> Stock wheels or not???

[Bill Elliott]

On Tue, 2 Aug 2005 09:30:03 -0700, Ron wrote:

>You didn't mention "All Weather" rating which is more important than 
>anything else.
>RonH


That's another whole discussion, but an important one. Depending on the enviornmental circumstances it may or may not be more important than anything 
else. If the pavement is warm and dry (or just wet) then it's really not that important...except to warn against using all season tread... but if it's cold, icy, 
snow, muddy, etc... diffierent story.

"Summer only" tires are typically much better in both the wet and dry than "all season" tires...until it gets cold. Then the rubber compounds get hard and 
don't work well... you'll first note how horrible the car is in the wet, but get a little snow or ice on the road and they quickly become suicidal.

(My daily driver is my Allante... I have super sticky Kumho MX  Z-rated tires on it for the summer (talk about changing the driving characteristics of a car... 
steering got much heavier and I can now actually feel the chassis flex in curves... but the grip is just about the most I've seen on a street car). Last winter 
we had an early snow (just a couple of inches) before I swapped over to the dedicated snows (a whole other story...). I backed the car just out of the 
garage onto my basically flat paved driveway... and could NOT pull it back in. Even with traction control.)

Both the tread design (self-cleaning) and rubber compounds used on the all season tires make them a much better tool for cold weather use with 
occaisional snow use or anywhere mud, sand, etc... would cause traction issues. they do this at the expense of warm handling. They do everything "okay" 
but nothing particularly well.

The best combo is a pure summer tire for summer and a pure winter tire for winter... but if you're going to live with one tire year-round (and you are in a part 
of the country that gets a little winter), then an all season tire is a good bet. A high perfomance all season tire is an even better bet...and that's what I ended 
up using on my Corsa... while my wife's Corvair (which is never driven in winter) gets pure summer tires.

Bill