People might wonder why they should spend a lot of money on a set of winter tires, when the winter is only a few months long and most time is spend driving on all-season tires. Well, the level of difficulty to drive on ice, snow and slush is so much higher than driving on dry summer roads. When you drive during the spring, summer and part of the fall, you will have mostly dry roads with the occasional wet roads. The main difficulty arises when you have heavy rain, which can cause hydroplaning. This is what happens when you the tires aren’t able to press away the water from the road surface and the tires will instead be pushed up on the water layer. This will cause the car to lose contact with the road and thus you lose all control over the car. This can be very dangerous and is why you also need to have premium all-season tires that have very good wet properties. This relates both the ability to prevent hydroplaning and the wet grip, so that you can have a short braking distance.
When it comes to winter tires aka snow tires, they have to perform both on dry roads, on icy roads, on snowy roads and when you have the wet snow aka as slush. Slush can in the same way that water can cause hydroplaning, it can cause slushplaning. To create grip on snow and ice you need to have a tread pattern that can help in snow, sipes that can assist in creating grip and then you can have added something to the tread. For studded tires you have metal studs protruding from the tread and with them you can create excellent grip on ice as the metal studs will dig into the ice. For non-studded tires they will have to rely on added gripping particles, like cryo-crystals. This will add a sandpaper like surface to the tread, which in combination with sipes will create sufficient grip on ice without using metal studs. Since the studded tires aren’t allowed in every state and province, you will need an alternative that performs comparably. When you purchase premium tires then you have a good possibility to get the best possible tires that can provide sufficient safety and control when driving in difficult winter conditions.
For areas where you might not have a long and harsh winter, where it sometimes can feel like an overkill to change between all-season tires and winter tires before the first snow arrives, the all-weather tires can be a good option. There are all-weather tires that are approved for winter use and can thus be use all-year round regardless of what weather conditions that you will face. This makes them very convenient for these areas and will allow you to always be ready to drive regardless of weather or area that you will visit.
For more information regarding premium winter tires, visit: http://www.nokiantires.com
