VA 8 Owners, question about snow
 

Was reading another thread in the main discussion forum about the 8 needing snow tires, and I thought I'd ask the VA owners what their experiences with the car in the winter here has been. We're looking to buy soon, got the choices narrowed down to the RX8, Mini Cooper S, and maybe a G35 Coupe. I'm leaning towards the 8 so I can have an all rotary garage, but I'm worried about the snow aspect as this will be my wife's daily driver.

Will I need a set of snow tires or will the stock tires get through our winters?

Thanks.

I live in central VA, and I put snow tires on around the beginning of December and take them off in March. The summer tires that come on the car are not really even appropriate for the cold weather, let alone snow. You really run the chance of wrecking the car if you try to drive in any snow with the stock summer tires.

I put Dunlop Winter Sport M3's on my stock wheels and have no trouble in as much as 4" of fresh snow. Much more snow depth than that and you're going to get into clearance issues anyway. Most people recommend to get snow tires mounted on cheaper 17" wheels and just switch the whole thing every winter, but I was too cheap to do that. It's worked out fine for me. It costs me about $60 to get the tires changed each December and March.

Hope this helps.

PS: That's a gorgeous RX-7. I just love the 3rd gens!

whatever you do, don't buy a MINI. sohc, supercharged, fwd, junk. i deal with MINIs everyday and i can't stand them.

if you buy the 8, make sure to get some snow tires just like loco said. otherwise you'll be sliding/getting stuck everywhere.

DO NOT try to drive in snow the stock tires, I tried last winter, NOT PRETTY lol

note to self: get snow tires this winter!!!11

I live in Richmond. I had my 8 for 6 months then we had our first snow. I learned they don't call them "summer tires" for nothing. As soon as the road was coated with a thin layer of snow, the 8 lost all traction. LSD, TCS, DSC and ABS all require at least one wheel to connect with the ground so they immediately became useless. I had to park at a friends house until they plowed the roads a few days later.

If the 8 is your wife's daily drive, then switch to an "all season" performance tire. You lose a little handling but gain the ability to drive in the small snows we get here in VA. For heavy snow you should go with a winter tire.

Thanks for all the input guys. Looks like I'll have to look into a set of wheels and all season or snow tires for the car, I'll need to keep the summer tires since she want's to autocross it!

Definitely get snow tires if you plan on driving in the snow. I've got all the Pirelli P-Zero Nero's on, which will supposedly get me home in a pinch(though I'd never consider driving even on those if the snow was actually really starting to stick)in an emergency- but when it's snowed any amount, I've just left my car at home. It lived in the driveway for 2 weeks in 2003, because even though all the roads had been plowed, the apartment community I lived in hadn't done a very good job getting ice, etc, out of the parking lot and I couldn't move it at all. It'll just live in the garage this winter if it snows.

HOWEVER, if you have another car that is driveable in the snow, at all, I woudn't bother with the snow tires. Our elderly BMW does just fine, so we take that when we have to. The snow tires just seemed like a huge investment for somewhere that sees so little actual snow.

I just picked up my RX-8 the beginning of this month, but I do have experience with the G35C in the snow. For short distances (I work <3 miles from home) on flat roads, you can get by without snow tires. I live in NY, where we get a bit more snow than you do in VA, and I got through the winter in my G35C on the stock Pilot Sport summer tires. The key is to follow the normal snow driving techniques (being light on the gas and brake, slowing down completely before turning, doing everything gradually). I made it through several inches of unplowed snow many times in the G, and up my moderate incline driveway with a couple inches on it.

That being said, I'll probably buy a set of winter tires and wheels for the RX-8. It's not all that much money, and long-term you eventually replace your tires, so having winter tires can help make the summer ones last longer, and allow me to go a little wider with the summer ones when the stockers are used up (something I wouldn't do if I was going to use them in the winter).

For Virginia, I guess it depends on how far you'd have to go in the snow, and how hilly the area is. If it's not that far and pretty flat, you can get by with the stockers. I can't imagine them being any worse than the Pilot Sports on the G (those were wider 245s, with more weight on them, probably giving about equal contact pressure). Throw a little weight in the trunk, and you'll be fine.