KFence27

I know there are a ton of snow tire posts out there, but this one has a little different spin on it. Is everyone just putting the snow tires on the rear wheels or is everyone buying a complete set of 4. I'd like to get by with just the rear wheels/tires but I don't know if its safe enough. Money to fix body work or money to buy a set of 4. Any thoughts out there?

Gord96BRG

Nope, we've covered this before too. Think about it - snow tires on the rear wheels will certainly help get your car moving.

What's going to help it stop or go around corners?

The front tires are equally, if not more, important to safe winter driving - especially compared to zero-grip performance summer tires. With summer tires on the front and winter tires on the rear, all that would happen is that you would slide into something faster. Seriously, 4 winter tires is the ONLY way to go.

Regards,
Gordon

KFence27

Thanks Gordon, I knew you'd be a help, you always seem to be around these winter tires posts, haha. The only problem is choosing which way to go and the availability of tires/wheels. I got my car 3 weeks ago and have had no time to prepare. Luckily for now I still have my Explorer, but not for long.

carnut

Gordon is right again. Suspension in modern cars is tuned for tires to have identical characteristics on all four wheels. I did 4 snows, also. I know it's a fair amount of money, but I think it's worth it for those of us who have to use our 8's in all kinds of weather.

zoomalot

The equal front to rear weight distribution of the 8 makes four winter tires more valuable and effective.

KC_RX-8

i know it's better to have 4 instead for 2 but wouldn't it help getting up certain icey hills you wouldn't be able to get up with the stock tires?

Gord96BRG

Sure. What are you going to do when you want to come down the icy hills? (CRUNCH!)

Seriously - the stock tires have ZERO grip on snow/ice. NONE. You won't be able to steer, you won't be able to stop. Who cares if you can get the car to go with 2 rear snow tires? All that happens then is you'll crunch it into something. As for the icy hills - even with 2 winter tires on the back, you wouldn't be able to get to the hill unless you started out in a straight line below the hill. Any corners, stop lights, etc - forget it.

Regards,
Gordon

KFence27

I'd say 4 is the way to go. Got my tires and wheels Friday put them on Sunday and was able to get out and test it in some slushy conditions. The difference as you would expect is from one world to another. The only problem I have now is the flashing TPMS light and a little shimmy in my steering wheel. I'm gonna change front to back and see if that fixes it. Not gonna get to that for a couple days though.

KC_RX-8

i agree, but in my case, all i have to do is get out of my subdivision bec. they do not plow it. After that, here in KC, the roads are always in great condition. I just can't get out of my neighborhood.

Gord96BRG

Then it's a gamble - to quote Clint, "do you feel lucky, punk?" How far is it out of your neighborhood? It doesn't take very far to slide into a curb and ruin a wheel or bend a suspension arm.

More, though - one of the important reasons to use tires in matched sets of 4 is for balance and consistency of response. With 2 of each, in your subdivision your car would be skidding and understeering around and having problems trying to stop because of the poor grip of the front tires. Meanwhile, outside of your subdivision, on warmer days, your car would want to oversteer all the time and spin out, since your rear winter tires would not have as much dry warm pavement grip as your front tires. The handling balance would be very inconsistent from day to day, road surface to road surface, high temperature to low temperature, constantly changing. That makes it very hard to know the limits of your car and avoid exceeding them, when the relative limits front to rear are always different!

Regards,
Gordon

joanie

I finally got my snow tires on. I didn't feel like going for new rims right now so I went looking for snows that will fit stock rims.

As you all know by now, nobody has them. Well a local tire shop where I live wouldn't take no for an answer. It took him about 2 weeks, and went from Blizzak to Dunlop back to Blizzak again. He got me 4 Blizzak LM-22's the exact size of stock tires.

He put them on for me and didn't put one scratch on the rims. When I mentioned the fact that others on this forum were complaining about having a hard time swapping tires he was genuinely surprised and said he changes 20" tires all the time with no problem. And then mentioned something about the equipment he used was coated with plastic (or something like that) and didn't scratch the rims. Whatever!! It worked.

Now all I need is some snow. Its going into the 50's today! I guess now that I got the first pair of snow tires I even bought in my life, it won't snow in NYC for the rest of the winter.

Of course these tires weren't nearly as cheap as I would have gotten from the Tirerack but it was worth the extra money for peace of mind. Plus he threw in a free car wash!

Merry Christmas everyone and have a safe and Happy New Year!

SleepR1

This is great news! My hope is to use the stock wheels for snows, and buy a set of Paul Yaw's Rx8-specific 9.5 x 18, 3-piece wheels/255/40-18s for daily use the rest of the year. I tried Tire Rack to see if they had 225/45-18 Blizzaks, and they don't have ANY 225/45-18 snows! How did your local tire retailer find them? Perhaps I could be as persistent as you LOL Enjoy the new Blizzak LM22s on the stock wheels. You'll get around better than most SUVs on all season treads

joanie

He said he got them from a supplier in Indiana. By the way, the 4 stock tires, in garbage bags, fit in the back seat no problem.

Good Luck!