Help Me Decide Which Tires to Run This Week

[williaty]

OK, so I'm leaving Ohio tomorrow morning to travel to Knoxville, TN. We'll be staying in Knoxville for the week. My fiancee will be attending a medical imaging seminar and I'll be jumping over into the mountains every day for driving, hiking/photography, etc. Basically, each day, I'll leave Knoxville, enter the Smokies, drive around shooting stuff and making a hoon of myself, then end up back in Knoxville each night. I'll be hitting roads like US129, NC28, The RFMT, etc, so good driving.

The part I can decide is what tires to take (note, can't take both, won't have any way to switch). I've got Falken 452s and Hankook Icebear W300s. The Icebears are really pretty god, but they do have lower grip than the Falkens. The problem is the weather. If you look at the forecast for Knoxville and Gatlinburg, TN and for Cherokee, Bryson City, Topton, and Almond, NC (the places closest to where I'll be driving), the temps are right on the "who knows what to do" line. Every morning and night will be into the low 30s or high 20s and it might warm up into the high 50s each day. Obviously, the forecast for the end of the week isn't available yet. I'm worried that I might get caught in the mountains with some precip below freezing if the forecasts are off a little bit. At the same time, if I can get away with summer tires, that would be a lot more fun.


So what do you guys think, hot or cold tires?

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[007WRX]

Cold tires. Better safe then sorry.

[recnelis]

Take the W300s. Unless you need the summers for competition (autox/track), you aren't losing much going with snow tires over summer tires in colder weather.

For what it's worth, my Dunlop SP Sport 8000s have problems stopping on a hill near my house (ABS kicks in) in near freezing weather, whereas my W300s have no problems at all on the same hill.

[williaty]

Well, we're down there now. Went with the W300s due to the forecasted temps in the mountains. 400mi on the highway with them today at about 50F. The problem was that for 90% of the trip we had a 35-40mph head/crosswind. The car was SOOOO hard to drive with these tires and that much wind. It was almost impossible to keep in in our lane. It required so much concentration to drive that we were having to run short, 2 hour intervals for driver switches because it was just frying us. For the bit where we didn't have any wind, they behaved great.

[Uncle Scotty]

....sounds like something other than the tires to me.....a front lip may have helped

[williaty]

It doesn't do this on my summer tires (Falken 452). Interesting thought about the lip though. I suppose my windspeed was pushing 110mph...

[Uncle Scotty]

...also....too much or too little air in the tires may affect handling like this......and your alignment may be 'wrong' for your winter tires....toe may be an issue.


My '02 was VERY unstable without a front lip....noticable above ~45mph.....after adding a lip....it was MUCH-MUCH more stable at speed

[williaty]

Originally Posted by Uncle Scotty

...also....too much or too little air in the tires may affect handling like this......and your alignment may be 'wrong' for your winter tires....toe may be an issue.


My '02 was VERY unstable without a front lip....noticable above ~45mph.....after adding a lip....it was MUCH-MUCH more stable at speed

0 Toe.

Played with the air pressure every 75-100mi by 1psi increments over a 6psi total range higher and lower than the initial starting value. 1psi lower than the initial value turned out to be optimum. Didn't eliminate the problem, but dropped the frequency the car was oscillating at.


AFAIK, no lips for a GG. Skid plate under the front end helped A LOT with highway stability in wind back when I did it though, can't imagine what today would have been like without it.

Which lip do you have Scotty? I had previously had the impression that 90% of them did jack for aero.