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By Christopher McGraw, Autoblog
Contrary to popular belief, all-season tires do not perform well in all
seasons. They are spring, summer and fall tires. That's why I'm here in
Copper Mountain, Colo. We have some snow and ice. We're testing out
Nokian's all-weather and winter tire portfolio.
All right, we're about to do an acceleration and braking test. We have Hakkapeliitta R3s on this Audi Q5. We're just going to go straight until the end of the cones and then slam on the brakes, so here we go.
We were at 45 miles an hour, slammed on the brakes, ABS kicked in, and
we stopped with a ton of room left over with these tires, so, once
again, we have the Hakkapeliitta R3s in the Audi Q5. I'm in sport mode.
Traction control still on, we're doing the acceleration and braking
test. All right, three, two, one, all right, I'm floored. Okay, here we
go, 54. That's the fastest we've gotten up to.
I'm in an Audi Q3.
It's got Quattro, which is obviously their all-wheel drive system. It
also has OE tires on it, which are Pirelli Scorpions. The brand doesn't
much matter. What does matter is the fact that these tires are
all-seasons, which means they're good for spring, summer, and fall, not
for winter. We're going to test these tires out on a slalom course right
now and see how they compare to an all-weather tire, which is the
four-season tire, Nokian WRG4s, so this is the OE tire, the all-season,
and off we go.
Accelerating, you don't get much grip because it's
too cold for these tires and you're not able to keep tight turns around
the slalom course, not as tight at least as the WRG4. I'm sliding
around quite a bit, and now I'm getting to the turn, and I'm just
sliding, just sliding. The traction control is on, but it is not a tight
turn. I'm getting back up to speed here. Oh, man, I'm sliding all over
the place. I might hit one of these cones here. I'm trying not to, but
you don't really have as much control in the all-seasons as you would in
an all-weather. They're just not made for winter driving.
Once
again, we're in an Audi Q3. This time, instead of these wheels being
wrapped in the OE all-season tires, we are in all-weather tires. These
are the Nokian WRG4s, so we're talking winter, spring, summer, fall.
This can handle it all. They're not going to be as good in the winter as
winter tires and they're not going to be as good in summer as like
summer performance tires, but they are much better than all-season
tires, which is really just good for three seasons, so off we go.
Even just gripping the snow with the acceleration, you're able to get a
lot more grip, because all-seasons are not made for winter despite
their name, and, now, as I'm going around, I'm able to make much tighter
turns in the WRG4s just because they're more suited for winter weather
and there's barely any slip at the end when I'm doing this U-turn here
in this slalom course. I am keeping a much tighter line just because I
can on the slalom course. The turning is a lot better.
I'm
actually able to go a little bit faster as well, and that is just the
difference between having an all-weather tire and an all-season tire,
and so if you have all-season and you like your all-seasons, you can
keep your all-season. Just get a winter tire if you're going to be
driving anywhere where there's a lot of snow and ice and cold
temperatures or, if you just want to have one tire year-round, you can
run something like the WRG4 and you'd be fine.
All right, so, right now, I am in an Audi Q5. It has all-wheel
drive, and wrapped on these wheels are Nokian Hakkapeliitta 9s, which is
their flagship winter tire. These are studded tires. They actually have
two different types of studs. The center studs are more lateral, and
the studs on the shoulder of the tire are actually more triangular so,
that way, you can grab more as you're turning, so it's like a little bit
more performance in winter. I'm in a lateral track right now, which is
basically just like a big circle. We'll be driving around and seeing how
these tires perform when just constantly cornering, so off we go.
I'm doing pretty tight circles right now, and I'm sliding a little bit,
but really not a ton. If I take it to a bit wider circle, I'm able to
really grip on those studs on the shoulders a lot more so than if I was,
say, on a studless tire or especially like an all-season tire. It's
going to be no comparison. Now, I can get it to do a little bit of
sliding if I really floor it, but it's a lot harder to do some sliding
with these tires on just because of the studs, the two different types
of studs, and the overall performance.
Now, these studs, unlike
normal studs, which are just made out of steel, are made out of
stainless steel, so they won't corrode as quickly, which obviously is
good. The lighter the stud, the less damage on a road, so these studs
were made to be a bit lighter as well.
I'm turned all the way
right now and I'm able to keep this tight radius due to the studs on
these tires, and it goes to show, if you're going to be doing a lot of
driving in these kind of conditions where you're driving around in ice
and snow, we had a lot of snowpack on this lot yesterday that melted in
the afternoon, it's actually getting quite warm already this morning,
and then, overnight, it froze, so there this layer of ice on top, and
these studs let you really grip.
Another thing with winter tires
in general is their ability to handle through black ice, and what black
ice is is it's a layer of virtually invisible ice, but on top of that is
a tiny layer of water, and so winter tires actually have quite a bit of
traction on bare ice itself. That's what they're made for, and they an
incredible amount of traction, more than you would expect, but, when you
add that extra layer of water, that's where things get hairy, and so
winter tires are built to filter that water away from the car into the
grooves of the tires so that the tire is touching the ice itself.
Last but certainly not least, we're here with the Ram 1500.
We have the Hakkapeliitta LT3 tires. We're going to test them out on
this snow track. Unsurprisingly, they're good in the snow. Obviously,
the Hakkapeliitta LT3s are replacing the LT2 which have been around
since 2012, which is quite a bit of time, so they've upgraded and almost
everything is better about these tires. Actually, not almost
everything, everything is better about these tires. You get more grip in
snow, more grip on the ice, more grip in wet conditions, which could be
tough with a winter tire, and it's handling this snow track like a
champ.
As you can see, it's pretty, pretty rough, this course,
and these tires are handling it very easily better than my GoPro is
handling it, that's for sure, because I know a lot of people out there
like to run all-terrains year-round on their tracks, so we're talking
General Grabber AT2s or even BF KO2s, and, in situations like this,
that's where you're going to have a harder time than if you had a
dedicated winter tire like the LT3. I'm pushing the truck pretty hard
and, likewise, the tires, and I'm still maintaining control around this
entire course.
Looking to grab some Nokian tires for yourself?
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