What's worse: winters in summer, or summers in winter?

[NoSOD]

Next week I am at last heading out on a trip into SW US staring in Calgary, Alberta. I have winter tires on my truck at present and am debating the relative merits of leaving them on for the month-long trip, or having them changed to all season tires before I leave. The all-season ones are Bridgestone Dueller, they do have the MS logo. The winter tires are dedicated winter tires, cannot read the side wall as too dirty at present. My route will take me to Alberta/Montana border at Sweet Grass, south on Interstate 15 over three days through Montana, Idaho, and Utah until we stop at Zion NP. From there we will go west to Red Rock Canyon near Las Vegas, where it will be well above zero. Then we head back east to Grand Canyon March 30, then Monument, then to Moab into early April, from there back northwards stopping at Yellowstone on the way, then back up into Alberta, due back home April 19th. My concern is not having the best tires for the conditions we will encounter, but what is safer- winter tires in above zero and maybe raining, or the all-seasons in the below zero snow and ice on the way? Hopefully will be mostly above zero on the way back. All this depends on my being able to dig our trailer out of the snow at the storage place of course!

[DT6]

As we are in mid-March and nearing April, in years past I would say switch to the all season. But, with all of the atmospheric rivers coming into the coast, and other unpredictable weather events lead me to error on the side of caution. So if it were me, I would use the Winter tires and not worry about he wear and tear. If this causes more tire wear than normal, so be it.

I also assume road noise might be a factor with the Winter tires being louder than the all season.

So in either case you will probably be fine as long as you are careful and take your time. I've found the more I tow, the slower I go. This current trip we are on, I've been averaging 50 to 60 MPH, sometimes less. Admittedly I used to go faster, but I've seen so many things on the road the last few years while towing, that I decided living longer, or at least avoiding the delays an accident will cause, was more important than getting somewhere earlier. We have also adjusted our daily Google/Apple Maps trip times to 4.5 hours or less (usually around 3 to 3.5), which ends up taking us about 5 to 7 hours, depending on conditions.

Sorry I don't have a more solid recommendation. I used to live in Alaska so I'm aware of winter driving conditions, just this time of year is so unpredictable as to whether or not you will encounter any "last snowstorms of the season".

Good luck on your trip and wish you safe travels.

[Tosh]

I'm keeping my winter tires on until May. Though I live below 1000 ft, near the 45th parallel, I might be traveling over a mountain pass or 2 before summer is here. My tires are not studded, so they don't wear down the road surface much.

[occer]

I would put on the all-season tires and carry chains for emergency.
I would probably only travel when the weather is clear, not a fan of towing while it’s snowing or inclement weather if the weather turn bad I would try and stay an extra day or two.

[kevin27]

I had a set of Bridgestone Duellers that came on my Ram 1500 from the factory. I've heard the factory tires are of lesser quality than if you were to buy the same ones from a tire shop but I hated the Duellers that it came with. They were the only tires I've ever actually experienced hydroplaning with and they were scary in snow as well. Not sure if yours would be the same tires I had but I wanted to put that out there

[John in Santa Cruz]

Originally Posted by kevin27

I had a set of Bridgestone Duellers that came on my Ram 1500 from the factory. I've heard the factory tires are of lesser quality than if you were to buy the same ones from a tire shop but I hated the Duellers that it came with. They were the only tires I've ever actually experienced hydroplaning with and they were scary in snow as well. Not sure if yours would be the same tires I had but I wanted to put that out there

I'm sure it varies with the tire and vehicle, but its pretty common for a vehicle to come with a version of a tire thats not the same you'll buy at a tire store. For example, my 2008 Tacoma 4x4 came with BF Goodrich "Rugged Trail A/T" which were nowheres NEAR as good a tire as the All-Terrain KO2's. When I bought that truck it was 8 years old with only 8000 miles, so I replaced the factory tires (including spare) immediately with the KO2s.

[Iowa Dave]

Back in the day we used to run those BF Goodrich Super All Tractions. They were great tires especially in snow and mud. We had a set on the back of my 1970 F-100 with a pickup camper. Took us a lot of places where we shouldn’t have been and brought us home.
Iowa Dave

[Mike G]

Another vote for the winter tires. When towing a trailer, go for max traction to be on the safe side because I'm fairly sure you will run into some slippery conditions. If you wear them out, so what? Tires are cheaper than trailers.


I put some Bridgestone Blizzaks on my daughter's car when she was a young driver. Soft rubber and they wore quickly, but man did they grip the ice when others were spinning their wheels and going nowhere! I was really impressed with them.

[Iowa Dave]

The secret is in the rubber compound. Those softer tires, inflated to the lower end of the allowable recommendation do the best job on ice. We used to pull a planer on a pond where we held speed skating meets. That ice was like glass and would shave up nice and smooth, but if it got a little warm before we planed, it was tough to get going. Kind of a catch 22. Blade up you could go but not shave. Blade down you would break traction spin. But we got the job done most winters. That’s one of my guys brooming the shavings off the ice with a Satoh Bison tractor. 15 gallon oil drum filled with concrete on the rear end for traction.

https://www.thegazette.com/community...-cedar-rapids/

Iowa Dave

[John in Santa Cruz]

Originally Posted by Iowa Dave

Back in the day we used to run those BF Goodrich Super All Tractions. They were great tires especially in snow and mud. We had a set on the back of my 1970 F-100 with a pickup camper. Took us a lot of places where we shouldn’t have been and brought us home.
Iowa Dave

for offroading now days, in BFG's line, there's the KO2 all terrain, then there's the KM3(?) mud terrain for the deeper stuff. the M/T tires are pretty gnarly on the highway, but the A/T tires get good mileage, and are surprisingly quiet and smooth on the highway. as I'm 90% pavement 10% dirt at best, I go with the A/T's... they will definitely go places with ease that highway tires can't touch.

fun fact, in select sizes that fit heavy duty pickups, like my older F250, there's two almost identical KO2's... The standard one is '3 peak snow' rated, while the 'commercial' one is just M+S rated. The standard one has a bit of a reputation for 'chunking' on coarse gravel and such with a 9000 lb truck, and the commerical one doesn't. Both are available as load range "E" which is what my F250 requires.

and yeah, snow folks... M+S is the old mud+snow rating for all season tires, but there's a new enhanced '3PMSF' rating, "3 Peak Mountain Snowflake', signified by this icon on the tire sidewall...



these are supposed to be much better snow tires than the old M+S tires, albeit still nothing like a Blizzak class dedicated snow tire.

[Iowa Dave]

Thanks for catching me up on the BF Goodrich evolutions I see those KO’s on a lot of farm pickups when I stop at a rural convenience store. They’ve been pretty good for a long time.
Iowa Dave

[Dan S]

Absolutely switch to all season tires. In warmer weather, winter tires have longer stopping distances, load ranges are generally lower, handling goes in the toilet meaning sway is a more likely possibility. Get a set of all season Michelin Defender LTX M+S and you’ll wonder whether or not you even need snow tires next winter.

[NoSOD]

Originally Posted by Dan S

Absolutely switch to all season tires. In warmer weather, winter tires have longer stopping distances, load ranges are generally lower, handling goes in the toilet meaning sway is a more likely possibility. Get a set of all season Michelin Defender LTX M+S and you’ll wonder whether or not you even need snow tires next winter.

That was my concern, and in the end I did get the all seasons put on, and I carry a set of chains as suggested by occer. However, I was questioning my decision yesterday when we woke to an inch of snow at Massacre Rocks in Idaho! The 6 hour drive from there through Utah to Yuba Lake was awful, with high wind, wet snow, rain, and around Salt Lake City, very heavy traffic. I never lost traction though. Temperatures were between about minus 3C and plus 3C. Today we expect it to be just above freezing as we head to Zion. At least we are not going to need the maxxfan: a mysterious beeping turned out to be from that malfunctioning. Thanks to this forum, we have shut it up. Hopefully that will be the only problem we have on this trip!