Snow tires are a great way to keep you and your vehicle safe in the winter on icy roads. But can you use them year-round? Should they be taken off your vehicle during the summer? The short answer is yes, but let’s take a look at why it’s a good idea to change out snow tires in the summer.
There are many factors that can affect the performance and lifespan of snow tires. According to the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA), around 11,000 accidents occur annually because of bad tires. So it pays to keep the rubber on your car in good working order to avoid accidents.
What are the different types of snow tires to keep you safe on the road? There are two styles, studless and studded. Both accomplish the same task, keeping your tires in contact with the road. Snow tires are made of very flexible rubber. This allows the tire to conform easily to different cold-weather road conditions.
However, that feature also makes them a bad idea to use in the summer. In the summer, the heat from the roads will cause the tires to wear down faster due to their flexible nature.
The same feature that will allow tires to grip the roads in the winter can create hazardous conditions in hot weather. Winter tires don’t perform well in hot temperatures. While their flexibility in the winter is an asset, that flexibility can decrease handling in the summer, and your car won’t perform as well.
Winter tires are made from special compounds that make them pliable and flexible in winter.
The tread depth and pattern matter as well. An appropriate tread will help in the winter. However, the tread need not be as deep in the summer or may require a different pattern for better handling.
Snow tires should last four seasons when used properly. However, if they are used all year long and are not rated all season, this will shorten the lifespan considerably. This can also vary by what climate you are in. For example, a Michigan snow tire will see considerably more use than a Virginia snow tire.
Another factor that can affect how long the tires will last is the brand. Some brands are just engineered to last longer than others. The lifespan can also be affected by how much driving individual drivers actually do.
In addition, how and where the tires are stored can affect how long they last as well. If the tire is left in the elements, the tires may become dangerous. Sun, moisture, and heat can have detrimental effects on rubber. So it’s a good idea to store them somewhere protected from the elements, such as a garage.
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Tires on a car are like the shoes you put on your feet. You will want to choose a shoe that is suitable for the terrain you will be in. You wouldn’t wear hiking boots to the beach; you would wear sandals. And you wouldn’t want to wear high heels to go for a run.
The same is true for your car.
For your car to perform optimally, it just needs to wear the right pair of shoes. Cinderella said it best, the right pair of shoes can change your life. Or in this case, the right set of wheels can help your car live its best life.
Can you drive snow and winter tires year round? It’s an idea that occurs to many drivers who experience winter weather: If I have to mount snow tires every year, why don’t I just keep them on my vehicle all the time?
Unfortunately, using snow tires year round isn’t recommended. In the long run, it will cost more money than changing them out and could compromise your vehicle’s performance on the road. That’s why tire makers offer different types of tires for different seasons – the best option for you is determined by many factors including climate, driving style, and performance needs.
Here are some specific reasons why year-round use of winter tires is not advised. And if it’s the hassle of tire mounting, unmounting, and remounting that you’re tired of, we’ve included an idea for simplifying that process, too.
All winter tires, whether studless or studded, are made to maintain better traction in extreme cold, and on icy, snowy, or slushy roads. The rubber is able to remain softer, which makes it more flexible, allowing the tire to conform to the road better in extremely cold conditions. This feature, along with deeper tread depths and specialized tread designs, are what make snow/winter tires ideal for inclement winter weather and extreme cold driving conditions.
We use this analogy - tennis shoes. Yes, you can wear tennis shoes on the beach or in the snow, but wouldn't it be better to have flip flops on the beach and boots for the snow? Winter tires are like snow boots for your car.
Winter tires are specially designed for cold temperatures and winter precipitation. Once it gets warm, you won't need deep tread depths to handle snow or biting edges for traction on ice. Here are some specific reasons why using winter tires year round is not recommended.
Faster wear on warm, dry pavement - the tread rubber of winter tires is considerably more flexible than that of all season and summer tires. That same pliable tread rubber that adds traction in winter will wear down quickly in warm temperatures. Summer and all-season tires are built to withstand warm temperatures, providing long wear life.
Decreased performance - In warm weather, winter tires won't provide the same handling capabilities as summer or all-season tires. Imagine if you needed to make a quick maneuver and your tires were soft and squishy. You won't get the crisp response from a winter tire in warm weather. Winter tires need that flexibilitity to handle ice and snow, but it's not as useful in warm weather.
The specialized compounds and tread designs of winter tires are not designed for optimal warm climate performance and wear. Generally speaking, the softer tread of a winter tire will wear out faster in warmer temperatures. If you keep winter tires on your vehicle after winter has come and gone, you will have to replace them sooner than had you removed them for springtime.
That’s why using snow tires year round is more expensive than mounting them seasonally. The sooner they wear out, the sooner you have to replace them.
Driving on snow tires year-round could compromise optimal tread wear and ultimately be more expensive than just changing tires out for the season.
If you were considering year-round use of winter tires because you were tired of having to change them, here’s an idea that could save you time and money. Purchase wheels with the same diameter and bolt pattern as your current wheels. Mount your snow tires on those and store them in the garage until winter arrives.
Instead of having to change out your tires each season, just have a technician change the wheels. It’s a quick, relatively inexpensive alternative to mounting and unmounting snow tires every season.
Even with the best snow tires on the market, changing temperatures affect their ability to grip the road's surface.
Listen to the pros, and know what to expect when the thermometer drops.
Learn More
Even with the best snow tires on the market, changing temperatures affect their ability to grip the road’s surface. Listen to the pros, and know what to expect when the thermometer drops.
LEARN MORE
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How do you know when tires are completely worn out and it's time to change them? Everything is simple. For summer tires, the limit is 1.6 mm of residual tread depth, and for winter (or all-season tires used in winter) - 4 mm. Modern summer tires can travel from 40,000 to 70,000 km, depending on driving style and vehicle characteristics. An average motorist rolls such a mileage on summer tires in 2-3 seasons. Moreover, wear implies not only a decrease in tread depth.
For millions of cycles of deformation, the strength of the carcass and its adhesion to the layers of the rubber compound are violated. In short, every 2-3 years you should buy a new set of tires.
In case of irreparable damage to one of the tires and a relatively high total mileage of the kit, it is also worth considering replacing it. Well, or about buying at least a pair of new tires, which, for any type of drive, should be installed on the front axle. We put two tires back - the most decent of the remaining ones.
Many motorists drive only a few thousand kilometers a year. This does not mean that the tires will serve you for several decades. According to Russian requirements (GOST 4754-97), the service life of passenger car tires is 5 years from the date of manufacture. And for example, Continental recommends that all car tires (including the spare tire) older than 10 years old should be replaced with new ones.
Therefore, with small runs, you can navigate for ten years. The date of manufacture of the tire is indicated on the sidewall. Usually it is an oval with four numbers. The first two are the ordinal number of the week in the year, the last two indicate the year.
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Tires should be rotated periodically in accordance with the vehicle manufacturer's recommendations - information on this can be found in the owner's manual.
We can advise you to carefully use the tires and, most importantly, to store them correctly in the off-season. First of all, during storage, it is important to exclude direct sunlight from hitting the tires, which greatly age the rubber. Tires without rims should be placed vertically, and stacked on rims.
And before installing tires on a car at the beginning of the season, evaluate their condition.
There should be no cracks in the tread and sidewalls. The tire should not be dry, it should remain rubbery and not look like baked plastic.
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Winter tires have a much shorter life span. They almost always fail due to the wear of the treadmill, because the tread of a new tire is 7–8 mm, and only 3–4 mm remain working height. If the tires are studded, then with such wear there are very few metal elements left, and the tire will not provide adequate safety when driving on a winter road. However, not only spikes, but also Velcro, with such a degree of wear, also lose most of their capabilities.
The real life of winter tires rarely exceeds 30,000 km. "Bald" winter tires without studs can be re-rolled in summer, but their grip on hot road surfaces will be very poor. This must be taken into account, especially when braking.
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So: tires that have not yet worn out along the tread (that is, up to 1.6 mm tread depth for summer tires, 4 mm for winter tires) are changed either ten years after the date of issue, or when the rubber layer cracks tires or damage.
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Can winter tires be used in summer?
When the weather turns hot in summer, both temperature and road conditions change. And although it seems quite logical to change the tires on the car when the season changes, not all drivers have time to do it on time.
Moreover, some believe that winter tires from European manufacturers are designed for the "European winter", which is supposedly soft, so that such tires can be used in Russia in the summer. Is this really true and what is the potential cost of a mistake?
How a winter tire differs from a summer one
The differences are primarily due to the different conditions in which winter and summer tires operate, when it is required to provide maximum grip and driving stability, based on temperature and asphalt conditions. Therefore, there are differences in the production technology of winter and summer tires. An all-season tyre, which occupies an intermediate position between a summer and a winter tire, however, in the heat, it does not perform as well as a summer tire, and in a cold, not as well as a winter one. Thus, a pneumatic tire is a winter tire if the design of the tire, the rubber compounds used in its production, and the tread pattern are specially designed to guarantee increased grip on icy and snow-covered surfaces compared to a conventional summer tire.
Winter tires must be marked with the symbols "M+S" or "M&S" or "M S". The manufacturer of a winter tire, in addition to this mandatory marking, may apply an additional marking in the form of a snowflake against the background of a three-headed mountain peak:. This marking indicates that the winter tire is suitable for operation in severe winter conditions, including dense and packed snow, which is confirmed by the high results of special test tests. Tires with such a pictogram are usually considered real winter tires. The designation “M + S” on tires literally translates as “mud and snow”. The developers of such tires sought to improve the performance of such tires when driving on mud, freshly fallen or beginning to melt snow. Many all-season tires can carry this label, but not all that have it are tested as tires for severe winter conditions. So, a real winter tire always has the “M + S” marking and the snowflake icon against the background of three mountain peaks at the same time.
Differences in the rubber composition of winter and summer tires
In the manufacture of various elements of the tire, rubber compounds of different properties and purpose are used.
Compounds for winter tires must be such that the structural elements of winter tires retain their performance to the maximum extent possible in the temperature range characteristic of a particular climatic zone. Usually the range from positive 5 - 10°C to negative 40 - 45°C is implied. Unlike winter tires, the rubber compounds of summer tires must ensure the effective functioning of the tire at positive temperatures, up to 50 - 55°C. At a positive temperature close to 0°C, the functional characteristics of the rubber compounds of a summer tire noticeably decrease, and at negative temperatures they deteriorate sharply, which makes it very dangerous to use a summer tire in winter at a negative temperature.
Differences in tread pattern
Winter tires have a tread adapted to winter conditions.
It is deeper, its elements are larger, the structure itself is more sparse. Numerous lamellas (narrow sipes, the width of which is 5-10 times less than the width of the other tread grooves), oriented in different directions, increase the controllability and braking efficiency of the car on snow and ice, as well as increase the grip of the tire on the winter road and the braking efficiency of the car . Winter tire tread grooves are usually wider and deeper than summer tire tread grooves. Unlike a summer tire, the tread pattern of a winter tire should provide not only effective water drainage, but also the removal of a mixture of snow and water (snow-water sludge) from the contact patch of a winter tire with the road. In addition, the tread of some winter tires can be equipped with anti-skid studs, which provide increased grip on ice and packed snow. For any tire, the norm of the residual tread depth is set by law, upon reaching which the tire must be removed from service. The tire manufacturer must provide for the presence in the tread pattern of indicators that the tread wear limit has been reached, which help the driver to understand in a timely manner that the tread depth is the minimum permissible and the operation of such a tire should be immediately discontinued.
For a winter passenger tire that is operated on an icy or snowy road surface, this rate is 4 millimeters.
The tread pattern of a summer tire is designed taking into account the specifics of tire operation in summer conditions, usually these are good roads, high speeds, increased requirements for driving comfort, efficiency and mileage of a summer tire, and safety on wet roads. The number of sipes in the tread pattern of a summer tire is significantly less than that of a winter tire. The summer tire tread cannot be equipped with anti-skid studs. For a summer passenger tire, the legally established norm for the residual tread depth, upon reaching which the summer tire must be taken out of service, is 1.6 mm.
Effects of using a winter tire in summer
Winter tires have improved grip on snowy and icy roads. If you use winter tires on dry road surfaces, you may encounter a deterioration in vehicle handling, an increase in braking distances, an increased risk of aquaplaning, excessive heat generation in the tire, faster wear of the tread part of the winter tire, and a rather high level of noise generated by the tire.
Winter studded tires destroy dry pavement with their studs, thereby causing harm not only to the road itself, but also to the environment. Winter tires are usually heavier than summer tires of similar size, the groove depth and saturation of the sipes in the tread pattern are greater, which leads to the deterioration of such an important tire property as fuel efficiency for motorists.
The time when it is necessary to change tires
As for the procedure for using winter tires, it is defined in the technical regulation of the Customs Union "On the safety of wheeled vehicles" (abbreviated as TR CU), which was approved by the Commission of the Customs Union in 2011, and entered into effect in January 2015.
In particular, the TR CU establishes that during the winter period (December, January, February) it is forbidden to operate vehicles that are not equipped with winter tires, but in the summer period (June, July, August) it is forbidden to operate vehicles equipped with winter tires.
