Debating if I should put snow tires on Stinger or get an SUV (MDX)

[MerlintheMad]

But if you are driving in stuff above 40 degrees, you are going to wear out winter tires very fast. That is the nature of them.

Bingo. When the majority of your winter afternoons are either side of 40F, it makes sense to have the tire that gives the best performance (not referring to cornering speeds, here). If you don't mind wearing through snow tires then okay. I like A/S, have run them my entire driving life, and know that I'd hate feeling like I'm wasting my tires on those most common days. Further north? That would alter driving conditions enough to run snow tires instead.

 

[Redleg94]

I've always liked the "all weather" tires like Nokian WRs, but no one seems to make both sizes for the standard 19" staggered setup. As long thas there isn't a lot of snow on the ground, all weathers work well in the cold and still work well when the temperatures climb into the high 40s/low 50s on those early spring days

 

[RM7]

It's not about plowing, it's about a few cm of snow. Skinnier tires will do better because there is a thinner contact patch and thus a higher mass per square cm. It is able to dig a little better into fresh snow or wet snow, especially for RWD cars.

I would still disagree that narrow is always better from a traction and control point of view. There are lots of winter situations where you want to maximize grip and it's still a function of maximum surface area. Ice, packed snow, frost (black ice), etc. Narrow makes sense in some situations and places where you need to sink down significantly to get traction, but that's really nowhere you'd be driving a car IME. And a lot of times, turning or lack of being able to turn your drive wheels doesn't really cause you problems, it's controlling your steering and braking that causes the most problems. The fresh-snow situation doesn't last very long, at least for me and the amount of difference with say 225 vs. 255 on a vehicle like this is pretty much insignificant. Yes, vehicles with high axle weight tend to do much better in snow and ice, IME we really can't compete with that with the mass of our vehicles and tire options. You sacrifice too much traction in other winter situations going narrow cars like this.

 

[RogueIV]

narrower can work a bit better with slush too. IDK I run 235s all around in winter, and it's fine. 225s weren't available at the time I needed them.

fwiw, your contact patch on narrower tires will be longer allowing more tread to contact an area that has already been cleared.

Wider would be a possibly benefit on dry and packed snow surfaces.

If you live in a place that has a lot of ice, studs help a lot but are noisey and bad for dry traction.

Everything is a bit of a tradeoff. Plan for the conditions you see more of in winter, for me it's more of slush and wet that I have to worry about.


There's a decent write up on it here, which i agree with: Snow Tires: Wide Vs Narrow - Race & Track Driving (formerly Win HPDE)

 

[zetatai]

Everything is a bit of a tradeoff. Plan for the conditions you see more of in winter, for me it's more of slush and wet that I have to worry about.

That sums it up perfectly. The eskimos have 100 words for snow, and there are at least that many distinct road conditions involving snow, rain & ice determined by the relationship of temperature, humidity, quantity of precipitation, road surface/condition, etc, etc. In each situation, some tire/wheel/vehicle combination will be most effective, but you can't swap set-ups/rigs day to day, or even predict what you're going to run into on any given day... so you prepare for the most likely weather scenario, and make due with what ya got when the weather throws you a curve ball.

 

[Ruturaj]

Vote for a set of snow tires here ...

But you have two stingers???

Yes. Me and my fiance. I am returning mine when lease ends.

 

[Ruturaj]

I think you guy confused

MDX + snow tires vs stinger + snow tires

to be

MDX vs snow tires

I understand importance of snow tires. I understand how AWD in both cars work at higher level (stinger is 50/50 split in comfort, 20/80 in sport, gets adjusted depending on traction and does torque vectoring using brakes, while for MDX sends power in certain situations only, has overdrive in rear wheel to create rear bias, is a fast and self adjusting system that helps car going in direction steering wheel is pointed at). I wasn't sure about ground clearance and overall handling, wanted to check if anyone had first hand experience with both and get overall advice.