All Season Tyres

[stevehilt]

New to MB Club Forum

Last year I purchased my first Merc, a 2002 auto C200 Sports Coupe fitted with 225 - 45 - 17 Continental Sport Contact 2 tyres. In a small amount of snow they were terrible, the car would not move and went back into the garage.
I went to tirerack.com and the Contact 2 tyres have zero traction in snow.
I am thinking of changing to an all season tyre as the rears are getting low at 15,000 miles. My local Merc dealer was not very helpfull.
I liked the spec of Continental Extreme Contact or Michellin Pilot Sport A/S. I have contacted several local tyre suppliers and it appears they are not available in the UK.
It appears in the UK we have either Summer or Winter tyres.
Could anyone please advise me where I can get the above tyres or recommend the best all season tyre that is available in the UK.
On hol for next two weeks so will reply when I get back.

Steve

 

[Satch]

See this thread

http://mbclub.co.uk/forums/showthread.php?t=9443

 

[stevehilt]

Thanks for that quick reply Satch.

Do you have a preference to any particular tyre?

 

[adam1]

With the exception of the Nokian WR most A/S tyres do not perform well in the snow. Buy some steel rims and put winters and have them as your winter set.
Or you could change twice a year. Using winters thru summer will affect the handling and normally they are low speed rated unless you go for expensive V rated ones.

I just use a FWD car with skinny tires when it snows.

 

[stevehilt]

Thanks for that adam1 that is what I suspected.
So its either a Defender or change the coupe for an ML, does it ever stop!
Does anyone know how do ML's perform offroad?

steve

 

[Satch]

Thanks for that quick reply Satch.

Do you have a preference to any particular tyre?

Well, I do not like all seasons tyres much because they are a half way house and do am starting to seriously fish around for a set of Winters which I will need for a skiing trip in January. Think the Michelin Pilot Alpin which are highly rated but I want to get a package complete with wheels. Nothing fancy but alloys rather than steel wheels.

I was reading a while ago about the "Rule of 7 and 4" which is important to understand. In essence normal tyres start getting less effective below about 7C, so really a "winter tyre" is just that, not just a snow tyre. But when it comes to snow, even winter tyres tend to become very much less effective when there is less than 4mm of tread depth left.

So not very surprising then that with most Brits on summer tyres (with maybe 2 or 3mm of tread in many cases) we find the country slithering to a halt at the first snowflake because the tyres we use become practically useless. Meanwhile, in those parts where snow is unremarkable in winter, life carries on untroubled by anything other than huge snow dumps because they have the correct tyres.

 

[MainMan]

The Goodyear Eagle Vector EV-2 s that Satch mentioned in the link seem to get pretty good ratings in snow. These might be a good compromise. I think they're what I'll get. Maybe they wouldn't work up an Alpine pass but in the conditions we get here I think they'll be OK - much better than SO3/F1/PS2s etc anyway.