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I think you have misinterpreted what I am saying: in actuality, I do not find the unstudded hakkas perform poorly in ice + snow at all. In fact, they perform *extremely* well, particularly in snow + slush, and reasonably well on ice as well (comparisons with 60's or even 90's tires is a joke). They have multiple rubber compounds + heavy siping + have very little in common with older or low cost studdable tire designs. They are designed to use specific light weight "spring loaded" studs + that allows the siping to come very close to the holes for the studs. Nokian makes studless tires as well (with silica compounds) that have similar characteristics as Blizzaks and when inquiring whether I would be better off getting those given our government ban on studs, the tire shop said no, the unstudded Hakkas offer better deep snow performance + comparable ice performance (though they would have been happy to sell me the others as they stock them + they cost the same price). We get a lot of snow here + it stays cold + I like to go skiing when it snows, so deep snow performance is more important to me than ice. Tire tests I have read comparing Hakkas (unstudded) to Blizzaks place the Blizzaks ahead on ice + the Hakkas ahead on handling in snow. Studded, the Hakkas place ahead of Blizzaks in both, and Blizzaks, when new, are a good tire. I have many friends who have used Blizzaks and generally liked them, at least early on, though many switched to Michelins + like them better (though at least one with experience with studded tires also laments the silly law here and notes the huge difference)... admittedly with good tire compounds, the gap is narrowing between friction tires + studded, but in a quick google of the most recent results, again, the Hakka 5/7 studded seem to be coming out on top of the heap...
So don't get me wrong, I am very happy with our tires - they perform very well! I was just blown away by the performance of the old studded tires. I could stop, start, and corner (uphill) on glare ice virtually as if it was bare pavement. Unbelievable. And I could still do things like switch lanes at 60+ mph through 6" deep snowplow induced slush piles with complete stability just like the hakka 4s...
That said, I do not necessarily disagree with you that it is possible that some unstudded studdable tires may perform as poorly as all seasons in winter conditions. I'm not really interested in the lower end products though some might be, and that is valuable information to them if correct... the other thing to note is that running a good, winter optimized all season tire like the WR all year will run down it's compound faster than if it was used as a winter tire only. This may not be a big issue, especially in areas with milder winters, but it is possibly false economy up here... I'm a big believer of running good winter tires + good summer tires + leaving the "all seasons" for no seasons at all... but that doesn't work for everyone, and I recognize that!
cheers,
James...
posted by 216.59.24...
, Sun, 12 Dec 2010 11:12:16
, Mon, 13 Dec 2010 17:19:28, Mon, 13 Dec 2010 11:48:02
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