Which tires to buy? Wider or narrower? Higher or lower? Very often vehicle manufacturers recommend tires of different sizes for the same vehicle.
When choosing tires the most important factors are:
• Power of the engine mounted on Your vehicle.
• Season for which the given tire is used – winter or summer.
• Type of wheels mounted on Your vehicle – iron or alloy wheels and their radius.
Pay attention to the size recommended by the manufacturer of Your vehicle. Non-observance of these recommendations may lead to the worsening of steering, distortion of speedometer indications as well as damage the tires!
When mounting a tire the height and width of which exceeds recommended dimensions it can (especially when cornering) rub against stationary body parts or suspension components.
When mounting a smaller tire: riding comfort will be worsened, the possibility of wheel damage will rise as well as the load on all suspension components and bearings.
Advantages and disadvantages of wide tires:
Advantages:
• bigger contact area with the road surface
• improvement of acceleration and braking performance (especially when the vehicle is powerful)
• better cornering at high speeds
Disadvantages:
• price increase
• weight increase (especially when the vehicle has small engine volume)
• slight increase of fuel consumption level
• increase of hydroplaning effect (the vehicle loses steering on a puddle or slush)
Here the choice depends on Your personal preferences and financial possibilities. As a rule, wider tires should to be mounted on more powerful vehicles. Mounting such tires on a vehicle with small engine volume is senseless.
Very often the buyer asks: – “Why is this tire twice as expensive as that one if they both look similar?”
Visually the tires may look alike but not all is that simple. Expensive tire uses advanced technologies and materials, special rubber compound and latest cord design developments what allows to improve important properties of a vehicle.
Advantages of expensive tires:
• Weight decrease, improvement of dynamic properties of a vehicle
• Reduced fuel consumption level
• Longer service life thanks to slower tread wear
• Improved steering, decrease of braking distance (improvement of safety level)
• Reduced noise level
Tread pattern types:
Non-symmetric
Directional and asymmetric tread patterns are applied more and more often, especially on expensive models. It is connected with better performance which can be obtained if to compare with symmetric tread pattern. Such tires ensure more effective withdrawal of water or snow from the contact patch at the same time preserving or even improving other parameters.
Directional
The tire with a directional tread pattern must rotate only in the direction pointed by the arrow located at the sidewall. Incorrect mounting leads to considerable steering worsening and quicker tread wear.
The tires with a directional tread pattern provide outstanding driving performance. The only disadvantage is the impossibility to remount tires from the left to the right side of a vehicle. It means that You don’t know how to mount a spare tire on a wheel as You never know which tire will be punctured.
The best option is to have a spare tire with a symmetric tread pattern which is universal.
If the tread pattern on a spare tire is directional it is recommended to mount the tire on a right wheel. According to statistical data, right wheels are subject to punctures and damages to a greater extent than left ones. There are more pits and mud at the right side of the road and any contact with the roadside (especially at high speed) can result in a puncture.
Symmetric
Symmetric tires ensure good performance and have one very important advantage: the quality-price ratio. For many vehicle owners this factor is decisive as not all drives need super performance at high speeds, many people need inexpensive but quality tires.
Rain tires have been designed exclusively for driving in rainy weather conditions. Their main distinguishing feature is that they reduce hydroplaning effect.
Hydroplaning is the effect that causes loss of traction with the road surface due to big amount of water. The tread is unable to withdraw excessive amounts of water what entails drastic decrease of contact patch area.
Rain tires provide high hydroplaning resistance level thanks to the enlargement of water-withdrawal channels and additional circumferential grooves on the tread pattern. The vehicle equipped with such tires ensures outstanding steering control on wet asphalt. However, on dry surface the vehicle is operated worse as the enlargement of water-withdrawal grooves causes decrease of contact patch area.
The main advantage of studless tires is their excellent performance on dry asphalt and snow. But on the ice performance of such tires is considerably worse.
On the contrary, studded tires provide worse performance on the asphalted surface.
If You mount winter studded tires on the front axle of a front wheel drive vehicle, You solve a few problems at a time – better traction on heavily snowed surface, better start at the intersections, etc. But at the same time You face with a dangerous problem.
On a slippery surface when braking or just chop deceleration the vehicle begins to turn around. It all happens very unexpectedly and, according to statistical data, is the main reason for road accidents with the participation of such vehicles.
In case You mount studded tires on the rear axle of a rear wheel drive vehicle the problems of traction and ride start will also be solved. But it will worsen steering when cornering and make the braking distance on a slippery surface bigger.When braking the load on the front axle rises while the load on the rear axle decreases. That’s why studded tires mounted on the rear axle don’t provide effective braking on a slippery road. Besides this a rear wheel drive vehicle with studded tires mounted on the rear axle has big problems with steering on a slippery surface as front wheels (that direct the vehicle) don’t get good traction.
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