Summer, Winter, All Season: Know The Difference Between These Tires

Tires, tires, tires. What’s the difference? For most people, no other tires exist besides the ones that are already on their vehicle. That is of course until it’s time to get new ones. Stepping into that auto shop, with a wall of tires towering over the uneducated buyer, is nothing less than overwhelming. Suddenly there appears to be thousands of tires to choose from, where before walking into the store, they thought there were only two kinds of tires: summer or winter. Don’t fret, little one, tire shopping just got a little easier.

There are essentially three types of tires. Summer, winter, and all season. Summer tires are obviously made for the summer season. They have the ability to grip either wet or dry pavement. This makes it easier to apply the brakes and prevents skidding. Summer tires, as one may have guessed, do awful in the snow.

Winter tires, which are usually signified as such by embellishing an imprint of a snowflake or mountain on the side, are again, obviously more useful during the winter months. The tread usually has more slits, holes, and whiskers, that make for gaining traction on slippery snow much easier. People usually assume that because winter tires have so much traction, that they should do even better on dry pavement. This is simply not true. In fact, winter tires weren’t designed to grip smooth pavement, thus they slip around just as much as a summer tire would on snow.

For someone who doesn’t want to have to switch out their tires between seasons, it may be safe to assume that all season tires are the right option. All season tires shouldn’t be confused as the jack of all trades. In fact, their most suitable in areas of the country that have the least drastic changes in seasons. There’s also different levels of all season tires, from regular to high performance. People assume that the greater the performance, the longer lasting the tires will be. Again, this is false. High performance tires may have a better overall grip, but they wear out much faster than regular all season tires.

Aside from choosing the type of tire, one must also know the size and weight limitations for their specific vehicle needs. Something to keep in mind is that even if the car is under the same make, different models will have different tire sizes. For example, a Honda Civic has different sizes and weight limitations than that of a Honda Accord, but this can be cleared up by asking a trusted mechanic at a nearby auto shop in the Los Angeles area. A little research online can help define these differences. If there’s still any confusion, the safest bet is to go directly to the manufacturer.

 

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