-> I put tire chains in the boot when travelling south over the   
-> Desert Road in winter but have yet to put them on;  how do your   
-> snow treads differ from off-road treads ?  Noisy on macadam ?   
-> Imprecise steering ?  
   
Really good snow tires have metal studs, but they're not allowed here  
because they tear up the roads too much. So what we use here are tires  
with big, chunky treads, with lots of wide grooves that go transversely  
across the tire, so they bite into the snow. The rubber is made to have  
a high hysteresis, which gives it some grip even on very slippery  
surfaces. Yes. they are noisier than summer tires, and they reduce the  
car's performance and make it use more gas. I haven't noticed any  
effect on the steering, except that there is less tendency to slide  
sideways on ice. In wintertime, the pros greatly outweigh the cons. In  
summer, the reverse is true, so we switch back to regular tires. Some  
people have a complete spare set of wheels, and just swap them. I  
don't, so I have to get a garage to dismount one set of tires and mount  
the other.  
  
                            dow 
--- Platinum Xpress/Win/WINServer v3.0pr5