All season va winter - Page 3 - 6SpeedOnline - Porsche Forum and Luxury Car Resource

Mar 28, 2015 | 01:55 PM

#31

absolutionrome

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Quote:

Originally Posted by dnsacks

I strongly suspect that your panamera's winter performance with all seasons will be on par with that experienced by your q5 and cayenne friends, but will still lag significantly behind that provided by true winter tires. Significantly, its summer performance on all seasons will likely be similarly compromised too.

I view all season tires as kinda being the equivalent of a pair of light hiking shoes -- they'll get you around, but won't give you the same experience as a nice pair of running shoes if you're going for a run and won't work as well as a pair of snow boots if heading out in the white fluffy stuff. Put another way, while our VW Touareg (sister car to the Cayenne) did "just fine" with all seasons on a snowy road, it's confidence-inspiring to drive in the snow with dedicated winter tires and we find ourselves seeking out unplowed alleys, etc.

Guess what! It is spring here but we just received a snow day, probably around 2-3 inches and yes the car was slipping powder covered roads. I don't think the big wheel size helps at all. I purposely accelerate a bit around the corner and instantly my back end is loose, it felt almost like a rear wheel drive car! I am definitely considering changing to pirelli sottozero. Maybe it is because the michelin pilot sport A/S poor performance on snow, maybe pirelli P7 have better snow performance? I know that I will not be able to move anywhere on ice with these A/S tires.

Mar 28, 2015 | 07:28 PM

#32

Gus_Smedstad

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Quote:

Originally Posted by absolutionrome

I purposely accelerate a bit around the corner and instantly my back end is loose, it felt almost like a rear wheel drive car!

While I'm an advocate of getting real snow tires, and I think you'll be safest with those, I don't want you to be disappointed. I'm sure you'll get a similar response from snow tires if you push them hard enough. The difference being that the point where it loses traction will be higher.

My own concerns are mainly about cases where I might get stuck, or where I can't afford any wobble at all. For example, this February I had to inch past some cars on narrowed streets over snow. Sliding sideways at all could have results in expensive repairs, since I was just inches away from a car going the other way. I was glad that my rear end wasn't sliding around then, and I'm driving a rear-wheel drive Panamera.

The other situation that I've encountered is being on some snow-covered back road where I could tell that the car wasn't stable above relatively low speed. When I had a long way to go, how fast that crawl was mattered, and snow tires are going to be stable at a higher speed. There's nothing like driving through icy mountain highways on summer tires, with the car feeling like it was ready to pitch me off at anything over 10 MPH. I haven't done that in my Panemera, but I have done that in a rear-wheel drive sports car.

Mar 30, 2015 | 11:43 AM

#33

Macfly4

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I have a set of dedicated rims/michelin aplin's that I have been using this season up in Maine. They work brilliantly in the snow, almost as well as my prior X5.
just make sure that when you change your wheels you remember to turn off the air suspension control by pressing the ride height button for 10 seconds. whenever you jack a wheel up i believe you need to have this turned off.