Winter Wheels

[atgonzales]

Winter wheels coated with Mckee`s Paint Coating, gidyup

[Accumulator]

Ah, ahead of the curve!

Gotta admit, the Winter set for the Tahoe doesn`t get anything It`s a set of Machined-finish GMC wheels and they stay nice enough with just Wheel Cleaner. Eh, they`re not all that great anyhow, were the cast-offs from the Yukon I used to have (put a new set on that one, kept the old ones for Winter).

BUT...now you`ve got me thinking I need to get on the Winter wheels for the A8, failed to do `em back in the Spring

[atgonzales]

Accumulator

The Blizzaks I have are sport tires made for performance cars, they are outstanding, picked them up at Firestone and they matched the prices of TireRack, total time to do the wheels, from wash, apc sprayed, and in a few spots used Wheel Brighter to remove some tough spots, dried with Master Blaster, dried again, then panel wiped and applied Mckee`s Paint Coating outside and barrels, 3.5 hours waiting for them to cure and will place in wheel covers

[Nizmo]

Above and beyond there, lol. We just run steelies with no hubcaps. It does look a little goofy going from 18" low pro to base model 16" steels. Not even going to mention the nagging TPMS light with the absence of the sensors.

[arthur]

Above and beyond there, lol. We just run steelies with no hubcaps. It does look a little goofy going from 18" low pro to base model 16" steels. Not even going to mention the nagging TPMS light with the absence of the sensors.

Are TPMS the biggest rip off of the motoring public, or what? a Doz morons deflated their explorer tires and then failed the tires and rolled the truck. so, now the rest of us are stuck with these friggin things that cost 75$ ea, complicate having winter wheels as you say, and don`t last forever. When they fail, you get code on the dash and you wont get inspected with the code showing.

Write your representatives.

[Accumulator]

atgonzales- That sounds like 3.5 hours well-spent to me! Do your Bilzzaks look OK without any dressing? All of mine do...nice to be able to just skip that. Yeah, I`ve always liked Blizzaks, but some of mine are pretty old and I bet they have even better ones these days.

Nizmo- Can`t you run the sensors on your steelies? What kind of sensors does yours take? I only have TPMS on the Crown Vic and it uses the regular Ford Band-style ones.

Heh heh, I never minded running (uncovered) steelies in the winter, did that on a few vehicles. Figured it looked like I knew from Winter Driving (and IMO keeping them really nice helped with that). Used Collinite on them IIRC, didn`t want to waste KSG and this was before I discovered FK1000P let alone coatings.

[Nizmo]

Nizmo- Can`t you run the sensors on your steelies? What kind of sensors does yours take? I only have TPMS on the Crown Vic and it uses the regular Ford Band-style ones.

I`m cheap, at $70 a pop I can just deal with the light. Haven`t gotten everything together yet, but I`m going to have them just put in a set of regular stems.

[atgonzales]

Accumulator-I actually put on a tire dressing-Pinnacle tire dressing

[Accumulator]

Nizmo- Ah, OK...hey, if the light doesn`t bother you then I`d skip `em too.

atgonzales- Ah, wonder if I`ll end up dressing mine when I finally get newer ones... Hey, I`m using the Pinnacle too! Had two (very) old jugs on the shelf and !Gee! I really like it! Hadn`t even thought about it for ages, forgot all about it as it didn`t play nice with an interior I tried it on (~16 years ago!), but on the tires I`ve tried it on recently I think it`s great.

[Surly]

Just getting my winter wheels ready too. I am most likely getting new winter tires this year but I did a D143 (well, hot rims OTC) clean up when I removed them in the spring. Today I hit them with Iron-X and scrubbed every nook and cranny, rinsed, D143 scrubbed wheels and tires, rinsed again, degreased the hub area, rinsed.

In the coming days I`ll be hitting with Menzerna PF2500 or SF4000 (not sure yet), then Eraser, then GTechniq C5 Wheel Armor on outside, barrels, rear of spokes - everywhere.

Then I`ll be getting a set of probably either Hakkapeliitta R2s or Pilot Alpin PA4s to mount and balance. Haven`t decided yet. Hopefully the balance weights will stick OK on the C5.

BMW style 237 in 18".

[pdqgp]

Just getting my winter wheels ready too. I am most likely getting new winter tires this year but I did a D143 (well, hot rims OTC) clean up when I removed them in the spring. Today I hit them with Iron-X and scrubbed every nook and cranny, rinsed, D143 scrubbed wheels and tires, rinsed again, degreased the hub area, rinsed.

In the coming days I`ll be hitting with Menzerna PF2500 or SF4000 (not sure yet), then Eraser, then GTechniq C5 Wheel Armor on outside, barrels, rear of spokes - everywhere.

Then I`ll be getting a set of probably either Hakkapeliitta R2s or Pilot Alpin PA4s to mount and balance. Haven`t decided yet. Hopefully the balance weights will stick OK on the C5.

BMW style 237 in 18".

Your BMW may enjoy the Blizzak LM-32`s. I run them on my S4 and love them. They are 8/10 in deep snow but I was more interested in the 10/10 for dry cold road performance I lived in Mississauga for a couple years when we got dumped on but even then, I ran Blizzaks on my cars and loved them.

[Accumulator]

Surly- How`re you gonna decide on the snowtires? Like...what`re the criteria you`re considering.

I had to get Dunlops for the S8 (silly waste, only used `em once before deciding I wasn`t driving that in the salt any more ) because its Stability Control (which I almost alyways turn off anyhow) isn`t Blizzak/etc.-friendly.

And OK...I`ll ask...why coat `em before the mounting/balancing? I`d think that just the mounting might compromise the coating in places.

[Surly]

On choosing tires - well. I`m honestly waffling on how "severe" to go. In the greater Toronto area, a snowstorm is usually heavy wet snow, rain and freezing rain - not 2 feet of fluff. Sometimes the mercury plunges really cold, other times we hover above and below freezing for weeks. All of the winter tires I`ve had in the past, both "performance winter tires" and "full winter tires" have always had some kind of glaring negative beyond the obvious.

Examples:
- My Arctic Alpins had no `high speed` control. Above 50-55mph they had ballooned so much they did not feel safe, wet dry or otherwise
- My Dunlop WinterSport M3s solved the above problem, but had NO winter traction after the first couple of months. Lots of treads depth but all of the sipes rounded off leaving me nothing
- My Hakkapeliitta RSis acted like there was oil all over the road if it was wet and the temp was above 5C or so. Never found another owner with the same complaint, but every time a front went through with a "warm" rain component they were dangerous. Overall I`d say our winters weren`t severe enough for the Hakkas
- (My SO got Hakka R2s on her van and loved them - no hint of my complaints)
- My Blizzak WS60s actually had no major negative now that I think of it, other than only having "magic" tread compound for a few 32nds of an inch.
- My current Dunlop 3Ds exhibit a disproportionate lack of braking ability in various winter conditions and temperatures. It isn`t all the time, but I have often noticed that while exploring available grip, accelerating and turning has dramatically more grip than braking. They also got noisy very quickly in the wear cycle.

So right now my short list is Hakka R2 for "full" winter and PA4s for "performance" winter. Maybe I should put WS80s on the list...

On the coating - I`m dealing with a very large and complex fall todo list and I was planning to coat in the nice weather any time now and `git-r-done`. I`ll think about re-ordering my process.

[atgonzales]

Blizzak has lot of different versions of their tire, take a look at TireRack, do the coating after the mount and balance more then likely there will glue from the weight you will need to remove before coating

[Accumulator]

Yeah, if reusing the same wheels the adhesive from the old weights will need to come off..be sure to DIY that as the shops don`t always take the proper care, even when they (the local Michelin franchise no less) say they will.