Hi

 

I'm sure winter tyres have been done to death on here, but I can't find any specific thoughts from the Skoda community on these options. I'm picking up my Octavia estate on Wednesday - tyre size is 225/45 R17

 

I do a fair bit of driving up in Scotland and in the Lakes where I live during the winter months, so performance on snowy roads is important. Budget is almost as important though.

 

Nokian WR D3 - around £120 (apparently more suited to economy than the A3?)

Nokian WR A3 - around £120 (apparently more suited to performance at speed than the D3?)

Goodride SW608 - around £90 (budget tyre, but gets some good reviews?)

 

Any help would be appreciated. My budget is £120 max. Ideally £100 or less as I'll be buying 4.

 

Cheers in advance,

 

Si

From personal experience, I would never touch budget winter tyres on my car again. Some really are shocking.

 

Go for the Nokians.

Nokian A3s on mine, seem to be very good.

As above stick to nokians since you will be using them in the snow.

Nokians, the latest ones got really good test results.

A few of my buddy's are tyre fitters, they said the goodride are a a bitch to balance, and have sent container-loads back to distributor.

Nokian D3 on mine. Great tyre and pretty quiet for a Winter tyre. Travel UK to Germany and back fairly often and no issues.

I have Nexen Wingaurds on mine, good in all conditions £125 a corner

 

Thanks for the replies. Consider the Goodrides removed from my short list!

Does anyone know of a decent tyre at around £100? Serious budget issues.

Thanks again

OI have Nexen Wingaurds on mine, good in all conditions £125 a corner

 

for nexen

Don't know why the Nokians are so dear in UK. I got mine in Germany via Mail order for £70 a corner. I do live in Germany but can't see why price should be so different in UK.

Forgot to look at your tyre size, I run 16's on winter rims which will account for price difference.

Aye, 17s 'unfortunately'. There must be a half decent option below the 100 mark.

Nokian WR D3s are currently £107.90 fully fitted each at mytyres.co.uk if it helps (for 225/45 R17 and an H speed rating - not sure what you need).

 

Here's a recent test of tyres in your size (there are others on the site too):

 

http://www.tyrereviews.co.uk/Article/2013-ADAC-Winter-Tyre-Test-225-45-R17.htm'>http://www.tyrereviews.co.uk/Article/2013-ADAC-Winter-Tyre-Test-225-45-R17.htm

 

To get decent tyres much cheaper you'd need to look at getting a second set of smaller wheels for winter tyres I think. There are mixed views on having narrower winter tyres on safety grounds, see e.g. here:

 

http://www.oponeo.co.uk/tyre-article/tyre-widths-narrow-or-wide-winter-tyres'>http://www.oponeo.co.uk/tyre-article/tyre-widths-narrow-or-wide-winter-tyres

 

Edit: Just to add, the usual consensus is that cheap winter tyres are OK in the snow, but frequently perform poorly in the wet. It's getting tyres to do both that is the tricky part. See e.g. here:

 

http://www.tyrereviews.co.uk/Article/2013-Winter-Tyre-Buying-Guide.htm'>http://www.tyrereviews.co.uk/Article/2013-Winter-Tyre-Buying-Guide.htm

Edited 3 January, 201412 yr by Ultrasonic

I have Continental WinterContact TS830. £61 each fitted but this is our 4th winter with them on. Don't know the price now.

I saw Uniroyal winters for £60 on Camskill a few weeks back. Dont know what they are like but I have the Uniroyal rainsport2's and my Dad has the rainsport3's and both are very good.

I'm on 17's too.

 

I just had 4x Avon Ice Touring ST's fitted for £400.

I've got 18" avon ice touring st. Cost me £380 fitted which I thought was a good price. Would avoid budget tyres personally. Yes there probably better in snow and ice than a branded summer tyre but most reviews of budget winter tyres show them to be very poor in the wet. The avon winters I've got have been great in this recent spell of really wet weather. Dealt with standing water better than my Conti summer tyres.

I am having a set of Continental ContiWinter Contact TS850s fitted to my 4x4 (non-Scout) Octavia 2.0 diesel estate, to replace the cheapo winter tyres fitted by the vendor. Haven't got the car yet so don't know how good they will be, but have checked several different reviews (including Auto Express, Which? and tyretest.com). The TS850s consistently come top or near the top, and where they do not come top the tyres which beat them seem to be different in each review.

I am having 195/65 R15 91Hs ftted (the 4x4 estate comes on 15" wheels), and in this size they are significantly cheaper (i.e., £65.40 each from Mytyres) - about HALF the cost of 225/45 R17s. So there is clearly a case to be made for getting a set of smaller (maybe steel?) wheels for winter, if you can get some cheap ones and if you plan to keep the car.

Apparently Mytyres source their tyres from warehouses in Germany and delivery is claimed to be about four working days. They claim to have all their tyres in stock; a lot of other low-cost vendors do not.

The official size for my car is 205/60 R15 but since TS850s in this size are £89.90 (again, from Mytyres) I decided to go for the fractionally narrower tyres. According to this useful site

http://www.willtheyfit.com/

Nokian WR G2 are the only true winter tyres I've used and have had no issue with them. Spent this Christmas in Strathspey and found them to work a treat to the point that driving on snow and slush frankly becomes boring. Even pulling out of the lower car park at the Cairngorm Ski Centre on Boxing Day, and having switched off the ESP just for laughs, I couldn't get a wheel spin out of it.  

 

I purchased 15" steels from my local dealer and use the same size tyres as the summers the car came fitted with...

 

Nokian WR G2 XL 205/60 R15 95H M+S on Avantgarda 6.0Jx15" steel wheels. (with Avantgarda wheel trims).

 

Beauty of this is that the wheel/tyre combo is the same size as the OEM which kept my insurance company happy. Although the speed rating (H) was slightly lower than the OEM tyres (V) it still exceeds the published max speed of the car itself - 115mph. (H rated are good to 130mph).

 

Only other non-summer tyres I've used are the Goodyear Vector 4 Seasons on the polo, which are on all year and again I've not had any urge to swap them for an alternative brand/type.

Incidentally, it just occurred to me, I still have my complete set of Goodyear vector 4 seasons sitting in work

Edited 5 January, 201412 yr by Gizmo68
EDITED as the amount of info included could be deemed as non Freedom advertising.

Nokian WR A3's for me, It is the second car I've used them on.

Thanks all. Have gone for Nokian A3s on a set of steel rims. Job done.

 

Si

I have Nexen Wingaurds on mine, good in all conditions £125 a corner

 

 

Bought some Nexens for mine a month ago, £73 a corner from Oponeo. Seemed to be a bargain!

 

First time i've used winter tyres and must admit they do seem to have made a difference even though we haven't had any snow yet!

Bought some Nexens for mine a month ago, £73 a corner from Oponeo. Seemed to be a bargain!

 

First time i've used winter tyres and must admit they do seem to have made a difference even though we haven't had any snow yet![/quote Mine are full size 235/45 18s as Smaller wheels will wull not fut iver my calipers .hence the price]

I have Nokian D3 on the Octavia and A3 on the MX-5.  Obviously we've had no snow yet but:

 

1. Neither have adversely affected fuel economy

2. The D3s are much. much quieter than the summer tyres (a mixture of OEM Dunlop SP01 and Toyo Proxes CF1).  The A3s seem about the same but the MX-5 has no much road noise at all times that it's hard to tell.

3. If you care about such things, the D3 looks better.

 

I'm not too concerned about snow because *any* winter tyre works so much better than a summer tyre that it's like night and day.  I used to have really cheap Nankang SV-2 winter tyres on the MX-5 and they made driving even a lightweight RWD car quite easy in snow.

Edited 5 January, 201412 yr by rogerzilla

I have fitted 225/45-17 Nokian WR D3 winter tyres to replace the usual Conti 2 225/40-18 summer tyres.  Better traction on cold wet roads, slightly better ride and a little quieter.

 

Photos attached.