Winter Tyres

Indeed. Though I find myself more inclined to hand-wash the Fiat than the BMW, because it's much smaller! Only its multi-spoke alloys are a faff. I jet-washed the Fiat at the local Shell garage the other day for the first time in a while and the sheer quantity of black dreck that came out from under the roof gutters, the edge of the glass roof, under the rear window, the number-plate plinth, the Fiat badges, the chrome bumper trim inserts etc was quite alarming. Obviously the black lumps of muck are super-visible against white paintwork, but I was faintly astonished at how much had accumulated in the crevices.

I'm still torn about buying some winter wheels. There's a lot of shite on eBay and the official Audi wheels look like ones from a C6 RS6 or mk6 Golf R. I'd like to keep the wheels OEM, but finding some that will fit is proving to be a nightmare. These are the Audi ones.

www.ebay.co.uk/itm/Audi-19-inch-rims-Q3-RSQ3-8U-segment-aluminum-rims-winter-tires-winter-wheels/174045491341

The other obvious issue here is that I don't get to choose the tyres.

With most cars, I'd have thought the difference around a track would be noticeable.

The PS4S's seem fine at near zero to me - with pressures corrected there's a gnats less front end grip, but without snow (which I'd just avoid travelling any distance in) there's no point in my changing tyres.

I don't have a choice about use. If I don't go to work because it has snowed I don't get paid.

That'll affect cornering on the throttle, but otherwise cornering is lateral load. I'd have thought that torque primarily affects traction unless you are pushing pretty hard, which thinking about it John does mention.

I have been very surprised by how good such a performance-oriented tyre can be in the wet - it's only really the combination of wet and damp that brings with it such a very small reduction in front end bite. Be interesting to see what Goodyear's new rival is like, although it'll be a year or two before I expect to need replacements.

Yes, I was thinking about being able to use the acceleration rather than maximising cornering speed.

The PS4S does sound like a fantastic tyre, I'm quite tempted to ditch the Contis on the Golf, but they're OK really and I was surprised to see they still had 6mm tread depth on when I took them off a couple of weeks ago.  They've been on for 9.5k of the 14k miles it's done so far.

Purely in the interests of science, I can report that giving the car a ham-footed bootfull half way around a small roundabout is definitely enough to cause the rear to step out. But this is a long way from my preferred cornering style, and the electronics sorted it in conjunction with a proverbial dab of oppo.

I'm pretty cross with BMW Battersea this morning.

I picked my car up in the evening last week after having the winter wheels fitted and then had to drive across town for a dinner. Far enough from the dealership that I didn't have time to turn around and get back (not least before they shut at 6.30pm), a symbol pinged up on the dashboard showing all four tyres illuminated and saying that the tyres pressures needed testing and resetting. So I rang the service centre who put me through to someone who said "Don't worry - it's just the system re-setting itself. It will go out eventually and you don't need to worry about it". I pointed out that this was my fourth winter with the car and I'd never seen it do this before on any of the previous seven times the wheels had been swapped over. "Don't worry" came back the reply.

But the time I got home, the yellow warning triangle was still on and the iDrive was still telling me this related to the tyres. However, I then forgot about it as we were busy and didn't have cause to use the car again until this morning. At which point I remembered and did a re-set of the TPM, which promptly told me that all the tyres were at 2.1 bar, rather than the 2.6 bar that the sticker on the B-pillar recommended. Naturally I rang the service centre who told me it was likely a fault with the computer rather than the tyres being low, but if I brought it in, they'd check it. They aren't far away as the crow flies, but it would take at least half a hour in the morning rush-hour and in completely the wrong direction.

So I took it to around to our local Kwik-fit who found that the computer wasn't telling porkies and that all four tyres were indeed at 2.1 bar. They then kindly inflated them to the correct pressure for me without charge and I re-reset the TPM.

Indeed. I gave them both barrels, politely but nevertheless both barrels, and am waiting to hear back.

Car said 5, but not sure how reliable that is. It really was ham-footed, too...

You will need the Tyre pressure monitoring and the wheel balance as well I presume - that makes them about £1,500 depending on what exchange rate you get. How badly damaged is the tyre on the first lot?

I wonder how bad the damage is in reality. The ebay advert suggests that it is minor.

Surely all season tyres are the worst of both worlds? OK in the winter but not as good as a winter tyre and OK in the summer but not as good as a summer tyre.

That's what I'm thinking. All of the stuff on that site is either second hand or just seconds. They have some 18" ones on there where one rim has a ding in it but if I'm going to pay out four figures on a set of wheels I want them to be in good nick.

Found a Russian video where the 18s have been fitted. Don't look as bad as I feared they would.