Quote:
Originally Posted by mstevens
It's because no such thing exists! All-season means compromises for both warm- and cold-weather performance. On a sport sedan, that's fine. On a nearly-M roadster, it's not. As you'd intuited, "performance" definitely implies summer, or at least "not all-season".
The solution, as mentioned by others, is a second set of wheels with winter tires. Winter tires should typically be skinnier and higher-profile than summer tires, anyway, so it's much better to get smaller wheels for the winter tires than to try to find something appropriate for the summer wheels. It takes very little time to swap them when it's time. I know that's additional cost, but to me it's an anticipated expense of driving a performance car in New England.
My cars have summer tires for 6 months and winter tires for 6. My summer tires didn't pass inspection this year due to tread wear. The service manager told my wife "looks like Mark's been having fun!"
That means that the Michelin Pilot II's on my M4 when it was delivered in December of 2016 then immediately removed until warmer weather have lasted no more than half of the 18,000 miles on the car* nearly 3 years later and for only about 18 months of use. Performance tires are not durable, because that's not the goal any more than how they do in slush. Performance tires are made to very specific goals that have little to do with any considerations besides performance.
* Yes, it's my year-round daily driver. I have a 6-mile commute 4 days a week, so don't rack up a lot of miles.
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Thanks for the feedback. By the way, my Z4 M40i is Misano Blue and I think it's a really nice color on this car. I also love driving it, but it's a fair weather car for me and will be only taken out to "exercise" it in the winter on dry, rural roads for very short drives. Therefore, I've decided to just keep the summer tires on it. I think your plan makes sense for those who have to deal with winter conditions.