In the 20 years that I've been in the Northwest (WA-OR) I've had to learn a lot about winter driving, both snow and rain. One of the best things I've learned is to have my tires siped.

This morning on my way to work it was pouring rain and all kinds of water on the freeway. My 350 was as solid as a rock, no agua-planing at all.

The first thiing I did after getting the new car was to have the tires siped. Les Schwab does it for less that $10 per tire. They slice accross the tread at a 90 degree angle about 3/16" to 1/4" apart all the way around the tire. This gives you much better water dispersion and allows the tire to grip better and run cooler during the summer as well. Also helpful on snow, but it doesn't make you invincible.

There is no noticable drop in performance (who drives on the edge all the time anyway ?) and you really have to look to see it.

I've done this with all 5 Z cars and never have had to put snow tires on the car. I do stay home when it's really deep.

Keep on Z'n Still Jumpin for Joy!

 

OK, I'm curious. Has anyone else ever done this? I've never heard of it. Is it a northwest thing?

WayneTN

 

I did it as well, (i'm from indiana),, tirerack and such offer it as a normal service... when i origionally did it i think the process was newer because they were being kinda pushy about it.. i figured they were just trying to tack on some extra profit or reduce tirelife or something, but i figured i'd try it to find out... well acutally it was quite nice. really good grip and seemed to let tires warm up faster as well. however i do believe it might have a small (very) impact on the life of the tires... i say gettem siped

 

With all due respect, if it was the first thing you did, then how can you know it improved the Z's handling over unsiped tires, even if in your experience it had that effect on previous car/tire combinations?

People often jump to conclusions about things with insufficient information. For instance, people swearing that a certain oil or oil changing regimen is the reason their car lasted for 100K or 200K or a million miles, or whatever. With no control group, they have no idea how long the car would have lasted with different oil or less frequent changes.

So I'm not saying you're wrong, or not to do this. only questioning whether there's enough information to support the claim.

--James
Lemans Sunset Track

 

Common practice at tire stores here in MI. It seems to improve traction. My 99 astro had bf goodrich tiger paws which lasted over 80K miles but even when new the tires gave lots of excitement on overpasses in the winter time. I replaced them with new ones that had the sniping done and their alot less exciting on overpasses.

They have the same warranty regardless of sniped or not.

But to me it seems that the cuts would cause the rubber to absorb chemicals on the road and age faster.

Since it's a van I don't do alot of high performance driving and can tell you if it makes for better handling.

 

the word you are looking for is siped... not sniped as in bond
im just joking..

Hall

 

Melrummy,

Thanks for this post. I live in Portland too and currently have a 90 300ZX 2+2 (I'm waiting for delivery of a 350Z SS 6MT in Dec/Jan). After your post, I did some research on the Web and I'm sold. I think I'll give this a try on my 90ZX while I'm waiting for my new Z.

 

 

For Commasense,

This is the fifth Z that I've owned and have had a number of other performance cars in between Z's. I bought my '85 in Spokane where we had lots of snow as well as rain. In every case, the cars handled 100% better with siped tires in inclement weather. This is particulary true with performance type tires that tend to have block style tread. If you will notice, most mud and snow tires already have the cuts in the tread.

As others have posted, there is no loss of wear or warranty when siping tires.

Experience counts.

Keep on Z'n Still Jumpin for Joy!