Snow tires that actually work in the snow

Barney said:
Studs? Those pictures are like going back in time. Studs have been illegal in MN for like 40 years or more (they really did damage the highways).
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Wisconsin too, but for ice racing on frozen lakes….they have so much traction that rollovers in the turns are possible.
 
He did say rig dedicated to the property? He can run studs or tank tread or whatever in that case. Agree to the weight, might add it by way of bags of sand or cinder and a scoop for when you might wish to transfer some weight from the truck into some grab for under wheel.
 
Weight in the bed helps quite a bit. Our '48 pickup got great traction with an 800 lb commercial freezer back there. It also smoothed the ride out, so much so, that my FIL said it rode like his Cadillac.

Those tire studs, or should I say spikes, work well on frozen water. They also look good. However, they can be a handful in mud or on rocks. Do not AMHIK, I would have to plead the 5th amendment. How long is the statuette of limitations on that now?!?
 
cptlogger said:
Weight in the bed helps quite a bit.
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With the exception of the few weekends/year that I'm actually on the ice I store all my icefishing equipent in the bed. It's a perfect fit; sled/shanty, gas auger, fishing equipment, etc. I'm guessing that all added up it's over 250 lbs. maybe even more. Not a lot, but enough to notice the improvement in traction without too much of a penalty going back up the hill.

After we got the new driveway and my wife insisted I stop using the tire chains I learned to plow downhill only, which really wasn't that bad, and in fact reduces wear and tear on my dear old '55. Kind of a double, win-win, except when it's really icy (more often than I like) and I slide off the side and onto the lawn, IMO due to the lack of traction with the rock-hard tires.

This tire search actually all started last year when I broke a front axle shaft plowing and couldn't even drive back to the shop in 2WD, even with momentum from starting on the plowed driveway. I dragged it with the Suburban without issue and then winched it toward the shop until I had the rear tires on the plowed concrete apron and drove it in from there. My wife, the ever practical one with no love for this truck, (ever since she opened the door to get in and a mouse jumped out of the open door, narrowly missing her as she jumped away and nearly fell into a snowbank) asked why I don't just plow with the Suburban. Well, I don't think I need to explain my reasons to anyone here for an answer to her question, but I just gave her a blank stare. So, for now, the next step, if I do anything, is better tires, no studs, no chains. But, I did look into a type of "plastic" tire chain, but my home-made shop-built test-to-see-if-it's-worth-the-$$$ resulted in broken test parts and not much better traction.
 
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I’m not sure where you are coming from. I plowed snow in New England for years (still do). Here we have snowstorms over a foot at times And back in the day I used a V6 CJ5 with posi and used 7.50 x 16” mud and snows like you have pictured They worked great!!! (I did over 40 driveways) But chaining up would be a whole new planet not comparable.
I did not pressure down, that will be worse for plowing snow. And I did weight up the rear. Your problem to me is ICE, not sucky tires. Nothing pushes snow over ice except a dozer, and even with that, be careful of ICE. I know about that as well!
And for the Suburban, it weighs close to 6000#, your little Jeep is less than half that. That’s simple physics and math. And that Suburban won’t do ice any better than the jeep either.
Pushing snow is about traction and momentum, Other surfaces call for floatation and momentum and horsepower.
You need to keep a bucket of sand and salt mix around and throw a few hands full of that under your tires wehen there is ice.

diggerG
 
I just happen to be playing on ice this weekend. There’s no snow up up here on Winnibigosh (central Minnesota) this year except for a few patches that we park on so we don’t slip a fall getting the ice fishing sled/shanty out of the truck. So far fishing has been very poor, but it’s good to be with family and friends.
 

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Aha @JABJEEP , so you're running a 2500 series 4x4 Burb ?
Looks similar to my wife's '07 Suburban 2500 4x4 with the 6.0L engine. We really do like it _ _ _ ( it's our draft horse and HER daily driver ).
Gearing up for the winter we went from Goodyear Wrangler a/t's to the Goodyear m&s Authority's. 245/75-16.
They barely pulled thru the slick ski park parking-lot in 2wd on Wednesday. Yes, they are hummer's. LoL

How thick is the ice ?
 
JABJEEP said:
Only about 14” this year. Most years we have to o add extensions to our augers.
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Wow Jeff. Down in the cities the lakes havre open water and the Mississippi backwaters are not safe for an ATV. Surprised there is 14 inches and that you can drive on it. Figured it would be kind of punky

Bitz
 
Greaser007 said:
Wow, that is some thick ice for my neck of the woods.
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We typically go on this trip on the last weekend in February. This is the thinnest ice and least snow that we've ever had. The most was about 12 or 15 years ago when there was about a foot of loose snow on top of over 36" of ice. We added extensions to our augers so that we didn't have to go down on our knees to drill the holes. The lake is so big that we drove around, test-fishing different spots, and put on over 30 miles driving on the lake. The fishing has gradually been getting worse to the point where we're looking for a better lake next time. Not catching fish is part of fishing, but they're getting smaller to the point where we didn't keep any on this trip. In past years we didn't keep any perch that were less than 11" long. Our biggest perch this year was about 9". It's a 6 hour drive one way and lodging is getting very costly too. Coming home to the wife empty handed when she was really hoping for a home made perch fry was disappointing. But it was fun driving on glare ice, just to test the Suburban with nearly no traction. You had to be super careful though because even though you don't go very fast, you couldn't be sure where you'd stop. There's a whole bunch of "permenant" ice shantys out there that resemble motor homes, reminicent of the "town" on the ice in Grumpy Old Men.
 
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