Hello and good day. Having read through numerous threads I still can't get an answer to my query. I'm needing new tires and here's the skinny...... living in Dayton, OH for 2 years now and this will be my first new set here. Lived in Colorado for a few months (got snow tires there) and San Antonio, TX before that. I deliver pizza's doing about 600+ miles per week of suburb driving in my 2008 Prius, and have 226,000+ miles total now. Need tires that offer gripping for the 7 or so inches of average snow we get as well as great gripping in the rain. Noise isn't a big negative for me, I just want to to keep my mpg's up and have great traction. Also need tires that will last as many miles as possible with all the slow/stop n' go driving I do. Right now I avg. about 35,000 miles/year. Of course I'd rather pay as little as possible for a new set but my car is my livelihood so cost isn't the main concern for me. I would rather have all season's seeing as how I only drive in "bad" snow/ice conditions just a few days per year. Thanks for your time and have a great day!
Continental TrueContacts are an excellent choice for you: Continental TrueContact Note that these will likely slip and have problems in serious snow. If there's more than a few inches of snow on the road, you'll want winter tires. Also the 80-90k warranty is very optimistic when it comes to wear. See the choices here as well: Low Rolling Resistance replacement tires: Current List | PriusChat I don't think F8L has updated that thread with the TrueContacts as they're a newer tire. However the fuel efficiency tests at tirerack show good results for fuel economy, considering how well it performs in other categories (engineering tradeoff between grip and rolling resistance).
+1 on the True Contacts from TireRack.com I have no complaints. I also got free replacement from TireRack when we hit huge puncture nail or whatever. In general, you have to decide if you want max MPG and a little lower snow rating, because max MPG tires like Mich A/S tend to have lower snow rating. So True Contact is LRR but optimizes for snow and a little less MPG. Nokian might be the ultimate best of both worlds but TireRack does not rate those, so no data there. They don't sell em here. And there is no substitute for real snow tires in the snow, F8L would say.
Look around for a spare set of rims and get some decent snows! "All Season" tyres are a compromise, if you do decide to go with snows, by having them on dedicated rims, you will avoid the need to remove the tyres from the rim each season (damage to sealing beads, the need to re-balance each time) and it's much easier to swap wheels rather than tyres!
