Little follow-up on the Hankook IceBear 300 Snow tires.
Well we were up in the mtns for the weekend (sat-tues) and got to feel the full wrath of 2 feet of snow over night.
When we left on Saturday morning at 5am CDOT was only allowing 4wd and commercial vehicles with chains up to Eisenhower tunnel until they had a chance to clean up and treat the roads a little more (1-2 hrs). Luckily we had the A4 instead of the wife’s car so we kept on trucking. The tires hooked up great and we were able to keep going at 45-55mph in the snow pack up the to the tunnel, down and then over to Vail pass. Never once did we have any traction problems. There was 4-5” of snow on the road as we approached Vail pass so we had to slowed down to 30ish mph. Even in the 4-5” of snow the car had NO problems. There were a few places that were deeper and the car plowed a little bit, but nothing that any other lowered car wouldn’t have done. We pulled off at a few exits to get drinks at bathroom stops. We didn’t have any problems getting back on the highways. The car just pulled like a champ.
Monday night the mtns got dumped on again. We were heading into it and were some of the last cars to go before they closed I-70 at Vail. Visibility was bad and the roads were horrible. There were snow banks of 12-15” in between the lanes and trucks were driving down the center of the road just trying to stay on the road. Snow was piling up and we ended up pulling off in Frisco since the roads were so bad. When we pulled off the snow was deep enough that the front bumper was a plow. We had a few traction issues since the snow was so deep that we just didn’t have the clearance needed and the wheels wells were full of crap. When we pulled off, we pulled around several SUV’s and cars that were in the ditch and 2 tractor trailers flipped on their sides.
Yesterday we spent the day driving on hard pack snow/ice and the tires did pretty well. I was able to get the ABS to kick in at an intersection where the surface was pretty polished. We pulled away from the intersection will a little spin and the ASR light flashed on the dash. I think if the tires had a slightly softer tire compound they would have done better there. But they are still v-rated and still a pretty hard compound compared to past snow tires I have had.
Here is my overall rating (1-10, 10 being best):
Deep snow: 7
Hardpack covered by fresh snow (2-3” snow): 8
Hardpack: 7
ICE: 6-7
Rain: 7-8
Dry handling: 8
Overall I was very pleased. The tires allowed me to feel confident in the handling of the car in the snow and the mixed conditions we encountered. I think a tire with deeper blocks would have been a little better in the deep snow we were forced to drive into. I also feel a softer compound rubber would have been better on the ice and hard pack we encountered. Overall for the conditions that I drive in, I am VERY happy with these tires. Every tire is a compromise, and you need to find what is best for your area. They still handle very well on the dry roads for a snow tire. And they rocked the snow over the weekend. I am sure the Quattro helped out. But at no point did I not feel safe in the predictability of what the car was going to do or the connection I had to the road.
