GT Ultragrip Performance Winter Tire

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I would say not, Europe and maybe Canada seem to ALWAYS get the nice Ultra designed dedicated snows....USA gets lowend snows, or non ultra performance snows.
 
Good Year rarely brings their European winter tires here. They are really good. I owned several models while living there and for a long time they were best in business by far.
 
Originally Posted by edyvw
Good Year rarely brings their European winter tires here. They are really good. I owned several models while living there and for a long time they were best in business by far.


I was really impressed by their Ultragrip Ice WRT on my focus, moreso than the Michelin Alpin PA3s on my evo, so I can only imagine that it only gets better for the euro market.
 
Originally Posted by Pew
Originally Posted by edyvw
Good Year rarely brings their European winter tires here. They are really good. I owned several models while living there and for a long time they were best in business by far.


I was really impressed by their Ultragrip Ice WRT on my focus, moreso than the Michelin Alpin PA3s on my evo, so I can only imagine that it only gets better for the euro market.

WRT and PA3 are completely different class.
WRT is in class of Michelin Xi3, which is FAR better tire.
WRT was never offered on European market.
 
Originally Posted by edyvw
Originally Posted by Pew
Originally Posted by edyvw
Good Year rarely brings their European winter tires here. They are really good. I owned several models while living there and for a long time they were best in business by far.


I was really impressed by their Ultragrip Ice WRT on my focus, moreso than the Michelin Alpin PA3s on my evo, so I can only imagine that it only gets better for the euro market.

WRT and PA3 are completely different class.
WRT is in class of Michelin Xi3, which is FAR better tire.
WRT was never offered on European market.


You are correct they are a different class of tire. However, I've run Xi3's on my Cruze for the last 5 winters and will never buy them again. They are great in many ways, but they can't handle slush at all. This last winter they weren't even feeling that good in ice. Packed snow they were still great and deep snow they were still fine. At nearly 50% worn, they were feeling more like an all season on dry/wet roads (which is good). Treadwear was amazing as at 60k miles they were not quite 50% worn. I've got some used WRT's going on this year. We'll see how they compare.

If the Goodyear UltraGrip Performance+ tires were available here, I'd buy them. I had some UltraGrip GW-2's once and loved them other than fuel economy.
 
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I think you are asking for impossible.
Good slush performance seems to be at odds with snow and ice performance.

I think I saw tests where ancient winter tires (with plenty of voids) and performance winter tires outperformed all other types in the slush.

Krzys
 
Originally Posted by krzyss
I think you are asking for impossible.
Good slush performance seems to be at odds with snow and ice performance.

I think I saw tests where ancient winter tires (with plenty of voids) and performance winter tires outperformed all other types in the slush.

Krzys


I'm not asking for the impossible at all. The GW-2's I had were amazing in the slush, and most Blizzak's I've had were perfectly fine other than some Blizzak MZ-02's I had long ago. I have not owned any Blizzak's any newer (of the WS line) more recent than the WS-50's. The WS-90's look better than the WS-80's and the 80's looked like they had a LOT more void space than the Xi3's so I'm guessing I would have been much happier with the Blizzak's for my last set. This time I get to try some GY Ice WRT's for free so we'll see how they work. They likely aren't quite as good on ice as the other tires but they are good in snow and look to be pretty good in slush and my dad said they worked really well in slush, snow, etc.

You are right that any old tire with lots of voids will probably be fine in the slush even if they are no good in the snow and ice compared to modern tires. My Buick wagon has BFG Slalom Ksi's that are amazing in the slush, and great on ice and snow but no fun to drive on dry/wet roads. They are a modern tire (sort of) but not up to the level of performance of the better winter tires. I had actually never heard of them until I needed to replace my winter tires on the wagon and found these on clearance super cheap on tirerack.com. For the price I had to try them.
 
Originally Posted by WishIhadatruck

This time I get to try some GY Ice WRT's for free so we'll see how they work. They likely aren't quite as good on ice as the other tires but they are good in snow and look to be pretty good in slush and my dad said they worked really well in slush, snow, etc..


I liked the GY Ice WRTs alot on my focus. The tread pattern doesn't show a lot of deep snow confidence but it was definitely one of the better all-around snow tires that also had better dry/warm pavement characteristics than any other tire in it's class; and way better than the General Altimax Artics that I replaced them with.
 
Originally Posted by WishIhadatruck
Originally Posted by krzyss
I think you are asking for impossible.
Good slush performance seems to be at odds with snow and ice performance.

I think I saw tests where ancient winter tires (with plenty of voids) and performance winter tires outperformed all other types in the slush.

Krzys


I'm not asking for the impossible at all. The GW-2's I had were amazing in the slush, and most Blizzak's I've had were perfectly fine other than some Blizzak MZ-02's I had long ago. I have not owned any Blizzak's any newer (of the WS line) more recent than the WS-50's. The WS-90's look better than the WS-80's and the 80's looked like they had a LOT more void space than the Xi3's so I'm guessing I would have been much happier with the Blizzak's for my last set. This time I get to try some GY Ice WRT's for free so we'll see how they work. They likely aren't quite as good on ice as the other tires but they are good in snow and look to be pretty good in slush and my dad said they worked really well in slush, snow, etc.

You are right that any old tire with lots of voids will probably be fine in the slush even if they are no good in the snow and ice compared to modern tires. My Buick wagon has BFG Slalom Ksi's that are amazing in the slush, and great on ice and snow but no fun to drive on dry/wet roads. They are a modern tire (sort of) but not up to the level of performance of the better winter tires. I had actually never heard of them until I needed to replace my winter tires on the wagon and found these on clearance super cheap on tirerack.com. For the price I had to try them.

Of course void is important for slush. But, all winter tires are compromise. Xi3 is really good tire in ice, dry, wet, snow. Slush is not strong attribute. However, yes, you did not have WS80, as that tire has some really dangerous breakaway behavior on ice during lateral handling.
Also, after 5 seasons, I throw away summer tires, let alone winter tires where flexible compound is the most important aspect.
 
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