Celica Forums General Discussion Exterior Lower tire pressure for winter driving?

Is it better to let some air out of your tires for winter driving or should you keep them at the same pressure? If you should let some air out, what psi is good?

not an expert on winter driving because we hardly have a winter here...but it's my opinion that you should always keep the proper amount of pressure in your tires.

that said, cold-air is more dense. i don't see why you should let air out when it will already appear that your tires are low. somebody correct me if i'm wrong here.

That makes sense but I was thinking low tire pressure means that more tire would actually be on the ground which would improve traction. Last snow I was sliding past stop signs while going < 5mph so any help would be awesome.

Even if you let a little air out it wont help. If you hit a patch of ice you will keep sliding it doesnt really matter what tires you have. I would just keep the reccomended.

actually the more air in your tire the better the traction. ever notice how much easier it is to spin out when you have low air pressure?

Are you sure? Guys who drag such as Illusive and Lucky317 always talk about lowering there tire presure to 18 psi or 15 psi at the track. If your at the track, why else would you lower your pressure other than for traction?

i think it's only good for straight line traction...
u lost traction if you have lower pressure when cornering.

when riding in deep snow you want as littel footprint as you can get. too wide and it rides on the snow and can't get to trh ground for any traction. you want the tire to sink through the snow to get to teh ground.

True and Untrue.

Lowering your tire pressure can help you a lot in snow, mud, or the sand. When you lower your tire presure more of the tire hits the surface which means the sides of your tires will be hitting the road when they normally wouldn't. So therefor you would have more traction.(Also i don't know how true this is on winter tires for a car, but when you drive on the beach, go Mudding, or get stuck the first thing you do is lower your tire pressure, but that is on all terrians or Mud tires like the ones on my Jeep)

sorry...yes that is correct though. your cornering will be horrible with low tire pressure

I been drivin snow for 7 years now and there is one thing I've learned and thats no matter what you do and no matter what you drive snow is still slippery and theres nothin you car put on your car to help. Also, letting pressure out of your tires will just cause them to wear faster and come spring you'll need to buy more. think about it when was the last time you drove an extended amount of time on just snow?

buy the snow tire. that's the only thing we can do.

keep it the pressure you keep it all year long. to tell you the truth, check it out since cold air will make the tire pressure go down.

but yea, you dont want to reduce the tire pressure because your foot print would be wider than stock.

you ever thought about the snow shoe? its design. its made really big and wide so you have a big foot print. thus making it easier to walk since you'll be floating on the snow. well thats good for like sand and mud because usally there isn't a "bottom" to the road but in the snow, in most cases, there's a nice asphalt surface for your tires to grip onto

If you're just dealing with rain/wet conditions, lower the front about 3-5 psi for a little extra grip