New tires installed - very impressed.

Its winter time here in the north (Ottawa Ontario) and time to get the winter tires installed.
For those not used to this in the south, we in the north must use real winter tires as opposed to summer or all season so we can get grip in icy and snow conditions. The winter tires have a different tread pattern and rubber compound that works better in these conditions.

Anyways, after shopping around I found the best price and installation at Costco of all places. Ok now they got my attention, its time to impress me, which they did, big time!

Getting tires installed usually is a trivial process: tires off rims, new ones on then bolt back on car ... simple enough right. Not so at our Costco.

I watched the guy carefully take the rims off and install new rubber ... I've seen this dozens of times before. What I did not expect to see was the technician spend about another 20 mins thoroughly cleaning the inside of each lug with what looked like a break cleaner spray can ... yes ... each individual lug. And then he used a wire brush to clean all the surface of each hub and all the lug threads. This was not just a trivial quick brushing. This guy really put elbow grease into the job like he believed what he was doing was going to make a difference. Wow ...blew me away ... but it doesn't end there.

Before installing each tire he uses a wire brush to ensure the mating surface of each tire is 100% clean on the inside.

Lastly the lead shop technician inspects the work done by each technician by doing a quick once around with a torque wrench before he releases the car back to the customer ... me.

And the cost $15 a wheel, which included disposal of old tire, balancing and nitrogen filled tires. Average price elsewhere is about $19-20 a tire.

Not sure how things are in the lower states, but nitrogen filled is a big plus up here in cold Ottawa,Canada where the temperatures can fluctuate from -40F lows in January to over 100F in July. Tires filled with just air in the summer appear flat in the winter because of the air density changes. Also flat tires with air at -40 can be flat untill they warm up on the highway, so its a tough balance when guaging correct tire pressure. Nitrogen filled tires pretty much stay the same at all temperatures and you get way better wear and performance with Pretty much zero maintenance.

If any Costco techs read this ... Job well done!!! I did notice!!!

Back in my truck driving days in wither months many times I would keep a bottle of bleach under my sleeper. Many times it saved the day when driving on ice. For instants another driver and I was running along together on an ice covered interstate and stopped at a truck stop to have a coffee break.

The driveway at the truck stop was sloped upwards, with his truck he would get half way up them start spinning and slide back down, he locked his differential it did the same thing. I got my bleach out, poured a bit on each of his drive tires, he went up the slope with no problem at all.

I went up the slope with out a problem. and when we parked I told him to take a look at my tires, strange as it may seem I had the same tires on my drive wheels as he did, yet mine we up the slope covered in ice with out a slip.

Bleach is not good for your tires, yet it can get you out of a difficult situation when everything is covered in ice. And when driving on ice covered highways its easy to get into a difficult situation. Bleach can saved the day and help get you in out of the cold.

How does it work?

By the way ... Tires are Michelin XIce2.
I've always had good wear on Michelins so I'm comfortable with them.
I'm not a die-hard Michelin fan but that appears to be the tire of choice until a better deal is to be had on another quality tire.

The trick is to stay away from budget winter tires. There some great deals advertised but the tires wear out if you drive on the highway. You'd be lucky to get 2 seasons out of a set which really means the tires are not much good in snow during the second season. Prediction is the Michelins will last me 4 winters. You get exactly what you pay for.

The installation was flawless.
If there was a notiable difference between a good job and a great job, I'd say mine are perfect. No vibrations at all at any speed. In fact they are so smooth you almost think something is wrong.

By the way ... Tires are Michelin XIce2.
I've always had good wear on Michelins so I'm comfortable with them.
I'm not a die-hard Michelin fan but that appears to be the tire of choice until a better deal is to be had on another quality tire.

The trick is to stay away from budget winter tires. There some great deals advertised but the tires wear out if you drive on the highway. You'd be lucky to get 2 seasons out of a set which really means the tires are not much good in snow during the second season. Prediction is the Michelins will last me 4 winters. You get exactly what you pay for.

The installation was flawless.
If there was a notiable difference between a good job and a great job, I'd say mine are perfect. No vibrations at all at any speed. In fact they are so smooth you almost think something is wrong.

I ran one set of Michelin's on my blazer, they wore very evenly and I got better than 40,000 out of them. They probably had another 5 to 8 thousand when I took them off. I had a flat on the rear right one where a screw stuck through the inside sidewall, after that I probably did not run them another 2 to 3 thousand miles. I believe I would have got more than 50,000 if I did not have the flat.

I did not like the Goodyear Tires that come on it new in 92, they did not wear good at all, I've kept P335 70R15's on it, they seem to wear more evenly.