Winter studded tyres: Nokian or Continental?

[mrmacmusic]

Anyone used either the Continental Nordic Spike 120 (700x42C) or Nokian Hakka W106 (700x37C)..? The past two winters I've run Schwalbe Marathon Winters on my 28-mile round trip commute, and whilst they were great for staying upright on ice, things got hairy quickly when there was light snow or when trying to pull out of icy ruts. Crucially though I've had two pairs and both failed in the same way so I'd rather try something different this year – the Conti's certainly look like they'll cope with snow a bit better as they appear to have deeper tread blocks, but that might just be the marketing pictures.

 

[mrmacmusic]

Anyone? Having read elsewhere that the non-studded Conti Winter Contact is badged as a 37C but actually measures up at nearer 32mm (apparently) I'd particularly like to know how close either of these two studded tyres run to their stated size..? I'm trying to choose a new winter steed and need to know how big these tyres really are as I'll want to run them with 'guards on the new bike. The majority of bikes I'm looking at are running slightly knobbly 35C tyres but they have varying degrees of clearance...

 

[fossyant]

Got Schwalbe Snow Studs here and they work in mud, snow and ice. There might be old stock available

 

[mrmacmusic]

Got Schwalbe Snow Studs here and they work in mud, snow and ice. There might be old stock available

Cheers fossyant – I'd just rather try another brand this winter given the issues I had with the Schwalbe Winters...

 

[fossyant]

The others should be fine. Its the tread pattern that makes a difference in snow.

 

[andrew_s]

Conti are reputed to use steel studs, and these are more prone to wearing out when ridden on dry roads than the carbide tipped studs that Schwalbe and Nokian use.

 

[mcshroom]

The Snow stud studs are steel rather than carbide I think, they rust anyway.

I damaged one of the tyre beads on mine after three years (think I did it in storage) so am onto 30mm Schwalbe Winters. Much faster than the snow studs but not much tread for snow