tire pressure & snow tire wear, am I doing something wrong?

I have a set of toyo observe GO2 snow tires on the family daily driver for the winter, I bought them barely used 3 years ago, this is my third winter using them, I think they had 2 winters on them when I bought them. They definitely are better than regular tires for the snow & ice, but they have what seems to be an odd wear pattern to them, and I doubt that its my cars fault because they had evidence of this condition when I picked them up, and my regular tires wear well.

The tires seem to be wearing the edges of the tread noticeably more than the center. Common logic would have me conclude that the tires are running under inflated, but I stay on top of my tire pressures, I have more than one gauge that I trust, and I normally keep my tires a bit on the hard side of the recommended pressure. The car is a SAAB 9000 and I normally keep my pressure at 34 psi front and 32 psi rear, and that works well with the all-season tires. Is there some reason that snow tires would need more pressure, perhaps just these tires in particular or did the previous owner run them to low all the time and cause an irreversible wear pattern? Are toyo's snow tires garbage, and that the real reason why they were so cheap? Should I just shut-up and be glad that I have them at all, while saving up for some hakkas?

My 2000 Golf recommended an extra 3 psi for snow tires. I expect it would all come down to the construction of individual models, but it sure sounds like your Toyos want more.

I run Toyo snows on our Jeep. No weird wear patterns.

a little more pressure in the snow tires will keep your sidewalls more supported and help extend the length of the outer part of the snow tire. I run 3-4psi more on the snow tires on my V. Yokahama Ice Gaurds. Not sure what the rated psi is for your tires but bear in mind also, driving these when it is warmer and dry destoys them faster, especially on the edges and any high speed highway driving will wear themout fasteras well.

I torched a set of Blizzaks in 3 months on an 88' Civic Si a hundred years ago. I put 'em on when it snowed in December and left them in anticipation of additional snow that never came. By the end of February they felt like staying out on a dry track on rains.

Now in the summer I swap between Direzzas and RA1s on the M3, putting on the Pilot Sport PS2s after the last event of the year along w/ the quieter brake pads.

The Tacoma got new Michelin LTX AT/2s in 265/70-70 and they kill it in the snow, wet and dry. And they're supposed to last like 100k miles.

simple answer is likey rim width. Many snow tires are made for skinny rims when mounted on wide rims the center falls with out added presure.

Grab your pryometer and do a few hi-way exit runs jack the presure untill the center is with in 5 deg of the sides.

My old Geo gsi has 205 50 15's and the snows had to be jacked to 44psi to wear right funny thing is i thought they had great traction even at the lower presure but once i got the even heat they were like tractor treads.

My older chevy 1/2 ton had 185 cooper snows on a 8" wheel (too narrow) pumped up to 40 psi (too high) and those tires lasted about four years driving year round. Drive like a grandpa(ma) in the dry - that helps.

Since the tires had been run by the previous owner and like most people they don't check the tire pressures. Most likely the shoulder wear comes from that. I see lots of obviously under inflated tires now that the cold weather has set in.

I routinely see the same wear pattern on all my snows. It my case, I believe my cornering antics are to blame. It's fun drifting a Miata on snows on bare pavement, but I rarely get more than 4 seasons of use out of a set.

44Dwarf wrote: simple answer is likey rim width. Many snow tires are made for skinny rims when mounted on wide rims the center falls with out added presure. Grab your pryometer and do a few hi-way exit runs jack the presure untill the center is with in 5 deg of the sides.

My tires are 185 65 15 mounted on 5.5" or 5.75" wide rims, so the tire and rim width sould be a good match.

I'm going to up the pressure to 38psi and borrow your pyrometer to check them, are you comming to the Philly area any time soon?

Philly hell no..Well maybe to visit Detective Rush...

Anyway back to the post...Pyrometers can be had cheap enough. I like real ones with needles as i feel they get the real temp not the cooler surface temp but beat you know someone with an infa-red gun.