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I’m scared to drive my new Tesla in the winter

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My YP is a beast in the snow with the Pirelli winter tires and the 20” wheels from Tesla.
Still have to be careful with the regen but the car is unstoppable and handles great in snow.

Don’t recommend the 20” winter set from Tesla. — too expensive. Seems like a good bet is to put winter tires on a set of the 19” OEM wheels.
 
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In Colorado, definitely get winter tires. Especially due to mountain driving, etc. I have Blizzaks on my other vehicle and those work well.

I live in Michigan and have CrossClimate 2 tires on my model S and they do very well for all seasons in snow but a dedicated winter tire is better. Just try not to drive a winter tire in temps above 50 because they are of a softer rubber compound and will wear faster in warmer weather and dry pavement.

Good tires make ALL the difference. In fact, good tires is far more important than AWD.
 
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Ah, memories...
This thread has reminded me of 2 experiences when I was much younger. The first was a trip from Niagara Falls to Chicago and back. On the return trip the snow on the highways was as much as 10 inches deep and I hardly slowed down from the speed limit in spite of the fact that my old Ford van had large holes from rust in the floor just behind the front wheels (in this van the driver's seat was right on top of the front wheel) and you could turn the steering wheel from 11 to 1 without affecting the front wheels. Oh yes, and no snow tires. My brother refused to help with the driving! No exaggerations, I was young, foolish and poor. Did I mention how cold it was inside the van? There are advantages to learning to drive in a lake effect snow belt area!
The other was a trip from LA to Niagara Falls in February in my '65 Pontiac convertible weighed down with a dismembered dirt bike in the trunk. I'd been in LA for several months and wasn't thinking of the cold weather I was about to encounter. When I hit the cold I found I had no heat. Again no discretionary funds and the car was running fine so I spent the rest of the drive wrapped up in my sleeping bag from head to toe, while driving, with a rather light front end. I did sleep in the car for a few hours wrapped in the sleeping bag but otherwise just kept driving. No snow on the roads, thank goodness.
My point? Our S is more of a car than I ever dreamed of having. We keep all season tires on it and have the option of just staying home when there is snow or ice on the roads here in NW Ohio. Good to be retired.
 
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Yeah. About all-season, summer, and winter tires.

The summer tires that come by default on the "P" versions of Teslas are absolute, complete, crazy, horrors on snow and ice. Below 40F or so, that nifty compound that lets one go around Corners Really Fast in the summer becomes like rocks with No Traction Whatsoever.

I understand all the cold weather types repeatedly stating, "Get Snows! Get Snows! Get Snows!" because, well, Snow Tires are superior on snow and ice than anything else one might care to mention.

But I've been driving in New England, the Mid Atlantic States, Virginia (where Ice Storms are a Thing) and Northern Indiana with (wait for it...) All Season Tires.

And I'll bet the OP a plugged nickel that those SUVs he was driving before had All Seasons on them.

All Seasons won't beat anybody at the track. And they can't get through 10" of rough snow anywhere near as well as a proper snow tire. But, with VW Beetles, Datsun B210s, Honda Civics of various flavors, a Gen 3 Prius, several different brands of Minivans, and several years worth of Tesla M3s and a MY: Those All-Seasons worked just fine. The traction control works as advertised, I've never gotten stuck, skidded out, fishtailed, or what have you. Well.. Once with the Prius when I drove up on top of 1.5' of snow, and it took a lot of rocking to get it out. And once with the '71 VW Beetle when I did something like that and got all four wheels suspended, more or less, in thin air with the body being supported by the snow. But othewise.. naw.

All Seasons won't beat anybody at the track. The compound used in these works, basically, on snow and ice, although not as well as the Snows. As a random example, see: https://www.tirereview.com/summer-tires-in-winter/
You’re right never truly had a snow tire. We usually have all season mudders. But with the braking issue I’m concerned as I know how to slow down and pump but I don’t know any my car to react on its own and put me in a bad situation. I’ve even considered studs now. Knowing my car and someone else could be currently not in one piece right now is scary I don’t want that liability.
 
In Colorado, definitely get winter tires. Especially due to mountain driving, etc. I have Blizzaks on my other vehicle and those work well.

I live in Michigan and have CrossClimate 2 tires on my model S and they do very well for all seasons in snow but a dedicated winter tire is better. Just try not to drive a winter tire in temps above 50 because they are of a softer rubber compound and will wear faster in warmer weather and dry pavement.

Good tires make ALL the difference. In fact, good tires is far more important than AWD.
That complicates my decision. I hear winter and I hear all season. With your info I’m sure you know how bipolar CO weather is. So driving above 50 degrees would probably happen a lot. We r had 2 snow storms already this year and have been back in the low 70s in between. I can’t swap tires daily. So stressful to invest more money on the right thing when don’t know what that right thing is. I honestly thought I was getting a vehicle ready to drive 😂 I only know off road tires and never had anything like a car before.
 
You’re right never truly had a snow tire. We usually have all season mudders. But with the braking issue I’m concerned as I know how to slow down and pump but I don’t know any my car to react on its own and put me in a bad situation. I’ve even considered studs now. Knowing my car and someone else could be currently not in one piece right now is scary I don’t want that liability.
Good enough, and I won my hypothetical bet 😁.

But I guess the point is: Had your Model Y had All Seasons on it, you wouldn't have experienced or seen any unusual driving in snow. Driving around in the snow would have been the same experience or even somewhat better than your previous SUV cars.

But, if you're going to buy a new set of tires (Highly Recommended!!) so you don't have fun willy-nilly swapping ends down the roads, you might as well get Snows and have the Approved solution to getting around town. I mean, there's nothing actually wrong with the Summer tires you presently own, they're pretty much working as advertised (i.e., great in the warm, horrible in the cold).

The only question in my mind is whether you go whole hog and buy four additional wheels to put the snows onto, making the fall/spring swap relatively painless, or pay for mounting/dismounting all four tires before and after winter.

Last point, such as it is. I'm one of those maniacs who believes in buying cars and tires and running them until they don't work so well any more. So, several times now, I've had the tires (yeah, All Seasons) wear so the Lincoln Penny test failed, then went and got new All Seasons. In the winter time.

The difference between in driving on worn All Seasons with barely any tread (not bald, I'm not that crazy) and a decent new tread is phenomenal. One gets the sudden idea that the car can climb trees because, from one day to another, there's very little traction followed by Amazing Traction.

In your case, with those Summer Tires on, you had near-zero traction in the cold. It's the tire compound: It's not formulated to have "sticky" in the cold, and it shows.
 
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Like many others have suggested, get winter tires or at least aggressive all season tires. I'm in Colorado too so am familiar with out schizophrenic weather. I change to Michelin X-Ice3 tires sometime in October and put the all-seasons back on in April or May and don't worry about warm days in the winter. The Michelin Cross Climate seems to be a good winter and mixed season tire, but it does wear fast in warmer months,

You might also consider setting up a Snow-Ice driver profile with regen set to low, acceleration set to chill and steering set to comfort. And don't pump the brakes, let the anti-lock system do the pumping for you, it's faster and can brake wheels individually helping keep the car straight.
 
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Like many others have suggested, get winter tires or at least aggressive all season tires. I'm in Colorado too so am familiar with out schizophrenic weather. I change to Michelin X-Ice3 tires sometime in October and put the all-seasons back on in April or May and don't worry about warm days in the winter. The Michelin Cross Climate seems to be a good winter and mixed season tire, but it does wear fast in warmer months,

You might also consider setting up a Snow-Ice driver profile with regen set to low, acceleration set to chill and steering set to comfort. And don't pump the brakes, let the anti-lock system do the pumping for you, it's faster and can brake wheels individually helping keep the car straight.
Not totally clear what year their car is, but it sounds like it is a recent owner and car. In which case no way to set the regen to low (without 3rd party controls).
 
Like many others have suggested, get winter tires or at least aggressive all season tires. I'm in Colorado too so am familiar with out schizophrenic weather. I change to Michelin X-Ice3 tires sometime in October and put the all-seasons back on in April or May and don't worry about warm days in the winter. The Michelin Cross Climate seems to be a good winter and mixed season tire, but it does wear fast in warmer months,

You might also consider setting up a Snow-Ice driver profile with regen set to low, acceleration set to chill and steering set to comfort. And don't pump the brakes, let the anti-lock system do the pumping for you, it's faster and can brake wheels individually helping keep the car straight.
Oh boy you lost me on profile…. I have snow driver profiles? I can adjust regen? I’m going to get service next week I’ll ask them about all this.
 
Oh boy you lost me on profile…. I have snow driver profiles? I can adjust regen? I’m going to get service next week I’ll ask them about all this.
You have a drive mode "off road" that can be used to give more of a 50/50 power distribution between the drive wheels (front & rear). You do not have the ability to manually set the regen lower, however on cold days, the regen will naturally reduce. Just remember to slow gradually by easing off the acceleration.
 
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I think we’re overwhelming her with all these things.

Just buy snow tires. That will help by far the most of anything suggested. Just don’t leave them on all summer. Keep your existing tires for swapping in spring. This can be done at any tire store. You don’t have to go through Tesla.
 
But with the braking issue I’m concerned as I know how to slow down and pump
Do not do this!! You are reducing your stopping distance by pumping the brakes. No modern car requires this technique. The car's anti-lock-brake system handles everything - just push the pedal and hold it. It will pulsate when the wheels are slipping, this is the car modulating brake pressure to the wheels with the most traction.
 
Oh boy you lost me on profile…. I have snow driver profiles? I can adjust regen? I’m going to get service next week I’ll ask them about all this.
Um. I hope you're not waiting on service before putting new tires on your car; that's called "Rolling The Dice On When The Next Snow Storm/Ice Storm Hits."

I tell you this three times: YOU DO NOT NEED TO GO TO TESLA TO GET TIRES. Any tire store can and will sell you tires for your car and, so long as they meet the letters/numbers/symbols on the sidewall of your current tires, you'll be good to go.

As a satisified-customer $RANDOM example, consider TireRack.com. If you're doing research, go there, put in your make and model, and it'll pop up a list of recommended tires, wheels, and what-all. The prices are usually good, and very likely lower cost than anything Tesla will sell you. And their recommendations tend to be fact-based, which is not always true for, say, a tire place that's got One Manufacturer's Name on the overhead sign.

Another $RANDOM place to look for recommendations is Consumers Reports. That's generally paywalled, but, if you have a subscription, the recommendations aren't bad, exactly. It's just that enthusiasts always have something bad to say about what that particular crowd likes (or doesn't like.)

Once you've settled on a tire, then, if you don't want to buy on-line, you can ding your local tire places (including places like BJ's, Costco, Walmart, and what-all) for the tire you want. Often, these places price-match. Often, they'll give you lifetime rotations. And the fact that, say, Walmart sells the same tire as the whoopy-gee-whiz-tire-place-with-all-the-racing-tires doesn't mean that the "whoopy" place is better. It's a tire, darn it.

About the only thing to ask about, such as it is, is to make sure whoever does the work knows about putting a Tesla up on a lift. A few years back the Warnings about not putting a lift jack onto the battery pack was New And Different for the semi-minimum-wage types swapping tires out in back. Nowadays, what with all the BEVs scampering over the landscape, pretty much every place knows that there's four specific spots under the car on to which the lifting pads go. Doesn't hurt to ask 'em; mostly, they roll their eyes and say, "Yeah, we know about that."

Finally... I'm noting here that I never have had snows, so I truly don't know what I'm talking about with Snows. Having said that, Tesla's OEM tires may be something of a mixed bag. The 2018 M3 LR that the SO and I picked up back in 9/2018 had All Weathers that lasted about 30,000 miles, which is low for that type of tire. It was a set of Michelins. When they were worn, I looked up the warranty on-line, and was a bit unhappy that (a) these should have been good for 50,000 miles, and (b) that that long-range warranty specifically did not apply to tires delivered with the vehicle. A new set of Michelins, but not the foam, super-quiet type lasted some 45,000 miles and were still going strong when we sold the car this past year.

On the other hand, the 2021 MY the SO is driving these days is still going strong on the original tires, but they only have 12,000 miles on them. Go figure.
 
Um. I hope you're not waiting on service before putting new tires on your car; that's called "Rolling The Dice On When The Next Snow Storm/Ice Storm Hits."

I tell you this three times: YOU DO NOT NEED TO GO TO TESLA TO GET TIRES. Any tire store can and will sell you tires for your car and, so long as they meet the letters/numbers/symbols on the sidewall of your current tires, you'll be good to go.

As a satisified-customer $RANDOM example, consider TireRack.com. If you're doing research, go there, put in your make and model, and it'll pop up a list of recommended tires, wheels, and what-all. The prices are usually good, and very likely lower cost than anything Tesla will sell you. And their recommendations tend to be fact-based, which is not always true for, say, a tire place that's got One Manufacturer's Name on the overhead sign.

Another $RANDOM place to look for recommendations is Consumers Reports. That's generally paywalled, but, if you have a subscription, the recommendations aren't bad, exactly. It's just that enthusiasts always have something bad to say about what that particular crowd likes (or doesn't like.)

Once you've settled on a tire, then, if you don't want to buy on-line, you can ding your local tire places (including places like BJ's, Costco, Walmart, and what-all) for the tire you want. Often, these places price-match. Often, they'll give you lifetime rotations. And the fact that, say, Walmart sells the same tire as the whoopy-gee-whiz-tire-place-with-all-the-racing-tires doesn't mean that the "whoopy" place is better. It's a tire, darn it.

About the only thing to ask about, such as it is, is to make sure whoever does the work knows about putting a Tesla up on a lift. A few years back the Warnings about not putting a lift jack onto the battery pack was New And Different for the semi-minimum-wage types swapping tires out in back. Nowadays, what with all the BEVs scampering over the landscape, pretty much every place knows that there's four specific spots under the car on to which the lifting pads go. Doesn't hurt to ask 'em; mostly, they roll their eyes and say, "Yeah, we know about that."

Finally... I'm noting here that I never have had snows, so I truly don't know what I'm talking about with Snows. Having said that, Tesla's OEM tires may be something of a mixed bag. The 2018 M3 LR that the SO and I picked up back in 9/2018 had All Weathers that lasted about 30,000 miles, which is low for that type of tire. It was a set of Michelins. When they were worn, I looked up the warranty on-line, and was a bit unhappy that (a) these should have been good for 50,000 miles, and (b) that that long-range warranty specifically did not apply to tires delivered with the vehicle. A new set of Michelins, but not the foam, super-quiet type lasted some 45,000 miles and were still going strong when we sold the car this past year.

On the other hand, the 2021 MY the SO is driving these days is still going strong on the original tires, but they only have 12,000 miles on them. Go figure.
No I’m not waiting for service for tires. I have the infamous marble rolling sound going on. I have other vehicles to drive if the snow hits. I would like to add MY to my winter driving options, that’s why I’m going to get winter tires. I currently have the 20” wheels and now I’m contemplating changing the size etc etc. so much money to invest I want to do it right and not regret the look or drive later. That’s why I’m taking my time. If I relied on this to drive I would have just got any winter tires by now but thankfully I have time to research and shop. Tesla is not even a shopping option I’ve looked at.