How To Choose The Best Summer Tyres For Your Vehicle

With the hot weather well and truly underway and the UK seeing an onslaught of hot temperatures throughout July, if you haven’t already, changing your winter tyres to summer tyres is certainly overdue. Taking weather conditions into account is vital when choosing the right tyres for your vehicle. With summer tyres offering the greatest performance in the hot temperatures, we have put together a few tips on how to best choose the right summer tyres for your car. 

Summer tyres have a pronounced longitudinal direction, narrower grooves and sipes of another configuration in comparison to winter or all-season tyres. These design features mean the risk of aquaplaning is reduced and the tread helps improve grip on dry and wet road surfaces.

Choosing and operating summer tyres

When choosing the right summer tyre for your vehicle, it is crucial to take into consideration the kind of drives you are planning on doing during the warmer months of the year. This is when you need to take the tread design into account. 

By selecting the correct tread pattern in accordance with the vehicle’s operating conditions, you can drive with confidence that your tyres will do exactly what you need them to do. For example, if you are simply looking for short, quiet drives, a symmetrical tyre with a non-directional pattern will do. These are not too expensive and have well-balanced characteristics. 

Tyres with asymmetric tread patterns are the most versatile and are great for longer-haul drives. These tyres ensure the road-holding ability of the car is there for both wet and dry road surfaces, so they are great for sports driving. Tyres that boast a directional pattern are a no-brainer when driving in rainy areas as they are highly resistant to aquaplaning, providing high levels of safety. 

Another top tip when buying new summer tyres is to check their age and how long they have been stored. The longer tyres are stored in a warehouse, the shorter their service life will be since the rubber ages, even when not being used. It is always advisable to buy new summer tyres that have been made no more than 1-2 years ago. 

If you know your vehicle will need to withstand covering great distances regularly, summer tyres that are designed to be more rigid are probably your best choice. Although softer rubber tends to have a better grip, rigid tyres are more resistant to wear and tear and are unlikely to wear unevenly if your tyres are aligned properly. 

Your choice of summer tyre brand will of course mostly be led by your budget. Most manufacturers offer a range of suitable summer tyres, be it budget, mid-range or premium. The Bridgestone T005 Summer Tyres are a perfect choice if you are less likely to trust the ever-changing British weather, as although it is a summer tyre, it adapts to the varying weather throughout the season by performing well on wet surfaces as well as dry. Choosing this instead of a summer tyre, you can be sure of excellent grip no matter the weather conditions.

Choosing premium brands such as Bridgestone and Continental will give you the highest performing, long-lasting tyres, but summer tyres from mid-range and even budget brands such as Marshal Tyres will still provide optimum performance in the summer months.