Innovations in tire manufacturing help protect against hydroplaning. Good quality tires, especially with innovations that help prevent hydroplaning, can keep you safe in rainy weather. Early fall, as well as late summer, is when rains are the most common. When you equip your car with good quality tires with adequate tire pressure, it is the best way to protect yourself against hydroplaning.
To stay safe, you should make sure you have tires of quality that still have at least 2/32 inches of tread on them. Anything less than that severely diminishes the capacity to displace water between the tire and the road. You can quickly check your tire depth with the penny test. Placing a penny into the tire’s tread groove with Lincoln’s head down will allow you to test if the tread is sufficient. If you can see Lincoln’s head, your tread is below 2/32 inches and needs to be replaced. Something equally important is to keep the tires properly inflated. Adequately inflated tires along with proper tread amount on your tires can help reduce the risk of hydroplaning.
Tires like the Nokian WR G4 all-weather tires are examples of tires with innovations that protect against hydroplaning. Innovations like “Blade Grooves” that help route rain, snow, and slush away from the tires and the “Coanda technology,” ramp-like curved tread blocks located on the inner shoulder helping to guide the water from the longitudinal grooves into the transverse grooves. Even as the tires wear down, these properties are retained. Unique designs of the lateral grooves allow them to store an increased amount of water between the road and the tires. This helps prevent hydroplaning as the water will not lift the car tires off the road, which happens in hydroplaning. This can be quite disconcerting, and you should know if hydroplaning should occur; in addition, there is an accelerated flow from the main grooves. Stay calm, take your foot off the brake, steer in the same direction as you are heading, and slam on the brake under no circumstances. You should always reduce your speed during rainy weather because on wet roads, the faster you drive, the risk of hydroplaning increases as the tires don’t have enough time to evacuate the water. Make sure to avoid puddles and standing water, turn off cruise control, go in lower gears, avoid hard braking, don’t do sharp or quick turns. There are more accidents in the summer early fall when sudden rain showers might cause hydroplaning.
Innovations in both all-season tires and all-weather tires have given them better protection against hydroplaning. Features like special improved, innovative tread design help route water away from the tires while increased tread depth allows more water to be stored between the tires and the road to help protect from hydroplaning. Therefore, keeping well-maintained good quality tires that are adequately inflated is so essential. Make sure when replacing tires with doing so in pairs.
For more information regarding tires, visit: https://www.nokiantires.com/