Definitely get tire chains, you can google them and order online a lot cheaper than buyng from the dealer. Loading the tires wouldn't make a lot of difference as all your weight is already sitting on the axle IMHO. Also, going downhill take a "full bite" and on the return trip take a "lesser bite" depending on conditiions. I don't think tire diameter really works into it unless it means a bigger machine, width=traction particuarly with chains. If you've never had a blower, do you have a place to park it "inside?" Putting it inside where it's above freezing occasionally really helps, it melts the snow, ice, "salty mush" and keeps you and the machine much happier. If you park one with all that wet stuff inside, overnight it'll freeze, effectively freezing all the moving parts. A 60W trouble light turned on and put down the chute helps a lot. A lot of folks swear by water dispersal sprays like WD-40 before and after use, I just "melted them down" periodically. Good luck, Ev

Coeur d'Alene had 127 inches of snow by yesterday and then a little more fell. This was a new seasonal record and nearly double normal. Seems like when I lived right in town about 30 years ago, there was more snow to deal with. I think that might be true but with a certain amount of melting, some drifting, and days of shoveling - it's real hard to make much sense out of the landscape. I'm considering "burrowing" next. There were winds of 35 - 40 mph with gusts near 50, today. Lots of roads in and out of communities in the Columbia Basin are closed because of drifting and white-out conditions. I think it is now going to turn to rain except for up where you are, Margaret. And, even western MT may get rain by Sunday. Hopefully, there won't be very much. digitS'

All that dust came from here. :-) We missed all these last storms - just got the wind. so we're at 70% of normal snow pack, the reservoirs are way low, rivers hitting 100 yr lows. The big Dolores Irrigation scheme will be at 40% of normal water allocation, and as a side effect, my favorite trout fishing will be just about destroyed this year, they're dropping the dam release down to 18 cubic feet per second (vs 60 last year). But, at least, this year the runoff hasn't started yet. Last year, it was already pretty much over by May. But hey, thats nothing to whats going on in SE Colorado, SW Kansas and down around where Jay lives. They're headed into what now, year 3 of an 'exceptional' drought, and they missed all the snow this year......

Tires of the same brand and model on all wheels will react in largely the same way at the limits of adhesion (the limit of traction, etc). Mixing brands and treads is an invitation to making the car's handling unstable (or at least uncertain) when you need the tires most, erasing most of the advantage of using them in the first place. If budget is a major factor here, you're safer on four cheaper winter tires than you are mixing and matching pairs of more expensive tires. And, though it's hard to tell from your post, mixing snow tires one one axle with "all-season" or "summer" tires on the other is one of the fastest ways I know to make the back end of your car the front end. Flat-out not recommended.