Tires and wheels – Subaru 2005 Legacy User Manual

Page 548

11-49

Maintenance and service

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Tires and wheels

Types of tires

You should be familiar with type of tires present on

your vehicle.

! All season tires
The factory-installed tires on your new vehicle are all

season tires.

All season tires are designed to provide an adequate

measure of traction, handling and braking perfor-

mance in year-round driving including snowy and icy

road conditions. However all season tires do not offer

as much traction performance as winter (snow) tires in

heavy or loose snow or on icy roads.

All season tires are identified by “ALL SEASON” and/

or “M+S” (Mud & Snow) on the tire sidewall.

! Summer tires
Summer tires are high-speed capability tires best suit-

ed for highway driving under dry conditions.

Summer tires are inadequate for driving on slippery

roads such as on snow-covered or icy roads.

If you drive your vehicle on snow-covered or icy roads,

we strongly recommend the use of winter (snow) tires.

When installing winter tires, be sure to replace all four

tires.

! Winter (snow) tires
Winter tires are best suited for driving on snow-cov-

ered and icy roads. However winter tires do not per-

form as well as summer tires and all season tires on

roads other than snow-covered and icy roads.

Tire pressure monitoring system

(TPMS) (if equipped)

The tire pressure monitoring system provides the driv-

er with a warning message indicating by sending a sig-

nal from a sensor that is installed in each wheel when

tire pressure is severely low. The tire pressure moni-

toring system will activate only when the vehicle is

driven. Also, this system may not react immediately to

a sudden drop in tire pressure (for example, a blow-

out caused by running over a sharp object).

If you adjust the tire pressures in a warm garage and

will then drive the vehicle in cold outside air, the result-

ing drop in tire pressures may cause the low tire pres-

sure warning light to come on. To avoid this problem

when adjusting the tire pressures in a warm garage,

inflate the tires to pressures higher than those shown

on the tire placard. Specifically, inflate them by an ex-

tra 1 psi (6.9 kPa, 0.07 kgf/cm

) for every difference of

°F (5.6°C) between the temperature in the garage

and the temperature outside. By way of example, the