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Last updated 8/12/2024 - Originally published 8/12/2024
Written by SimpleTire
Established in 1942, Nexen is one of South Korea’s oldest tire manufacturers and has since developed its business into a multinational company with worldwide distribution. Today, Nexen offers a wide range of premium tires for sedans, minivans, coupes, and crossovers, as well as light trucks and SUVs. That includes all-terrain tires for trucks, all-season and Grand Touring tires for cars, and ultra-high-performance and summer tire designs.
Nexen’s Winguard family of winter tires is engineered for dependable performance in challenging winter conditions, the kind of driving where all-season tires are always not going to be up to the job. Nexen’s Winguard tires are a far cry from the noisy, heavy, clumsy “mud grips” or “snow grips” that might have been on your grandpa’s Ford Country Squire wagon back in the 70s. Today’s winter tires are designed in collaboration with automakers, and are centered around the power, torque, handling, braking and overall driving dynamics of today’s vehicles. These tires are loaded with innovations and advanced design features, delivering refined ride quality, composed road manners, responsive handling and low road noise. That is, of course, along with confident grip, control, cornering and braking performance on snow, slush and ice. Like most winter tires, the tread formulation of the Winguard family is designed to stay flexible and deliver good traction in subfreezing weather. This softer tread compound will wear quickly on warmer days, and Nexen advises against using these tires if temperatures are above 40-45 degrees F. Let’s take a quick look at the Winguard family of tires and what they have to offer:
Nexen Winguard Winspike 3
Winter tires have all the design features and enhancements for dependable grip in snow, slush or on wet roads, but when an ice storm hits and leaves the roads as slick as a hockey rink, there’s only one thing that can dependably get the job done: studded tires. The Nexen Winguard Winspike 3 is a winter tire that’s pre-drilled to make it easy for a tire tech to install TSMI #12 studs (note: check local and state laws for the legality of studded tires where you are, along with calendar restrictions, for their use). The tread compound of the Winguard Winspike 3 is designed to stay flexible to continue delivering traction in subfreezing weather, when other tires might stiffen up and lose their grip. Its directional winter tread design includes angled grooves and longitudinal grooves that route water and slush away from the tire’s contact patch to resist hydroplaning on wet roads. The angled and lateral grooves work as a system to resist hydroplaning by funneling water, slush and melting snow away from the tire’s contact patch. The tire’s intricate network of sipes delivers surefooted grip in some of the most difficult winter conditions.
Nexen Winguard Sport 2
Designed for performance-oriented sports sedans, coupes, and crossovers, the Winguard Sport 2 delivers confident winter grip along with the kind of braking, handling, control and road manners you’d expect from a performance tire. Its directional tread features sweeping grooves to eliminate snow, slush and water from the contact patch to resist hydroplaning, and its reinforced shoulders are designed for stability and sharp, precise cornering ability. The dense network of 3D sipes in the Winguard Sport 2’s tread multiplies the tread’s surface area and traction with hundreds of thin, biting edges that slice through standing water, snow and slush. The Nexen Winguard Sport 2](https://simpletire.com/brands/nexen-tires/winguard-sport-2) is 3 Peak Mountain Snowflake certified for severe winter service.
Nexen Winguard Ice Plus
The Winguard Ice Plus from Nexen starts off with an innovative directional tread design, with a row of dual V-shaped blocks toward the tread center and differently-angled tread blocks towards the inner and outer shoulders. The directional V-shaped grooves work as a system with circumferential and lateral grooves to enhance traction on snow, slush and ice, and its continuous center rib gives the Nexen Winguard Ice Plus rock-solid stability on the highway as well as enhanced steering response. 3D sipes work as a system with the groove pattern to enhance winter grip, and their extra depth ensures that the Winguard Ice Plus will continue to deliver confident winter traction even as the tread wears down. The shoulders of the Winguard Ice Plus are reinforced for durability and improved cornering ability, and it has the 3 Peak Mountain Snowflake rating for severe winter service.
Nexen Winguard Ice SUV
Nexen took their proven Winguard Ice tire and updated it for the needs of SUVs and crossovers. The Winguard Ice SUV is designed with reinforced internal construction to easily handle the weight, torque, and power of modern SUVs. It alters the tread of the Ice Plus slightly to feature directional tread grooves with sawtooth-shaped blocks towards the center, then a different geometry of directional tread blocks towards the inside and outside shoulders. Circumferential grooves and smaller semi-grooves work to resist hydroplaning and remove slush, snow and water from the tire’s contact patch. The Nexen Winguard Ice SUV has the 3 Peak Mountain Snowflake certification for severe winter service.
Nexen Winguard Winspike
The Winguard Winspike is pre-drilled for easy installation of studs in case of severe winter weather and ice, with the arrangement of studs strategically placed in 12 staggered semi-random lines for optimized traction and reduced noise. Wide directional grooves and wide shoulder blocks are designed for good control and handling, and the sipe network of the Winguard Winspike works with the grooves and studs to reliably dig into snow and slush. The ]Nexen Winguard Winspike](https://simpletire.com/brands/nexen-tires/winguard-winspike) is covered by a 30,000 mile limited manufacturer’s tread life warranty, and it features the 3 Peak Mountain Snowflake rating for severe winter service.
Other Winspike Tires
- Winspike SUV: Directional winter tread design with V-shaped grooves, pre-drilled for installation of studs in 12 strategically-placed rows for dependable grip and low noise
- Winspike 231: Directional winter tread design with V-shaped grooves, pre-drilled for installation of studs in 12 strategically-placed rows for dependable grip and low noise, with interlocking intermediate ribs and high density of kerfs
- Winspike WH62: Designed for sedans, minivans and crossovers with directional winter tread and V-shaped grooves, pre-drilled for installation of #12 studs, 3 Peak Mountain Snowflake rated for severe winter service