Both the Kleber Quadraxer 3 and the Vredestein Quatrac Pro, excel in the Grand Touring All-Season category, offering a mix of comfort, durability, and all-season dependability. To find the perfect match for you, let’s dig deeper into their unique qualities.
Main Highlights
So overall, the Quadraxer 3 is better at:
- Superior Dry-Road Braking: Offering shorter braking distances due to a larger contact area and even weight distribution.
- Resistance to Hydroplaning: Excelling in efficiently expelling water and preventing hydroplaning with its directional tread pattern.
- Performance on Light Snow: Optimizing snow-to-snow contact for improved grip in powdery snow conditions.
Whereas the Vredestein’s tire here, is better at:
- Wet Road Traction: Providing better grip and handling in wet conditions with its optimized siping structure.
- Traction on Icy Surfaces: Offering better traction and handling on ice due to its dense, full-depth siping and numerous in-groove notches.
- Quieter Ride: Reducing overall tire noise with its specialized tread design.
- Better Fuel Efficiency and Tread Longevity: Thanks to its well-optimized contact patch.
Tread Features
First up, the Vredestein Quatrac Pro. This guy’s got a cool asymmetric tread design.
It’s made up of 5 ribs (or block columns), and the two on the edges are continuous-running and have prominent in-groove notches.
Though both sides differ, in terms of siping, where one side features laterally arranged interlocking sipes, while the other comes with linear slits, with longitudinal in-block biters.
The middle part? It’s doing its own thing too.
Out of 3 ribs here, the ones near the shoulders again vary from one another in terms of sipes.
While the central most rib features unique angles linear slits, notches, and in-block V-shaped biters.
Together, these ribs form 4 circumferential grooves. Though they aren’t interconnected to each other, due to the continuous-running nature of all of the tread ribs.
Now, the Kleber Quadraxer 3. This one’s got a directional tread pattern that kinda reminds me of the Crossclimate 2 SUV (review this tire here).
Now this tread can also be divided into 5 parts, thanks to these slanted cuts on the swoopy lugs, which you may have noticed.
Near the edges, these cuts are more obvious and create notches, but as you move towards the middle, they get slimmer, forming a structure that’s similar to the tire’s sipes.
The central area is pretty dense, with lugs with create an interlocking design, forming the middle-most zigzag circumferential groove.
Here you see linear sipes, (just like everywhere else on the tread), and the tire’s secondary rubber layer, where all the lugs are sitting on.
Basically, this layer acts as reinforced foundations for all the V shaped lugs, providing the tire with the needed stability, especially while taking aggressive corners.
Info on Sizes
Vredestein Quatrac Pro comes in 17 to 21 inches, with sizes having following specs.
- Speed ratings: H, V, W and Y.
- Load ratings: SL and XL.
- Weight range: 19 to 37 lbs.
- Tread depth: 10/32″ on all.
- UTQG: 400 A A.
- Treadwear warranty: 50k miles.
- Also all sizes have rim protectors, and Tri Peak ratings (along with M+S).
The Kleber Quadraxer 3 comes in 107 sizes, in 15 to 20 inches rims, having following specs.
- Speed ratings: T, H and V.
- Load ratings: SL and XL.
- Weight range: 18 to 34 lbs.
- Tread depth: 10.5/32″ on all.
- UTQG: 600 A A.
- Treadwear warranty: None.
- All sizes have the Tri Peak ratings, along with M+S.
Dry-Road Performance
When evaluating the tire’s traction and steering response, examining dry performance provides a complete overview. Therefore, it’s advisable to analyze each of these aspects individually.
Linear Grip
Longitudinal grip is all about how well a tire grips while moving straight ahead, and it’s mainly about how much of the tire’s center comes in contact with the road.
We measure this grip by looking at braking distances.
Now, let’s talk about our contenders here.
When put to the test, the Kleber Quadraxer 3 stands out with its superior braking performance, where it consistently stops about 2 feet shorter than the Vredestein Quatrac Pro when braking from 60 mph (according to my tests).
Why? Well, because of two main reasons:
- More Rubber in Contact with the Road: The Kleber has a larger contact area in its middle tread, unlike the Vredestein’s interlocking grooves which don’t offer the same extent of contact.
- Even Weight Distribution with a Rounded Contact Patch: Despite being heavier, the Quadraxer offers a rounded contact patch that distributes weight more evenly across the tread lugs.
How evenly distributed weight helps? Well, because it lowers momentum inertia, making the tire easier to stop. Remember, less momentum means a tire can stop more quickly.
Overall Handling
Overall handling of a tire is significantly influenced by a blend of its linear and lateral grip, along with its steering response. These factors play a crucial role in the three phases of cornering: entry, mid-cornering, and exiting.
During the entry phase, as the vehicle begins to turn into the corner, effective braking and sometimes shifting down are key. And the Quadraxer 3, with its superior braking, allows for quicker deceleration before entering each corner, contributing to a faster lap time in terms of handling.
Additionally, the Kleber tire provides a solid on-center feel and comparable lateral traction to the Vredestein’s tire, enhancing its performance during the exit phase, as well.
Though the main problem with this tire is its heavier weight, which affects the feedback during mid-cornering, giving the Quatrac Pro an edge in overall handling.
This is because the Quadraxer comes with a winter focused tread rubber and a relatively heavier weight. And both of these design elements, cause its lugs to bend more.
This bending of the lugs results in a “delay” in returning to their original shape, which translates into a “delay” in steering response.
Read more on this here: Improving Dry Performance From All-Season Tires.
Wet-Road Performance
On wet roads, the essentials are grip and the capacity to resist hydroplaning, both of which originate from efficient water clearance. We should thoroughly review these aspects.
Wet Grip and Handling
The effectiveness of wet traction is primarily influenced by sipes, which, while appearing as mere cuts on the tire tread, significantly contribute to overall performance.
These sipes are intricately designed to generate suction, effectively clearing and drying the road surface beneath the tire lugs, preventing slippage.
Consequently, to make an all-season tire good in rain, it’s crucial for a tire to not only possess a plentiful amount of sipes but also to ensure that these sipes are flexibly designed to maximize their suction capability.
Understanding this, I can now explain, why out of both tires, the Vredestein Quatrac Pro outperforms its counterpart in wet conditions, excelling in both wet braking and handling.
Why? Well this is due to following factors:
The tire takes the lead in both wet braking and handling. This is due to:
It offers a higher density of sipes.
It features an optimized siping structure, with linear patterns on the shoulders and wave-like designs elsewhere. So its sipes don’t get stiffen up, unlike its competitor.
I mean, the Kleber Quadraxer 3 not only falls short due to its insufficient sipes, but mostly with their predominantly linear structures.
This design of sipes, basically hinders their ability to efficiently absorb water particles, especially during sharp cornering, lowering wet traction.
For Your Info: The Quatrac Pro is ranked as the best tire for overall wet performance, in my list of best grand touring tires. You can check out the list here: https://tiredriver.com/best-grand-touring-all-season-tires/
Resistance to Hydroplaning
Hydroplaning, also known as aquaplaning, is a critical concern in tire performance, that occurs when a tire loses contact with the road surface due to a layer of water coming in between the tread and the road.
This causes the tire to float. Though its mitigated by grooves on the tread, taking majority of water out.
Now, when it comes to Kleber Quadraxer 3, its performance against hydroplaning is notably enhanced by its directional tread pattern and rounded contact patch.
The V-shaped lugs of this tire effectively expel water laterally, while the rounded contact patch intensifies this effect by creating negative pressure.
This combination results in a more efficient expulsion of water from beneath the tire.
Winter Traction
Both of these boys here, are excellent choices, offering a top-tier blend of summer and winter tire features. They’re particularly adept at handling snow and ice, with outstanding braking and acceleration capabilities, and both come with the 3-peak mountain snowflake ratings.
However, when subjected to thorough testing, subtle differences in performance emerge, where the Quatrac Pro demonstrates superior capabilities, especially on icy surfaces, and Kleber takes the lead on light snowy terrains.
The Vredestein tire’s performance is attributed to its dense, full-depth siping which combines linear and interlocking structures, providing highly needed micro level bite, when it comes to ice traction and handling.
And besides having an abundance of siping across its tread area, it also offers a lot more in-groove longitudinal and lateral notches. These features create numerous biting edges, enhancing traction on slick surfaces, further.
Conversely, the Kleber tire features a directional tread pattern with swooping lugs that excel at expelling snow, particularly backwards, generating forward momentum with it.
Additionally, the tire’s design well optimized snow-to-snow contact, which is crucial since snow binds more effectively with itself than with rubber, akin to the “snowball effect.”
This snow-to-snow interaction, combined with the forward motion generated by the tire’s swooping lugs, results in improved performance in powdery snow conditions.
Though keep in mind, that they both despite having 3PMSF ratings, can’t offer similar performance compared to winter tires.
Noise Comfort
Tire noise mainly arises from the interaction of air particles with the tire’s tread blocks.
These air particles, basically enter through the shoulder blocks, and their impact of hitting against the tread walls, is what generates initial noise.
This noise then echoes within the tire, influenced by the rubber’s composition, leading to what’s known as in-groove resonance.
Having said that, it makes sense why the Kleber Quadraxer 3 is a louder option here.
Its design, which includes more prominent voids especially around the shoulder and sidewall areas, allows a larger volume of air to enter and circulate within the tread pattern.
This increased airflow contributes to the overall noise level, and is further amplified due to the tire’s softer composition, resulting in more pronounced in-groove resonance.
In contrast, the Quatrac Pro tackles this issue differently.
By placing ridges between the shoulder blocks, it reduces noise at the source.
Additionally, the rubber composition of the Vredestein’s tire is optimized for better pitch sequencing.
This is basically a tread configuration, which creates sound waves of varying wavelengths and frequencies that work to cancel each other out, effectively reducing overall tire noise.
Learn more on this here: https://tiredriver.com/are-all-season-tires-comfortable-and-quiet-enough/
Wear and Fuel Economy
Both fuel efficiency and treadwear in tires are influenced by factors like tire weight, rubber composition, and tread design.
Now out of both tires, the Quatrac Pro is a better option. I mean, its not the best, comparing others in its category, it still takes the lead compared to Quadraxer 3, which is one of the least efficient option here.
Why? Well this is because the Kleber tire with its softer, winter-focused rubber compound and greater tread depth, leads to more bending in the tire lugs.
And this bending not only generates more heat, accelerating wear, but also results in energy loss due to the constant reshaping of the tread, thereby reducing fuel economy. You can learn more on it here.
That’s why it makes sense, why it doesn’t offer any treadwear warranty, whereas the Vredestein offers 50k miles.
In a Nutshell
Although you should read the whole thing for a comprehensive understanding, for those seeking a quick overview, here’s the key takeaway.
Now, here, the Kleber tire excels in dry-road braking with a superior linear grip, though it lacks in handling in comparison.
And although it offers decent hydroplaning resistance, it lacks to its counterpart, in terms of wet traction.
Whereas with Quatrac Pro, well, you get to know, its the king of wet traction, in its grand touring all season category.
Moreover, it also offers superb ice traction as well, though snow performance is better on Quadraxer 3.
And yes, it also offers a relatively quieter ride, and a better fuel and tread efficiency.
