There are clearly not enough winter tyre threads on here so

I currently have two decent tyres, two rubbish ones and one mediocre one. They are all summer tyres. The rubbish ones really need replacing, the sidewalls are looking like they might perish soon.
If I put the two good ones on the back and the mediocre one as the spare can I then buy two winter tyres and put them at the front? Will this provide all the grip and steering control I need or will mis-matched tyres make it handle like a pig?
It’s a front wheel drive Transit. Discs at the front, drums at the back, manual diesel.
Yes, I know I should really buy four winter tyres but this will obviously cost twice as much as just buying two.
Any thoughts? Anyone done this, was it any good?
Cheers.

I had a FWD long wheel base Transit, with normal but proper tyres on it made good progress through 4 good winters in lancashire and cumbria. The only thing that really defeated me was uphill ice and even then a run up sorted it out in the end. the fact the wheels are skinny and there is good weight over the front helped a lot. Add in plenty of time spent driving in snow/ice and muddy fields when I was younger.

If the back is unladen it will probably slide around anyway.

Buy 4.

That. Keep the two good ones aside and buy two to match them in the spring.

Yep run the new winters on the front and if you have little weight in the back run the summer rears at -5 or so PSI. Your rear spring rate is really high so more tyre compliance will help a little with that. I do the opposite in my car as it’s such an under steering pig.

If you can buy a spare set of steel wheels cheap (you should be able to get them dirt cheap for a tranny) then get 4 winter tyres on those wheels and swap them over summer-winter. It will be cheaper in the long run than just running the same tyres year round as IME summer tyres wear fastest in winter.

Interesting JCL, never thought of playing around with tyre pressures to compensate. It’s coil sprung at the front, leaf springs on a solid axle at the back. It is always pretty much empty, weight wise anyway. It gets filled with bulky but light items, like bikes, which take a up a lot of a space but never get it anywhere near the payload limit.
Yes, I know I should buy four winter tyres really but that’s £360 from my local ATS whereas the fronts are obviously half that, not sure aout the idea of used/remould winter tyres, anyone ever tried any?

Surprise the looming shadow of insurance hasn’t been raised.. No not in the modification sense, but in the fact that when I checked the advise was that winter tyres are fine as long as you follow your car manufacturers recommendtion. My last car I fitted winter tyres, had the manufacturer recommendation that all 4 were swapped to winter tyres

Didn’t htink of that zippy, will consult the handbook tomorrow.

FWIW my insurance had no issue with just using 2 winters. I found it effective enough, especially as my focus had terrible rear brakes so a sort of natural brake bias and ABS to balance out the standard tyres on the back 😉 But 4 is better, and the more you ask of the tyres the betterer it gets

4 if you can manage it – even though its a 2wd vehicle its not only the driven wheels that matter. In snow you use 2 wheels to get moving but you use all four of them to stop and steer. Your manual will probably recommend a various winter and summer tyre types but what it won’t recommend is mixing them

Its best to have a matching level of grip all round – not in the chugging through deep snow scenario but in general driving – front wheel drive cars suffer if the they’ve got less grip at the back when its wet. When you’re cornering , in a situation where you might understeer or drift a bit the front grips but the rear slips so you can spin quite easily. In a transit where you’ve got a lot of weight over/ forward of the front wheels then this would be exacerbated when you’re driving empty.

Quite often when people are replacing tyres they’ll tend to want to put the newest ones up front on the basis that those are the driven wheels but its actually wise to have more tread at the back.

Its almost like we need a winter tyres FAQ / sticky, or something.

It can go next to ‘what woodburner for cannop chase’ and ‘which wheel size will fix my brakes’