akbro93704

I have the stock Continental ProContacts (225/45-17 front, 245-40-17 rear) on my car, and the rear tires are nearly worn down to the wear bars, probably only a couple thousand miles left on them. I have almost 20k miles, seems quite soon for a 400 tread wear rated tire...

anyways...any recommendations from those who have already replaced their tires? I'm probably going to buy a full set of tires even though the fronts have quite a bit of life....I really like Michelin products, but they're quite expensive.

Thanks for any suggestions!

Sportstick

All-season? Summer only? Ride versus handling preferences?

akbro93704

a tire thats a good balance between everything if possible... treadwear, noise, steering feel, smoothness, etc... Ive researched on TireRack quite a bit.

Sportstick

If you need all-season capability, up to just before and after the dead of winter, the Michelin Pilot Sport A/S Plus are great...was enjoying them very much before I put the Blizzak WS60 on for the snow season. If you plan to use them deeper into winter, Continental DWS might get you through if winters are not especially bad, but if you are reliable about getting non-winter tires off in time for dedicated winter tires, before temps drop to near freezing, Michelin PS2.

JimPap

If you rarely get into snow, then I'd recommend the Michelin Pilot MXM4s. I'm in Alabama and rarely get any snow, although last week we got a freak snow storm and got 4-6" of snow. Driving was no problem as I was out taking snow photos. :-)

Also, before you spend your $$, my Pilot MXM4s have 48,000 miles on them. The rear tires still have tread that according to one tire guy I saw last week should go 8-10K further. The fronts have so much tread that its hard to say exactly how much more but probably 15-20K.

As an aside, the wear bars are an indication of when you performance in wet weather drops below the design parameter of the tire. I got the impression that if you're not getting tons of rain, you actually can drive your tires further. I was under the impression that once you got to the wear bars, you were done. That's not really the case....although most tire stores would like you to believe that as they can sell you tires before you actually need them.

Just wanting to complain a little, last week when I was getting my tires balanced this other tire guy was carrying on that my tires were worn out and that the tread was down to the wear bars. Plus he pushed that my fronts should be changed too...although it turns out that I could probably go another year on those. I pointed that out to him that the tread was above the wear bars on the rear tires. He flatly lied and said that the tread was below the bars. These morons must think we're blind as well as stupid.

Will38

I think the Bridgestone Potenza RE-11 are nice, which is what I'm using now. I think it's awesome when it comes to handling and everyday driving. Not too sure how long the tread would last but the guy in Wheel Works said it will probably last over 30k mile. ( I hope he's not lying )

akbro93704

thanks for the suggestions so far...

I've had Michelin PS2 on a previous car, the PS2's remained sticky and quiet throughout their life, but only lasted about 15k miles (I do very little freeway driving). Very $$ but also very worth it!

The Pilot HX we currently have on our 2008 Jetta Wolfsburg (225/45-17). They're not very sticky but have better feel than the ProContacts on my C300 right now. They're also VERY expensive in the tire sizes I'd need.

I'll check out the Bridgestones as well

Any thoughts on Pirelli P-Zero Nero All-Seasons or Michelin Pilot Exalto PE2? The new Continental Extreme Contact DW and DWS look appealing as well (very reasonably priced).

duck718nyc

I'm going with the Continental Pro Contact DWS, next month...I was looking for all season & a quiet ride, & as with the great advise from our forum members & the ratings from tire rack, it will be those.

JimPap

akbro93704,

One thing that I found confusing on tirerack.com was in the reviews of the Pilot Sport A/S plus that it rated higher than the Pilot HX MXM4 in terms of quietness and ride.

Given that the MXM4s sell for more than the Pilot Sport A/S, I wrote Michelin and which would be the more comfortable and quietest of the two. Their response was that although the Pilot Sport A/S is a comfortable and quiet ride that the MXM4 was moreso and also had better control.

One of the tire salesmen that I spoke to when I mentioned tirerack reviews to him said that most people are comparing the performance of their worn out tires to new tires. If they could compare new tires to new tires, that would be a more fair comparison.

As for cost, its true that the MXM4s have a higher up front cost but if you only got 15K out of the PS2 then I would argue that they were the more expensive tires to operate. As I've said, I've got 48K on mine and can still go another 8K on the rears and probably another 15-20K on the fronts. I should note that about 10K of my driving each year is on the interstate keeping a constant 70mph.

Sportstick

Exaltos are great....bought a set for my son...a lower performance category than Pilot Sport A/S Plus, but a level up from Primacy for performance, but Primacy MXV4 offer even quieter smoother ride. I put those on my daughter-in-law's car.

Salesman's comment makes little sense, unless it somehow fit into his sales pitch. Either its a common variable which affects the entire survey, which would then not impact ranking, which is what this data is really all about. Or, when one considers the millions of miles of consumer use, he has no real basis to know when on on what basis these comparisons are made. It certainly makes little sense when looking at, for example, a tire with 3 million miles of consumer usage that these were all ratings submitted when the tires were just first installed. Large sample data is the most reliable, and I would far more likely rely on tirerack surveys than one salesman or a Michelin consumer support rep.

Whatever you do, don't skimp on tires! The small contact patch is the only contact your car has with the outside world! (Or, should be!!!)

JimPap

Another consideration that may be useful is since you can't rotate tires on the C300 (different sizes) go with a tire that once you wear out on the rear that you'd be willing to replace with the same model. You probably don't want to put one model tire on the front and another on the rear.

Sportstick....you make a good point. I somehow doubt that Mercedes would have put a more expensive tire on the car for nothing.

Something else that you guys might find interesting is that if you go to the Mercedes dealership and check out the the C300s Sports on the lot, you find at least Michelin, Continentals and Pirelli. I also checked out what they had on one of their E350 Coupe and it was a different model Michelin.

akhenaten

Hankook Ventus V12. I have been impressed with their performance and the price point.

Sportstick

Another thought on the OE tires....manufacturers are all pushing for the best possible mileage ratings, so they equip their vehicles with OE tires typically not available in the aftermarket. The tire model names may be same/similar, but the OE tires often use harder rubber compounds for reduced rolling resistance, which can result in longer lasting tires but have reduced dry/wet handling and are noisier than better aftermarket tires. This is what I learned from the suspension engineers at the auto company from which I retired (no pun intended).

C300Kid

+1

ljn21

I went with Toyo Proxes4 - absolutely love them so far.

matthew121170

I put a set of Sumitomo HTR A/S on my 350 around November of last year. I went in for my B service on Friday and the SA told me that it's time for new rear tires. My car has 50K miles on it and it's on it's second set of tires. The first set lasted my 40K which were the stock Conti's. The problem that I had with those is that the rears were gone at about 40K, and the front's were fine with respect to treadwear, but since you can't rotate them front to back, they were cupped like mad and the whole car would vibrate at highers peeds. Now here i am about 11K miles later, and I'm looking at new tires again? The tread compound is 360, but maybe I'll have to go higher. According to my SA it's a problem with the weight of the car and the torque to the wheels.
Another thought that i've been having more and more is to take of my "fat" rear tires and find the front tires from another 350/300 and putting them on my rear. Anyone done this? I'm hoping that I'll be able to rotate them and get more life out of the tire package. Any thoughts on this?

JimPap

matthew,

I don't know if its true or not, but I've heard that if you get into a bad accident your insurance company may deny you a claim based on that changeout.

matthew121170

Well I'm not too awfully concerned about that as I am the fitment and any rubbing issues..but would there be any with putting a smaller tire in where a larger tire used to be?

E92-Lighting

i love my falkens

CureCar

Bridgestone makes great tires that are reasonable priced. Continentals that come on the cars are garbage.

Glyn M Ruck

Continentals are noisy crap.

As Sportstick says - Michelin Pilot Sport A/S Plus & PS2 are the best tyres for these cars. Exalto PE2 is also great but not available in the correct sizes for most 204 setups.

You don't buy a Benz & then compromise on tyres or brakes.

Glyn M Ruck

With staggered you should rotate side to side to change rolling direction. Especially important on the front. Do not run directional tyres or you can't do this. All Benz cars feather & cup their front tyres due to the suspension setup.

Benz OE tyres go out to tender. They fit the cheapest tyre that meets their minimum requirements. They have a habit of fitting touring tyres on European production. Typically hard compound for the sake of fuel economy. No touring tyre excels in the handling stakes. The Primacy's are particularly bad. Prices you see in the market have zero relationship to what Benz pay. If Pirelli have overstock of specific tyres they will dump them on the OEMs at a very attractive price.

Most SA production come with Continental because they have a plant here and they are cheap - but nasty on a Benz - noisy & get noisier with wear.

ShoremNJ

I have the Michelin Pilot MXM4s and changed them at 63,000 miles and replaced with the same, they a good in snow, good all around tires.

Glyn M Ruck

Any tyre that lasts 63,000 miles, even if you are a careful driver, is compromised in the handling stakes. You can't have it both ways. It all depends on what you want. Life or premium handling & grip.

Sportstick

We probably need to take extra care with Michelin nomenclature. They have at least 5 different tires with "Primacy" in the name, in addition to whatever they supply in OE compound formulations. The ones which we've had excellent experience with and do well on tirerack.com are Primacy MXV4.