Hi Guys,

I am looking at a MY 09/10/11 C300 and wondered what kind of tire life I could expect from them. Any and all comments are welcome.

Thanks guys
GC

Between 10000 and 25000 miles depending how you drive. I only got 12000 on rears and 18000 on fronts staggered 17 rims. Changed to pilot sport a/s and got 18000 rear and 25000 fronts

How well you maintain your tires will greatly affect tread life. Routinely check your psi and rotate them approx. every 5k miles or so to maximize life. Also you don't mention if you have a 4matic or not. I don't know if it's the case with MB's, but my last Audi Quattro chewed through tires pretty quickly although I did drive that car more spiritedly than I do the Benz. I would say the above post should give you a good ball park. I can't really speak for mine yet as I only have about 5k on my car.

+1 Rotating staggered tires side to side will greatly extend life and minimize "feathering" which causes tire noise.

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Unfortunately a lot of high performance tires are directional, so you really can't rotate some staggered set ups at all.

I got 28K on my 17" staggard Michelins and had about 4/32cds left on the rears and 6/32cds on the fronts when I changed my setup to 18s. Mostly city driving and usually drive moderately.

I'm sorry I'm a bit late to ask, but would you elaborate on "directional" since my tires are staggered, and if you meant that I will not be able to rotate them. Thnx

Directional means that the tires have a certain tread pattern that performs best on one side of vehicle. If your tires are directional and you want to rotate them, the tires on your drivers side can only be rotated with the tire on the drivers side (front to rear). Assuming the W204 has different tire sizes on the front and rear, you can't really rotate front to back.

My stock rears were bald at like 18K miles, and the outer edge of my fronts are wearing much faster than the rest of the tread.

Thank you for the explanation. I am still running the OEM ContiSportContact 3, and it seems the pattern will change if they are switched from side to side, so I guess I gotta have a look at the pattern very closely.

I appreciate your follow up

What you're saying might confuse a few people.

When seperating tires from the wheels, you can change them driver side to passenger side and keep the same direction. For all the cars that are staggered AND have directional tires, you move side to side. If you want any type of tire rotation to a different corner, you will have to take them off the wheels.

Sounds like an alignment and/or inflation issue. Stock suspension?

I'm sorry, but your post was way more confusing than the one you quoted.

Here is the ContiSortContact 3 tire


as you look at it, the thread is different on the left side than that on the right. So, if I switch them on the rear, the threads will be backwards from what they are now, and I don't know if that is going to affect the stability, drive-ability or the integrity or even the safety of the ride.

Now compare it to this Bridgestone Potenza RE970AS Pole Position:


Here I noticed that the thread is pretty much the same on wither side of the tire, thus making it none directional and its ok to swap the rears.


That was my understanding of the directional tires. As I said, this is only my understanding, so I might be incorrect, and hopefully somebody will clarify it further...

You're assumptions are right, you will affect the integrity/safety of your vehicle by reversing the treads. The treads are the part of the tire that offer stability and traction. Without treads your car can slip and slide which can lead to an accident.

You're also completely correct on your understanding.

Some more information can be found here:

http://www.tirerack.com/tires/tirete....jsp?techid=43

I wasn't saying I was confused, but he was trying to clarify for others and I personally found his reply was more confusing that the first one. Yours should have cleared it up though.

Thanks Domm. So this means I simply cannot rotate anything. It probably also means that I have to replace tires in pairs, which I would do anyway, if not all of them at the same time. I say a pair at a time because I read here somewhere that the life of the rears are much shorter than the fronts. Something like 10,000 vs 18,000 miles on the fronts.

That assumes the tires are directional, and preferably the same size. Otherwise, keeping the wide staggered wheels on the rear, the tire fits would likely be narrow on the rear, and wide on front, well outside preferred fits.

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I agree that the pictures definitely cleared things up and my original response was kind of confusing (front to rear, side to side )

Good conversation and well done to all! Just for the record......

Tires have t-r-e-a-d-s

Fabrics and forum conversations have t-H-r-e-a-d-s

Manufacturers have taken all the guess work out of this. If the tire is directional, there will be a "Rotation" arrow/symbol on the sidewall. If you try to rotate left-to-right (entire wheel/tire setup, not remounting the tire), you can't make the arrow point in the correct direction.

ps I thought the SportContact 3 was non-directional? Either way, something you can easily confirm now, GC, by looking at the sidewall...

Thats good advice. I never actually took a good look at my tires

I got 32K out of my PS2's.

You're still playing PS2? Dude, get yourself a PS3. The graphics are so much better

Seriously tho, that is good to know. How did you manage such long life?

How often rotated side to side, and also aligned?

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