Right away I am pulling the trigger to buy winter wheels and tires for my CLK (W209). The car came to me in May with nearly new Michelin tires which are summer only, so by mid November they will hard as granite and dangerous when wet and slippery. The issue is wheels and I have been wrestling with the entire issue since I bought the car. I do not intend to drive the car in extreme weather but I like driving the car too much to just keep in the garage all winter. So on those good days, when the roads are clear and the snow and freezing rain isn't coming down like the great deluge, the CLK will get used. Now the big question is wheels. I'm going to indulge the car (and myself) to have dedicated winter wheels for this car. This is what I did with my last new Mercedes, a 1987 190D-Turbo. Since that was a daily drive back then, and since I was on the road covering this state all the time, I bought new winter wheels from Mercedes and had studded tires on all four wheels. I will again have steel wheels on the CLK, this time of equal width per the owners manual. The problem is finding any other than what the dealer can sell me, which are VERY expensive.

Right now there is a German tuning shop (pretty big organization, it appears) advertising on eBay and I think I will order a set of wheels from that place. The wheels are certified and made in Germany and are specifically for the CLK. I had fantasies about getting a set of remanufactured original equipment wheels for the CLK, but getting four together isn't easy as not all companies selling them have four, and again, they're pretty pricey.

I am not sure about tires other than to buy true, WINTER tires (NOT "all season"). But there are numerous manufacturers who make them with the "three peak, snowflake" symbol which means the rubber compound complies with a new tire manufacturers winter tire standard.

The steel wheels will be black and the car is black so I'll be monochromatic through the winter. This should be interesting.

 

Get a set of all seasons and you should be fine most of the winter. When the snow gets really bad use another car as the CLK is no winter warrior lol. I use my ML or GLK or E as they have 4Matic. Trust me you don’t want to DD a CLK in northern winters.

 

The state standard is that by the end of 24 hours following a snow storm, all major roads are clear to bare pavement. Now that sounds great but the reality is on secondary roads which sometimes take days and days to be clear to pavement.

My intention is to drive the CLK when roads are dry and clear of ice and snow. I won't use "all season" tires because there is no industry standard for cold weather performance as there is with pure winter tires (those marked with the "three peak/snow flake" symbol). I expect the CLK to be more sensitive to winter than my 190D-Turbo was although that car had remarkable torque and I "tamed" it by using studded tires on all four wheels.

For true winter weather, I'll use the GMC extended cab pickup with its automatic four wheel drive.

 

I bought a set of OEM rims off craigs list in good condition. Put Nokian Hakkapelittas on them for winter & swap them November(ish).
The wife like to rub curbs, so I've had the rims powder coated a couple of times. Pot holes around here can be brutal & one rim cracked, fixed & cracked two more times about 120 degrees from the 1st so
tossed it & bought an OEM refinished one off ebay for $190 w s/h

I'm not sure they make that much of a difference from the Goodyear Eagle F1 all seasons, but they make her happier.

 

This is very useful for me. I have looked on about every place I can find for a set of good, used OEM wheels. I have also scoured the manufacturer's websites to for a set and find them hard to find and where they exist, they are pretty pricey for "winter" tires. In the end, the least expensive way to shod my car with winter tires is to buy German steel wheels that are new. I also have considered studded tires for the car as that is what I used on the last 2-wheel drive car I used year round, the 190D Turbo from 1987. But I don't want to drive in extremely bad Maine weather and I don't much want to drive the Mercedes in less than "good" days, that is when the roads are mostly clear. In the end, I think I, like your wife, will feel better with dedicated winter tires.

 

I picked up a used set of AMG 18"s for my CLK off of Craigslist and run Blizzak WS80

 

The only problem with those for me is that the life expectancy of 18" wheels on a car like the CLK is measured in months. Once the frost starts to heave the roads here, cast or forged wheels die pretty quickly. That's one reason I was so pleased to find the CLK I have with it's 16" wheels.