AMGAffalterbach

Please forgive me from stealing this post from another one of my responses about tires, I meant originally for this to be a short comment to a question asked on the forum, but since I put quite a bit of time into justifying my perceptions about tire behind this and doing some additional research, I wanted to post some of my opinions about what tires I think are the best on the market, a lot of which comes from owning many of these tires on various cars. Before you fault me and say I'm simply parroting the Tire Rack results, a lot of this is derived from personal preference when it comes to tires, as once again I am quite obviously a Michelin/Pirelli fanboy. Maybe we could start this thread as with similar responses from other W211 drivers: what you think is the best tire in each category and why. Thanks!

[BEST TIRES]:
If you want a great super high mileage all-season for passenger cars: Michelin Defender

If you want all-season capability with summer-like grip (best ultra high performance all season): Michelin Pilot Sport A/S 3, read my review https://mbworld.org/forums/e-class-w...-3-review.html the only thing I will caution is they are wearing faster than expected, but I put more miles on my car now and drive it like a hooligan. [http://bit.ly/1byDE38]

If you want the best max performance summer tire: Michelin Pilot Super Sport [http://bit.ly/1EvE7jd]

If you want the best extreme performance summer tire (more aggressive than a max performance summer but less so than an R-compound): Bridgestone Potenza RE-11A [http://bit.ly/1Jy08vx]

If you want the best R-compound track tire (adding this for kicks because these are streetable track tires): Pirelli Trofeo R (Michelin Pilot Sport Cup 2 is just behind but not quite as good) [http://bit.ly/162BwxF]

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If you want an excellent max performance summer tire but want to pay less than a Michelin Pilot Super Sport: Vredestein Ultrac Sessanta

If you want a good, middle-of-the-road to high-end all season that will last longer: Continental DWS

If you want an R-compound streetable track tire and don't care about noise and want to pay similar to a Michelin Pilot Super Sport: Toyo Proxes R888


[WORST TIRES (Stay Away)]:
Please spend good money on tires, they're a very important safety feature of the car, so stay away from the cheaper brands, a lot of which are Chinese. They aren't all unsafe, but most don't come close to more well known tires in areas such as braking performance:
Arizonian (Discount Tire off-brand)
Nankang
Mayrun
Hercules Tires
General Tire (Budget US brand, again not unsafe, owned by Continental)
Firestone (Look into the history of these)
Uniroyal
Douglas
Nexen
Fuzion (Made by Bridgestone, not unsafe)
Geostar
Sunny
Pegasus


[OTHER TIRE OPINIONS]:
Nitto: These aren't top shelf but they aren't cheap, I trust them but I think a lot of their performance tires (specificially the invo) offer terrible grip considering how aggressive their tread patterns are, yes I'm talking about the Invo here. Their NT05r isn't a bad drag radial at all though.

Continental: Absolutely a trusted and respected brand, never really had their tires, but heard exclusively good things about them, I still prefer Michelin - yet Mercedes uses these as OEM quite a bit.

Goodyear: They have one or two products that are decent such as the Eagle F1 SuperCar tires, but honestly most of their tires are pretty bad, I had a set of TripleTread Assurance tires back in the day that were bleh

BF Goodrich/Dunlop/Cooper: I'd classify as more entry level/mid range with some okay products but I'd never buy them, the Dunlop Direzza ZII makes a good BF Goodrich gForce Rival and Bridgestone RE-11A rival, though

Hankook: Definitely isn't a bad tire brand considering how inexpensive they are, their Ventus V12 Evo 2 is a good max performance summer tire, but through a friend that runs them on a CLS55 their sidewalls are pretty damn stiff

Michelin Primacy MXM4/MXV4/Pilot HX MXM4 Lines: Owned all of these grand-touring tires, they are decent and comfortable, but being a grand touring tire they have a lot of sidewall roll and are VERY overpriced for what they are. I say either go performance oriented like the Pilot Sport A/S 3 or go completely comfort, mileage, fuel-economy oriented like the Michelin Defender or one of their eco tires.

Yokohamas: Some of these are passable tires, most I've owned have been terrible, their performance tires are definitely capable but they are noisy as hell, yet aren't a bad deal financially

Vredestein: Excellent European tire that is now owned by an Indian company, but originally from the Netherlands. Their tires that are by Giugiaro design are insanely sexy looking tires, specifically the Ultrac Sessanta I recommended above, a lot of the SRT8 Cherokee guys run them around here as they are good at making odd sizes. The Ultra Sessanta is suppposed to be a very good and progressive summer tire at a reasonable price, with a tire pattern that is squirmy during break-in but excellent thereafter.

Falken Tire: They are a division of the Sumitomo tire company, Japanese made tires for a good price and definitely a newer brand. Mixed reviews on a lot of their products that range from complaints about tread wear, to noisiness after a certain number of miles, to poor resistance to sidewall bubbling when talking about curb impact. Some state that they have no issues, but the common denominator seems to be problems showing up in over 10,000 miles. Most people seem to say they are competitive to Goodyear and Yokohama.


[FINAL NOTES]:

DO NOT buy tires from eBay as stated above - you're opening yourself up to everything from fakes, to long shelf-life tires, to tires that have been stored improperly, and the like. Stick to the major retailers such as Discount Tire, Big O, or to Tire Rack. They sometimes offer good warranties and will pro-rate your next set of tires if your current set wear under the mileage warranty. If you have any more questions about tires please let me know it's a topic I find super interesting, but as you know a lot of the people on this forum have a lot of knowledge and experience as well - I am just one opinion, and as you can tell I'm biased towards Michelin and Pirelli. But paying a premium for tires is worth it 1000x over.

The softer the compound, the higher the tire performance, but the worse the wear, you have to really chose what you want. The Nitto Invo or the Michelin Pilot Super Sport won't last as long as a good all season.

If you need winter tires, nothing will beat a good Blizzak as most will tell you, but Nokian tires are becoming a really good premium winter tire. The Michelin X-Ice Xi3 is the best rated snow tire above the leading Blizzak at the moment, but here in Colorado people swear by the Blizzak. It's also important to note ANY dedicated snow tire of reasonable quality will be better than your competing all season and certainly better than your summers in the snow and ice.

[UPDATE 1]: Added a note on Falken/Sumitomo

NthDegree

iTrader: (-1)

Excellent write up on tires. Couldn't have put it better myself.

beejAMG

very nice write up! long read but worthwhile! just ordered my set of wheels yesterday and will take 8 weeks to build so I have enough time to decide on the tyres. this thread will definitely be handy. cheers!

Worth the wait

Nice!
I agree with just about every single statement, however I would strongly avoid Continental DWS.
They wear well and have great grip, but they suffer from lack of sidewall strength. Our cars are heavy and have a lot of negative camber dialed in from the factory....that puts strain on the tires. Continental actually changed the design recently because they got so many complaints about flats. I heard that didn't really fix the problem.

I have personal experience and real life results, the AS/3 can take a beating where the DWS will pop.

homeofstone

Some good information. Some not since it is not based on scientifically measured testing with same model of car in same conditions, at same speeds and same roads or track. I prefer to go with the tirerack.com tests and surveys.

Round Goby

What a coincidence. I thought about replying to your other thread regarding your experience with A/S 3 the past week.

Thanks so much for the write up. I currently have Continental PureContact on my E500 for about 2000km now (Previously had mixed two DWS and cheap winter tires, I know so bad.). I attempted to do my own alignment with toe in/out setting, and I think I made some mistake as now front inner edge tires almost worn out. I purchased an toe setting alignment tool on ebay and I'll be rotating the tires front to back and hopefully fix the toe setting with the new tool in couple weeks. One of the auto shop (Canadian Tire) in Canada couldn't do the alignment check for me, since their machine couldn't read it when I had them installed the PureContacts. Something with to do with airmatic?? Love airmatic btw.

I ordered my tires from QuattroTires.com and they shipped quickly. I used to order tires from Canadian Tire, but the tires never came after 3 weeks.

I thought about going with A/S 3 tires next, but your experience says the tires wore out too quickly. I look for more comfort/long lasting tires with good winter capability since I do a lot of highway driving this year. Though performance tires are nice.

I was actually considering General Altimax RT43 since they have connection with Continental and cheaper, but you suggested to avoid Generals.

I have never tried Michelin. Wanted too, but the price is too much for Primacy MXM4. I may go back to all 4 DWS or newer DWS06 coming out depending on the price.

I also thought about the new Toyo Versado Noir, but too new to rate and no info on TireRack.

Thanks again for the wonderful write-up AMG.

AMGAffalterbach

Thank you everyone for he wonderful feedback and response to this, makes me really happy that people value this post.

Worth the Wait, interesting you say that about the Continental DWS tire - it makes sense that on these much heavier cars there can be that type of issue, we all have cars that have generally more aggressive toe and camber from factory than the average family sedan (for high speed stability) so something to keep in mind when buying a tire. Never heard about that specific problem but I don't doubt that it could be a widespread issue with sidewall or bead design.

Round, weird that their machine couldn't read your alignment, I assume if it was a standard Hunter type machine that they would be able to, but it may be your best bet to take it to a dealer and they will tell you if there are any suspension issues causing your wear problem. I'm not an expert or trained mechanic at all but sounds like it could be too much camber? Toe angle could be the culprit too as you said. Just a note - according to Tire Rack the AS3s tend to wear heavily when you push them to the limit, which I do on a regular basis, so if you have a laid back driving style they may be better. Ran the MXM4s for about 2 years and honestly like the wear life but was not impressed by the handling/comfort for the price. Not a fan of General just because of their generally lower ratings from objective tests, but Continental might not be a bad route to explore - the Altimax RT43 isn't either, if you look hear at their rating for tires in their category they are definitely better than the TripleTread Assurance from Goodyear http://www.tirerack.com/tires/tests/...y.jsp?ttid=195, but if you spend the extra money on a Michelin you won't be disappointed... maybe the Michelin Defender is a good tire for you, has like a 90,000 mile warranty and the set on a family member's car has been great so far.

homeofstone

FWIW In the 1990's Michelin made a great grand touring all season tire that came with an unlimited mileage warranty. I bought a set to replace the worn out oem tires that came on the car and never paid for another set of tires in the 8 years and 220,000 miles that I put on my Mazda 929. Each set lasted about 60,000 miles.

AMGAffalterbach

Another tire I recently came across thanks to TheCold5.0 with his new E55 AMG: Bridgestone Potenza RE760 Sport. It's an Ultra-High Performance Summer Tire, so fits right below a Max Performance Summer Tire in category but man those tires hook, and they're really quite affordable. Much better than any all season tire and a great entry-level yet super capable UHP Summer, probably going to be my next set. Not to mention the tread pattern is insane.