JTK44

Do not worry!

I now have close to 6,000 miles on my E450 with RF Pirelli Centurato P7: the ride is silky smooth and I anticipate minimum of 30,000 miles. I do not accelerate hard from stop signs, do not brake hard but anticipate stopping by slowing down but do drive above 70 mph on the Interstate. My driving is 50% local on Long Island and part in NYC, the other 50% on the interstate. I have an excellent air compressor at home and religiously check the pressure to make sure it is 10% above the recommended pressure as per the fuel tank flap: 36 psi front and back.

I have no intention of swapping out my tires for any of the deficiencies mentioned by many of the posters here simply because I have not experienced any of those deficiencies.

But then again, I may not be as finicky or have the sensitivity that other poster here in this forum have

DFWdude

I concur with replacing OEM tires with more plentiful choices of aftermarket tires. My experience with Continental OEM tires dates back to the mid '80's, and I never found a single set of OEM Contis that lasted a sarisfactory amount of mileage. Not to be overly rough on Continental, to be honest, because I've not found ANY Eurpoean OEM tire to last more than 20,000 miles

I've had occasion to drive several loaner MBs lately. Both E300 and C300s. The ride on these cars is horrible, compared with my W212 E-Class on non run-flats. And my W212 tires are somewhat overinflated, too, but still ride more comfortably.

Last few years, I've had much better longevity from Yokohama tires. And frankly, the OEM Kumho tires on the wife's Hyundai Sonata have passed 30,000 miles and have another 5K left.

jl199986

I agree we can expect more out of MB's engineering department. As for being able to design a suspension to go with any tire, I disagree about that even being a goal for them. Tires are absolutely the most important element of a suspension, some (Scotty Kilmer) suggesting they deal with more than 70% of all shocks a car experiences, passing along only 30% to the suspension. A tire's unique role in a suspension is that it's rotating, and while recovering from deformation (not on the ground) can rebound in a way that doesn't fully transmit motion back into the car. Springs are damped, but the rebound still passes movement into the car albeit more slowly. Energy is dissipated in both systems into heat, but overall movement gets transmitted back from a suspension in a way that doesn't occur nearly as much with a tire. (Not like the tire's role is a free lunch- they are certainly a wear component.)

I find the overall ride pretty fine for bigger shocks, road dips, float, etc. It's the road imperfections/isolation with RFT's I mind- chatter, patch lines, etc that a good tire deals with quite well. And there's just much more of that than bigger bumps, etc. I'm very much looking forward to throwing my NRFT winters back on in a few weeks's time. Then maybe next summer I'll feel like I've used up the OEM RFT's enough to swap them out too.

I'd probably be most happy with a super stiff anti-roll suspension and soft tires. Maybe I need an indy car.

rraisley

I never meant it was a goal for them (MB). Or let me clarify. I was saying 1) That, in theory, a suspension /can/ be designed that will work well with almost any type of (single) tire, making up for any deficiencies of that particular tire. And 2) That MB probably is, and probably should, be designing the E-Class suspension to work well with their designated Run-Flat tires.

Other than that, I agree with what you said.