2007 R350 18k miles and mercesdes tells me that I need new tires
 

Is this correct?

Not sure about how many miles on tires before the tires wear out but I certainly know low worn tread tires do need to be replaced.

My 08 R350 has 8,900 miles on the odometer and the tires look like new (tires were rotated at 4,000 miles)

Thanks for the reply. I don't know either but I have owned enough cars to know that something doesn't sound right.

Ah, but apparently this is your first Mercedes.

ALL Mercedes are sold Autobahn-ready, meaning they are fitted with high-performance tires, good for at least 130 mph safety. These are NOT 40K mile grandma tires like on Camrys, etc., although many people degrade their Mercedes by fitting same. The first instance of this was when all the 1970s 450SLs had their 150 mph VR-rated Michelin XWX tires replaced by whitewall Sears Roadhandlers. Those whitewalls went well with the baby blue leisure suits and white belts and shoes of the era, but they didn't do much for the cars.

Expect 25K miles if you're lucky.

You'll note that your owners manual specifies fitting tires with MO embossed on sidewall, meaning Mercedes-approved. You don't have to buy these at the dealer.

I see the Sienna is NOT on the no-sell list.

Kent thank you for replying and you are correct, this is my first benz but not my first car. I am not a tire expert but to me tires excluding low profile should ware the same. i have 17 tires on my benz and have had 20 inch on my infiniti and the 20 so far have lasted longer then the 17. Am i making sense here? Like i said i could be speaking a different language since i am not a tire expert.

Peter,
you make perfect sense. Unfortunately, M/B's chew through tires like crazy. I replaced my original Contis at 25k....like most posts, 25k is really a stretch. I'm sure you can get tires at Sears that will fit, but that defeats the rest of the vehicle.
Just thank god you don't have 21 inch GL wheels, 401 each and only Continentals will fit..

Not really. The rubber compound being used by different tires or brands can have some huge differences in tire wear. Some high performance tire has very soft compound and it wears out very fast.

Thanks all!!!! Appreciate the feedback

My lease is up in April so when they dropped this bomb on me ($300 a tire) I thought they were trying to squeeze me for new tires. Hate to think this way but it seems like every time my lease's are up i get blindsided.

Here is my take on this. Either the tires are worn unevenly due to bad alignment and need replacement, or the dealer figured since you will be returning the car to him in a couple of months you foot the bill for the tires now. This way he runs it through the CPO process and gets it certified without paying for the tires himself. :)

This is really much easier than everyone here is making it (answering the question thta is). Take your car to ANY tire dealer and have them measure the tread depth with a tread depth gauge. New tires are almost all 10 mm of tread and are considered shot at 3 mm of tread. If you take the 7 mm minus the remaining tread you will get an idea of how much, if any, safe wear you have left.

For example, you find out you have 5mm left. That means you have 2mm left until you reach the magic 3mm. BTW, you should be able in theory to get the same percentage of additional miles. So using my example if you got 18k miles from the first 5mm of wear, the remaining 2mm should give you an additional 7200 miles.

BTW, the tires should wear out slower as you go since the tread effectively gets shorter and wider as the tires wear which makes them stiffer and increases contact area. This is also why tires seem to ride harder and get noisier as they wear, they are! What that translates to is the remaining miles estimated on miles versus wear to date is conservative.

Thanks again!

I just replaced the Contis on my 08 R350 at 24K, which was probably a few thousand miles longer than I should have waited. I replaced them General Grabber HTS. So far, seems like a great tire at a great price. Happy to be done with the Contis. Good luck!

Why don't you check out your tires and tell yourself? Is it really too hard to measure the tread or at least estimate based on the markers on the tire? There are even some cheap tools specifically designed to measure this if it's hard to estimate otherwise. ;)

I'm checking my tires at least every month and right now I can see there's about 2-2.5 mm left so it would be actually time to change them soon. I didn't get my car to the tire shop to know about this ;)