mheffel

I've had my 2000 CLK430 for several years now, and have never been satisfied with the ride, mainly due to the loud tire noise. I understand with a performance setup like on this car with the 17" rims and low profile tires that the ride will be more harsh than on an average car, but the noise is getting to be too much for me.

I've generally used lower priced tires Kumho, General, so I guess my question is, is it worth spending the extra dollars for say Michelin PS2, or would it be a better idea to drop down to a smaller diameter rim (16") like on the CLK320 and use a tire geared more for comfort than performance? I'd like to hear some opinions on this.

Mike

mint

Going down to a 16" diameter wheel won't help out too much with tire noise; I would say that you just need to find a quieter tire. PS2s or any other high performance tire will definitely not be what you're looking for since the engineering core of these tires is maximum tracking grip, not treadlife, street driving ability, etc.

I have Continental ContiProContacts 205/55/R16 on my W208 320 and they're extremely quiet even at 75mph.

KA8

Changing wheels won't help. It's the tires that's giving you problem. So change the tires. Michelin is good, Continental is also quiet but has weak side prone to bubbling and short life. I'm currently on 3rd set of Nexen N3000's for my nissan, previous C230SS, and now looking to switch to nexens for my ML. For everyday driving you just can't beat it even cheaper than kumho's and hankooks. Our ML had Toyo proxes on 22'' wheel and they're unbearably loud and I'm looking to for Nexen Rodian HP which I haven't used before but looks like they had road noise in mind; they designed the tread pattern to dissipate noise. Couldn't be happier with Nexens. Flame suit on!