16k and Michelin Energy Savers are BALD!

I'm 2/3 of the way through my lease, at about 16k miles, and the tires are bald. I've rotated them but it's not solving the problem obviously. I read the warranty to say that these have a 65k mileage wear warranty, and that I'll get a prorated discount on a new set - so 16/65 = ~ 25%, so I'll pay 25% of the new tires, plus all the installation charges.

The Nissan dealer just tried to sell me tires which irritated me because they didn't even mention warranty. I looked it up right when I got home.

Thoughts? Am I right about the warranty? I don't want to get hit with an $800 bill when I turn the lease in, if I can pay more like $150-200 now and have new tires.

You have to turn in your leased LEAF with a certain amount of tread left on the tires, and you don't have that now. So you're going to have to replace the tires at some point anyways (might as well do it before winter comes). If you can get some mileage related warranty credit, that sounds like icing on the cake. I would replace them now and keep them inflated and keep up on the rotations and you should have enough tread to meet the lease requirements when you return the car...

It does seem unusual that you would have bald tires at this stage, though...Are they bald all the way across or just on an edge? What pressure do you run them at?

Found this note on TireRack website:

"NOTE: New vehicle Original Equipment tire warranties often differ from those covering replacement tires. Consult your vehicle documents to confirm Original Equipment tire warranty coverage."

Just interested. What kind of miles/kWh are you getting with the Michelin Energy Savers? And do you consider yourself a conservative driver or do you like to stomp on the accelerator?

Yeah I think the warranty is actually better on OEM tires. I get about 3.9 miles/kWh. I run whatever pressure it says inside the door on the sticker

wantonsoup said:

Yeah I think the warranty is actually better on OEM tires. I get about 3.9 miles/kWh. I run whatever pressure it says inside the door on the sticker

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Long-time owners have figured out that running at the door-rated pressure on the LEAF will hasten premature edge wear (especially on the front). It is a heavier than normal car...

I have been running my tires at 45 pounds and it seems to be much better for wear in general, but especially has eliminated the edge wear...

how you people manage to chew trough the tires in such a short time is beyond me. I would get that kind of mileage out of high performance summer tires on my Audi S4 with 5-6 HPDE track events and regular daily driving :?:

Wow, Do you brake a lot?, Like people in Gas cars do?, I have almost 19K miles and mine still look like new but I regen all the time, I only use the brakes to stop.

Or you could just have a bad batch.

wantonsoup said:

I'm 2/3 of the way through my lease, at about 16k miles, and the tires are bald. I've rotated them but it's not solving the problem obviously. I read the warranty to say that these have a 65k mileage wear warranty, and that I'll get a prorated discount on a new set - so 16/65 = ~ 25%, so I'll pay 25% of the new tires, plus all the installation charges.

The Nissan dealer just tried to sell me tires which irritated me because they didn't even mention warranty. I looked it up right when I got home.

Thoughts? Am I right about the warranty? I don't want to get hit with an $800 bill when I turn the lease in, if I can pay more like $150-200 now and have new tires.

Click to expand...

Lasareath said:

Wow, Do you brake a lot?, Like people in Gas cars do?, I have almost 19K miles and mine still look like new but I regen all the time, I only use the brakes to stop.

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Well, yeah, I use the brakes when the car is going faster than I want it to, to reduce the speed. I conversely use the accellerator pedal to increase the speed But I wouldn't say we drive it 'hard', I mean we love growing the trees on the display.

Or you could just have a bad batch.

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That's my assumption.

Randy said:

wantonsoup said:

Yeah I think the warranty is actually better on OEM tires. I get about 3.9 miles/kWh. I run whatever pressure it says inside the door on the sticker

Click to expand...

Long-time owners have figured out that running at the door-rated pressure on the LEAF will hasten premature edge wear (especially on the front). It is a heavier than normal car...

I have been running my tires at 45 pounds and it seems to be much better for wear in general, but especially has eliminated the edge wear...

Click to expand...

Colorado, like California, has some twisty roads that would accelerate treadwear. I agree with Randy and have also found it necessary to run a higher pressure to get even wear across the tire tread. Fit EV has Michelin 185/65R15 88H Energy Saver A/S Green X Blackwall UTQG: 480 A B, and weighs about the same as the LEAF. I was also hoping for the original tires to last thru the lease, but apparently low Rolling Resistance (LRR) tire compounds sacrifice mileage to reduce friction. At 24k miles, my original tires are ~75% worn, and I predict they will hit the wear markers by 32k miles. A bit of research shows they have a limited 65k mile treadwear warranty, and could be eligible for prorated replacement.

Randy said:

It does seem unusual that you would have bald tires at this stage, though...Are they bald all the way across or just on an edge? What pressure do you run them at?

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Also curious to know these.

Interesting... I now have about 45K on my Michelin MXV4s and they still look close to new with very even tread wear and about 7/32" left... I run 44PSI.

KeiJidosha said:

Colorado, like California, has some twisty roads that would accelerate treadwear...

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Yes. I'm about to replace my OEM Ecopia tires in a few weeks at ~21,500 miles (although they aren't quite down to the wear bars, I want new tires before winter). I drive steep mountain hairpin turns and dirt/gravel roads, so it's no surprise that I never, EVER, come remotely close to the rated mileage on tires, despite being a hypermiler.

My right tires are very worn on the outside edge, presumably because of higher Gs on curves to the left in my driving pattern (you'd have to see the terrain to appreciate why). On the next set of tires I plan to do a cross pattern rotation to balance the wear somewhat.

I think that the reason the outside edges wear more quickly is that soft sidewall LRR tires roll more on high G curves. I run my LEAF tires at 40-42 PSI, which I think helps some (as well as improving mileage efficiency, of course).

Pretty even wear on my tires - the fronts obviously wear a lot more than the rears at rotation time, with one tire having a little more outside wear but nothing too drastic.

I live in suburbia and do normal street and highway driving. Nothing weird. I don't drive much different than in my previous two hybrid vehicles and have never had tire wear issues before. I am thinking MAYBE defective tires.

I think it would be helpful for us to see a photo of one of your tires so we can better visualize what is happening to them....

Nothing to see, very even wear.

Acceleration from standstill is very deceptive. There is so much silent torque that you may end up using 'too much' of it when starting off without ever realising it, and when the tyre enters the 'slip' condition where the blocks of the rubber are just pulling clear of the tarmac as they come unloaded, it is as damaging to the tyre as a 'spin' condition.

Basically, I think you are being a bit of a lead-foot at the traffic lights. Feather the throttle real nice and the tyres will last 40k miles.

I changed my Ecopias out at 22k. The edges were completely bald. I bought new Ecopias. I now only drive in ECO and will rotate every 5k miles. 44 PSI.

We live in Colorado also and are leasing our 2012 Leaf. The Bridgestone tires are bald at 17,000 miles. So we are now faced with having to buy new tires. We bought a Chevy Volt 6 months before we got the Leaf and we got 60,000 miles on those tires. Bridgestone has told us that factory installed tires do not come with a warranty. Why would a company not warranty their product? And why would Nissan choose these tires to put on their product?! I'm not happy.

ColoEVfan said:

We live in Colorado also and are leasing our 2012 Leaf. The Bridgestone tires are bald at 17,000 miles. So we are now faced with having to buy new tires. We bought a Chevy Volt 6 months before we got the Leaf and we got 60,000 miles on those tires. Bridgestone has told us that factory installed tires do not come with a warranty. Why would a company not warranty their product? And why would Nissan choose these tires to put on their product?! I'm not happy.

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I was curious about that also and called the Bridgestone number in the warranty booklet and the rep confirmed what you were told. The warranty is for defects but there is no mileage warranty on tires used on new cars.

My tires also look bald, but that is because the outside edge of the Ecopias don't have full tread depth indentations. So they look bald on the outside edge even though they aren't down to the wear bars yet. But I'll be replacing them before winter anyway because I want new tires to deal with snowy roads and my steep, curved, snowpacked driveway. I'll be getting ~22,000 miles out of them, which is decent mileage for my very severe driving conditions here.

If you haven't already done so, you should keep your tires at higher pressure than Nissan recommends, at least 38 psi and 40 to 42 psi would be better. Some run them at 44 (or higher). It does make the ride a bit harder but it also improves mileage efficiency — reduced rolling resistance — and seems to help with wear on the outside edges (because the soft sidewalls of LRR tires tend to roll under due to the G forces on curves). FWIW.

You're 100% correct, I just read the warranty for Bridgestone and it explicitly states no mileage warranty for OEM tires. Thankfully my Michelin isn't so callous - my OEM warranty states:

Limited Mileage Warranty:
MICHELIN passenger and light truck tires – replacement and original equipment
– are covered by a limited mileage warranty (hereafter referred to as
limited warranty for treadwear).

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And it's 65,000 miles pro-rated. So I'm at about 17,000 miles, so I will hopefuly get 73.8% of the cost of new tires covered by the warranty.