I am getting only 40k on a set of tires (Michelin Harmony on a Toyota Avalon). My mother is having a similar problem–only 40k on a set of Michelin LT-MS
on a Jeep Grand Cherokee. Neither of us is an aggressive driver. The only thing I can think of is that we both do more in-town driving than the national average. Does that increase tire wear??
Where do you live? Certain areas, like the southeast, use a lot of crushed granite in their blacktop which is very abrasive to tires. In-town driving should not be the issue. I do all city/suburban driving and have never had to exercise a tire mileage warranty. Ask others at your location what their tire life is.
How you much you carry, tire pressure and driving habits mean a lot. Plus, you have a heavy, fairly powerful front drive which is always harder on tires then a lighter 4 cylinder. Raising air pressure a couple lbs will help, but 40 isn’t bad as all tires are over rated for what we often get out of them. Only drive in a straight line, not accelerating or stopping and they could easily get 100k. So try to mimic those situations and turn, stop and accelerate as gradually as possible. Oh, don’t turn the wheel unless you are moving…my pet peeve.
I was totally unable to find any information anywhere (including the Michelin site) about Michelin Harmony tires. But 40K does not sound unreasonable to me on any tire other than a “summer” tire. Even on a summer tire, with today’s higher speed ratings wear is often compromised. By the way, what are the ratings on your tire? They’ll all be molded into the sidewall.
My wifes Lexus Es-350…She has a little over 160k miles…and we’re on our 5th set of tires.
The first set (Bridgestone) lasted less then 30k miles.
The Second and third set were coopers…and they lasted about 35k miles.
The 4th set was Michelin…and they lasted just under 40k miles. But my wife really liked the way the car felt with the Michelins - so we bought another set.
I was only able to find the tire on the Walmart website, and that didn’t say much. Other sites seem to indicate this model is no longer available.
Driving style and road conditions have a big impact on tire life.
What is the treadwear rating on the tires (three digit number)? While this doesn’t give you absolute lifespan, it is useful for comparison purposes. I just replaced the tires on my Altima, and this number was one of the factors I had as a priority since I drive like a little old lady (not the one from Pasadena). I chose the Pirelli P4 with a treadwear rating of 760 and an 85K mile warranty.
TireRack,com is a great site to shop for tires even if you buy them locally.
The Michelin Harmony apparently has an 80,000 mile “limited warranty,” so you may be able to collect some $ from Michelin if the tires have worn out prematurely.
http://www.1010tires.com/Tires/Reviews/Michelin/Harmony
And as Dagosa said, in-town driving with many turns of the steering wheel will wear out tires a lot quicker than in-line highway driving.
How often do you rotate the tires? The fronts will wear out more quickly if they are not rotated to the back, especially on FWD cars. I expect that the Jeep is RWD when not in 4 WD, bit there was a recall last year on Michelin LTX M/S tires for inflation problems. Are your mom’s tires involved?
40K tire wear is excellent in my opinion. I once had a set of “run-flat” tires that only managed 16K before they were removed and replaced with a better set of tires. In-town driving increases tire wear because of all the corners (left and right) that you have to make. There are very few corners on the open highway and interstate.
If you can believe CR, which, I often do, they feel that tire makers over estimate some of their ratings and underestimate others for tread wear. So, it may be as much of a merchandizing ploy as anything IMO. Reading reviews, both professional and owner from Tire Rack, CR and others may be more worth while. I can’t remember the last time I took advantage of a tire wear warranty. After 40k, I just figured you were living on borrowed time and just traded tires when they stopped performing well. If your tire looses winter or rain traction well before 40k even though it’s still legal and well above the warranty rating, you will get no help. But it’s still time to replace. That the tires “wore out” makes me wonder what the actual tread depth was.
40K is a lot of miles. Personally, I’d be fine with that.
Yeah, 40k is the distance to being down to about 1/8" of tread.
The Harmony was about 700 or so on tread; LTX MS I was surprised to find was down near 500.
It sounds like I am actually not doing too bad, so thanks.
A lot could depend on the meaning of worn out. Worn out as in uniform wear across the board, alignment issues due to camber or toe issues, under or overinflation, etc.
OTOH, the Harmony tires are rated for 80,000 and the LTS M/X are rated for 60,000. Getting 10,000 or maybe 20,000 less seems reasonable, but getting half the lifetime does not.
I once had a set of Michelin Symmetry . . . predecessor to the Harmony, I believe . . . on my Corolla.
I easily got 80K out of them. I always maintained the tire pressures, and I rotated them every 5K. I believe the tread wear rating on them was 600.
By the way, I replaced them because they were dry rotted, NOT because of low tread depth
If the Harmony are at all similar to what I had, and if they’re being rotated often, 40K seems kind of low, to me anyways
“Getting 10,000 or maybe 20,000 less seems reasonable, but getting half the lifetime does not.”
I agree, but…we have no idea of whether the OP’s tread wear was even across the tread width, or if it was the type of wear that would indicate bad alignment.
For that matter, we have no idea about the OP’s diligence regarding proper tire inflation, and we have no idea about whether or not he rotates the tires on a consistent basis.
In the absence of all of that info, I don’t think that the tire wear he is reporting is really bad, and in fact–it may actually be good!
I agree @ VDCdriver, and also asked before about tire rotation. My daughter put 40,000 miles on her Cobalt and the OEM tires are worn out on the front but there is still plenty of tread on the rear tires. She did not rotate them.
I seem to get about 60k with the Michelins all-season I buy at Costco. 40K doesn’t seem out of line depending on the tire, local road conditions, and driving habits. It stands to reason the more stop and go miles vs. highway miles, the fewer total miles you’ll get from the tread.
As mentioned above, rotating the tires helps too. And if the tires aren’t wearing evenly, there is probably something you can do to improve the outcome for the next set. Like visiting an alignment shop. Still, with 40K,other than the common-sense advice in the posts above, this isn’t something I’d worry about too much
Guess my math is a little fuzzy but 1/8 inch is still 4/32 and well above the legal limit in most states. Technically, they aren’t worn out. So, this is a false alarm (?) or the tires are just failing to perform up to expectation. Having said that, at 4/32 I would start shopping around too for new tires. Just trying to contribute to the economy.
As far as @db4690 getting 80k out of a set of tires…you can trust that happening from anyone too cheap to buy anything but a crappy old Corolla. 
Yes, in town driving is hard on tires. It’s the corners. Straight ahead driving is practically free. You could get over 100K if you could avoid making turns.