Hello. I have a 2006 E90 325i. I am finally getting around to replacing the wheels. I bought 18" M3 style wheels and now have no clue as to what tires to put on the car (non-run flats). This car is a daily driver. I live in Houston so no snow but we get terrible downpours so I would like good traction and the best performance I can get without the ride being too hard or noisy. I have seen people here mention Continentals, Goodyear Eagle F1, and Pirelli P-zero. I would appreciate any and all opinions. I would like to get these tires this weekend. Thanks!
I kinda like Bridgestone, Yokohama, and Dunlop, but I'm sure there's plenty of great tires available including the brands you mention. Call the Tire Rack, they'll surely be able to advise you appropriately. They ship fast too, and can recommend an installer. If you want to take the time, you can do a search on their web site for the size(s) you need, and check the details to see if you find something that fits the bill.
I called Tire Rack. What was suggested for my car (from my specifications) were the Michelin Pilot Sport, Goodyear Eagle F1 Asymmetric, and Yokohama Advan Sport. Any thoughts?
I also live in Houston. My previous BMW, a 2001 E46 328i came with a new set of Contintentals. They started getting noisy at the 12,000 mile mark. I replaced them with a set of Goodyear Easgle F1 GS-D3 tires. I was very pleased with them. They were quieter and smoother. I replaced them with another set of Goodyear F1s. The price I got from Discount Tire locally was not much more than Tirerack.com. Good Luck.
Michelins Pilot Sports are my choice and the ones I have on my M3.... Stay far away from Continentals. I have thread wandering around here that details my experience with them... cheers...
I currently run a different brand of tire on every car I own (Bridgestone, Dunlop, Yokohama, Khumo, General and Pirelli) and believe it or not (and don't laugh!) for my wife's daily driver M3 sedan, I absolutely LOVE the General Exclaim UHP !! They have great traction in the wet and dry, they have good steering response, they are quiet, they are wearing extremely well and they were half the price of anything else out there!? I was VERY skeptical when I bought them (based on a bunch of recommendations I had gotten from other M3 owners) but they have turned out to be the perfect tire for a high-performance daily driver. When (if) they ever wear out, I will definitely be getting another set! But that's just me... Of the tires you listed, the Michelin's are great tires but they have never lasted well for me. They seem to wear out pretty quick considering how expensive they are. The Yokohama's are decent tires (not in the same league as the Michelin's) but they are a noisy tire, at least the ones I've run are (have them on the Miata). Maybe I just got a bad set. The only Goodyear's I own are on my pick-up so that's probably not a fair comparison . Tires are definitely one of those things that EVERYBODY has an opinion on so you need to take what we say, mix it with what Tire Rack told you and then pick whatever your most comfortable with.
Hey Dan, and everyone, thanks. That's exactly what I did. Everyone I talked to had a different opinion. I wound up getting the tires from Discount Tires because they had a nice deal - no interest payments for one year. That really helped. I had made up my mind that I would get the Goodyears but I took the Bridgestone Pole Positions. They came with a 40,000 mile warranty. If the tire wears out before that, I get a new one free, no questions asked. I find that hard to believe, but we'll see what happens. Anway, now what do I do about a spare? Right now I have one of my old 16" wheels in the trunk. But it's so heavy and takes up so much room that I'd like to know if I have any other options. I'd like to know if anyone has any other ideas?
Step 1. Take a picture of your trunk with the wheel in it. Step 2. Send it to BMW, with a letter complaining vehemently about a spare tire well not being incorporated into new BMW's. Ok, just kidding - that won't do any good anyway, BMW would probably just decide you're a demographic 'outlier'. If you generally don't need every square inch of your trunk and are willing to sacrifice trunk convenience for the assurance of a spare on hand, I'd say use the tire rack website to search for the narrowest recommended tire for your car. Do a search for your car under winter tires, and see if it lists alternate sizes in the same wheel diameter (or maybe even less) than your oem wheels. If you find an alternate size listed that's smaller than stock, make sure your car's brakes will fit within that diameter wheel (for instance, not that I know if this kind of optioning is possible, but for example's sake - if you had some sort of sport package bigger brakes compared to 'standard' brakes, it would seem likely a smaller-dia.-than-standard-stock-wheel wouldn't fit over the brakes). In any case, find out what the tirerack.com site says, and try to find an all-season tire in that width and diameter, or opt for a skinny snow tire if you have to, and get it on the cheapest steel or alloy rim they might have or recommend or that you can find. I would also try to secure it in the trunk area, so that just in case of any kind of accident possibility, you don't have that much mass unsecured and free to flail about the trunk or possibly even intrude into the passenger cabin. Perhaps some of those small ratchet straps with nylon webbing, if there's someplace to secure them. I will assume for aesthetics' sake you don't wish to emulate sports cars of the 30's by having your spare mounted on the outside of the rear of the car, or rally cars with spares on top of the roof. Or, just spend another 10,000 dollars re-routing the exhaust, rear-suspension, plumbing, etc, and having a spare trunk well put in place.... lots of money can do all kinds of things!
I really like Toyo tires, but they currently do not make run-flats (2007 335i coupe) so I'm kind of stuck. The Continentials that came on the car are okay, but I like the Pirelli snow tires I use in the winter. If I still have the car when I need new summer tires (petrified of the high engine oil temperatures 9 months out of the year in New England) I hope there will be more run-flat options.
I've been running the Michelin PSIIs and love them!! They have excellent wet and dry grip, and feedback. The only downside is price. I'm about to pull the trigger on a set of Bridgestone 760 Sports. The reviews are generally good, they are supposed to wear longer than typical high performance tires and they are almost 50% cheaper than the Michelins. I may end up disappointed, but I figure they are worth a shot.
Do you really want to change a tire? I mean, you also have to come up with a jack & lug wrench if you do. If not, just get a AAA membership and a cellphone and use it if you have to. There is the alternative of a 'tire-in-a-can' patch kit that will deal with the majority of the small holes (nails, screws, etc.) you are likely to get. That fits easily and requires no tools.
I recommend Toyo T1-R's because they're lighter than most tires on the market and has great wet/dry traction. (check out Edgeracing.com for good pricing) A new tire that's out on the market with good reviews are Nitto INVO. They're a quiet tire with good traction as well but not sure on the tread rating (260?)
Tread ratings are pretty much useless. There is no standard, so the manufacturers make them up. Some tires could have better treadrating than others but be worse.
Absolutely true. There is no good testing method that will reliably generate them, either. They are only marginally useful to compare tires from the same manufacturer (assuming they are tested identically), but there is no reasonable comparator between manufacturers. That said, you can usually be reasonably certain that a TWR of 50 (Yes, fifty!) is what we would call "Pretty Damn Sticky" while those above 400-500 would have the traction of Fred Flintstone's rocks ...
And it goes to show you how useless the ratings are. My tires say 400 on them and they actually have very good traction for an "all-season" tire.
