I have 23,000 miles on my 05 Mini Cooper S and the front runflats are bald. The tire shop has ordered me new ones but I'm not sure I want to replace them with more runflats. He said that they went bald because I did not rotate them. I was never told to rotate them. The point is the guy said I would have a hard time driving around curves with regular tires. He mentioned something about there being lawsuits because tire stores have replaced runflats with regular tires. He advised against regular tires. Can someone please advise me, as I have to take my car in on 9-20-06 to replace my tires and need to know what to do? From what I have read it appears that he just wants more moeny out of me. Thanks

 

I am not a tire expert but I think that if you purchase quality performance tires that fit the wheels you have properly, and have the same basic profile as the run flats you will save money and performance should not suffer at all. The only drawback I can see is thet you won't have a spare, but you can easily carry a few cans for fix-a-flat, I think that what they do for the Miata. The tire guy may be giving you what he thinks is the stright stuff I can't say, but I feel sure that the profit on performance runflats is most likely quite a bit higher.

 

He's full of bs. He's trying to sell you run flats by using the fear factor. He has figured out you don't know much about tires and he's trying to take advantage of you.

Get a good high performance tire , that's what I did and the car handles better and rides smoother.

Call Tire Rack or go to Tirerack.com.

 

You want the tires with the most meat on the rear of the car(at least on a MINI you do), so rotating is not such a great idea if you like spirited driving (unless you love the rear end swinging out on you).

 

um.
hm. if you dont rotate tires at certain intervals it voids many of the warranties for tire life.

rotating is good. you want the same tread on back and front of the car as best as you can so it tracks properly in the rear and can steer properly in the front.

runflats vs regular tire for safety is a bs thing.
runflats are safer though if you get a puncture.

 

I believe I saw while browsing the Bently manual it says NOT to rotate (makes no sense)...This runs against everything I know about driving maintenance. I will rotate anyway usually every 5-7000 mi!

I also bought a set of brand new NEW takeoffs (R84's + Dunlop 5000's) for $600 on fleabay so I can replace my 17" superlights when they wear out. Thought that was too good to pass up and I like the 16's better anyway. R84's are the stock Mini S rims