Winter wheels now fitted !!

[MJim]

Having bought some winter wheels (rims as new, tyres c 7mm) off eBay.de, I have now had them fitted. Apologies for the poor quality of the photo (taken with my phone), but I'm pleased with how they look:



I went with the 18in wheels as I'm told these are the best for snowy / icy conditions given the higher profile and that they are slightly narrower. The rear wheels do sit slightly inside the arches given the narrower profile which may bug some, but looks fine to me!

[X5Sport]

I've got the 19" Style 168's on mine and they are also a narrower fit than the 20" and don't 'fill out' the wheel arches as much as the 20" 214's do. It does look odd, but I get used to it after a while

The Mini has also just been done but they're 16" steel wheels for which there are no trims - the BMW ones don't quite fit due to an offset difference of just 4mm!! It's enough to make the covers spring off again though. Now on the lookout for some cheap, but decent plastic wheel covers.

Having been driving the Mini for a week, the X6 feels huge now

[Sanj]

They don't look bad at all - dread to see what mine will look like...

[MJim]

@Sanj - many thanks. I actually like the look of them - bit of a snowflake theme going on so apt for winters.

@X5Sport. I have the 19s as my summer wheel so your winters must fill the arches out just fine. I must admit I'd have preferred the 19in style 177s (they come in 18, 19 or 20) but went for the best for function. If I'd been putting them on just for a UK winter then would have gone for the larger ones, but with a trip to the Alps coming up figured I should go for these. Now I just hope I don't get any punctures - the tyres are unbelievably expensive, and that's if you can get hold of any!

[X5Sport]

I know what you mean! It took my supplier a month to get the Pirelli's at the beginning of this year, but I had ordered the RFT variant.

There is a material you can buy called 'Puncturesafe' a water based material that goes into the tyre and will seal holes up to 1/4". You put it in once via the (removed) valve, drive a few miles to spread it out and thrn you're protected until the tyre needs replacing in the usual way. E70 wheels need 19 Units per wheel.

I used to keep it my motorbike tyres - a puncture on two wheels can be lethal! - and as it's water based it doesn't cause the mess that the reinflation foams leave and tyre repairers hate!

[Turks]

Quick question: Can Run-flats fit on normal rims?

The reason I ask is that I like my wheels on my car but getting 315/35/20 in a Winter Tyre is impossible - however Pirelli do one in this size as an RFT.


Turks.

[Turks]

Anyone? ?



Turks.

[pvr]

There should be no reason why not, I swapped from RFT on my previous Z to non run flat and the rim does not know what is on there.

It is just a pig to get the RFT to get on the rim as they are so much stiffer than non RFT.

[Turks]

Cheers PVR. Wasn't sure if the rims were different to accomodate RFT's or not.

Might have found me a solution then to the winter tyres on my 20's!


Turks.

[bayrak]

If you're still looking for 20"winter tyres and wheels see Buy & Sell section, these are the Pirelli's sold as full set never been used.
BMW E 70 winter tyres & wheels.

[MJim]

In the Swiss Alps now - very glad to have the narrower higher profile winter tyres on. Roads just ice with compacted snow on top, so would be struggling otherwise. All working very well!

[mattchubb1]

Yeah yeah don't look too bad! And you should be able to help out all those stranded Audi q7's with huge low profile summer tyres

[MJim]

Managed to get stuck in an uncleared car park yesterday, although did get it out eventually without being towed (just some helpful pushers!). Just shows the importance of the off road features that the X5 doesn't have esp differential lock. A bloke in a Discovery was able to drive through the deep snow no problems. Not sure why these features aren't included as couldn't be very expensive to add? I suspect they will be on the X5 v3.

Here was my car at the start of the day:



Apart from that one incident it is coping very well, and it's great fun!

[x555]

Thanks for sharing .....what a great pic, thats some dump there must be good boarding/skiing
Wheels look great btw

[MJim]

Was even worse this morning. Saw the (Swiss German) discovery driver again this morning who explained the car actually has a snow button which raises the car and presumably locks the differentials. Nice bloke but enjoyed pointing out the X5 is designed for the City. Git. But not far wrong! The skiing would be great for those who do off piste but sadly out of my league esp with constant white out! Big avalanche risk too ...