Winter Tyres & Rims

[MaXX99]

Hi all ...

I'm looking for a set of winter tyres and rims for my E70LCI 40d (without the M-pack).
I looked at some of the OEM BMW sets and can't really find my liking in their offering (I currently have Style 336 20" rims for my summer setup).

I do like the 300M or the 333M rims, but both are probably way too expensive to fit as a winter setup and ... with the 11J rims, my E70 doesn't fit in the nearby carwash . I therefore looked at some replica's I found on eBay at the vender named 'eagle_tyres' : http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/20-X5-BMW-GUNMETA ... 5ad61983ea
Does anyone have any experience with these replica's ? The staggered setup is 9.5/10.5 vs the standard 10/11. Could this cause any problems ?

Other suggestions are always welcome !

Also which tyres would you recommend ? Scorpion Snow & Ice, Goodyear Ultragrip or Dunlop Grandtrek ?

[Avtar]

Received a mailer from BMW last week, X5 winter wheel/tyre set from £1200......

[MaXX99]

It seems the UK prices are very far off the prices in Belgium then !
I also received a BMW mailing and the cheapest winter wheel/tyre combo (the 18" 209 style wheel) was over 2500 € ! I found the same set at www.salesafter.eu for 1850 €. I don't particularly like them though !
I'm interested to hear what the other offerings and prices were on that mailing in the UK though !

[Avtar]

Going to make some enquires about the offer here, does sound promising on paper.

[MaXX99]

Let me know what you find then .... it does seem the UK is quite a lot cheaper

[Avtar]

So, after a call this is what I discovered.....

£1200 get you steel rimes with winter tyres
£1850 get you 18" wheels with Continental Winter Run Flats
£2200 get you the ones that were pictured in the mailer...................

[Minda]

[quote=""Avtar""]So, after a call this is what I discovered.....

£1200 get you steel rimes with winter tyres
£1850 get you 18" wheels with Continental Winter Run Flats
£2200 get you the ones that were pictured in the mailer...................[/quote]


So which ones are you going for??

[Avtar]

Might look into reps instead, if so then I would not have run flat winter tyres.

[MaXX99]

I just ordered my wheels .... I finally fell for a new set of 19" Style 177 wheels with Pirelli Scorpion Ice & Snow's with 255/50R19 107V rubber on
All 4 rims have an ET of 48 though, so it might look a bit weird in the rear, but this a BMW winter recommendation apparently ....

Over here are some pics of an E70 with 20" 177's on (my winter setup will be 19")
http://www.flickr.com/photos/omak/30878 ... otostream/

[MaXX99]

The day after ordering them .. I noticed www.salesafter.eu are selling them also but with LM-25's for around 2000 € ....
This might be of some interest for some of you here ....

[Sheepy]

Due to the recent arrival of snow I have been hunting around for some winter tyres for 20" OEM rims. My local dealer told me today that BMW have run out of 19" tyres so cannot offer the wheel & tyre combo in this size & want £1,800 for a set of 18" wheels & tyres... Decided to search online tonight for options & found that BMW seem to offer Pirelli Scorpion Snow & Ice Tyres on BMW.com

scroll down to pictures here... http://www.xoutpost.com/bmw-sav-forums/ ... ons-3.html

and Pirelli offer them as runflat in the correct sizes for the rims 315/35/R20/105W & 275/40/R20 106W here... http://www.pirelli.co.uk/web/tyres-cata ... fault.page

So, am I missing something when reading of so many people sourcing smaller wheels to suit the winter tyres? Is it not simply a case of buying a set of 20" Scorpion Snow & Ice Tyres & getting them fitted?? I haven't looked into cost or availability yet, so it may be a moot point, however all feedback welcome! If I've stumbled on something new, please leave a set for me......

Cheers guys.

[Avtar]

Also an additional question to those points so far, if coming off 'run flats' for your winter tyres do they need to be a certain rating i.e. W?

[X5Sport]

I must admit to having had a think about this too. After all, why do I need a tyre capable of travelling at 150mph on snow or ice!? But then again, these higher speed ratings are also capable of handling the torque of the engine - more important perhaps for the diesel powered vehicles where the torque peaks much lower rpm which in poor weather is the operating area for most vehicles.

Technically I could use an 'H' rated tyre, but then again, these tyres will also operate on dry roads at motorway (or er, umm above) speeds and that may put me nearer the safe limit of the tyre.

Another question is how would your insurance company view things if there was an incident and they weren't happy with the tyre speed rating even if it was 'technically' still in its operating limit. And on the same line, what about any warranty?

Personally I have chosen to match the OEM issued rating and stuck with 'V'.

EDIT: - I should just add these are OEM approved Pirelli Snow & Ice runflat tyres on OEM supplied 19" X6 rims.

[flyfs6]

A lot of people don't got the 20" winter tyres in my opinion because OEM sized rears are circa £400 each. A good friend in the industry recommended 275/40/20 and 295/40/20. That said buying second hand smaller wheels and new tyres costs nearly just as much, you do get the convenience and benefit from having higher side walls. My friendly dealer has offered money off sets but only through their network of dealerships as they don't deliver.

Insurers tend to view different wheels as modification even if you are going down wheel sizes for winter use. However they don't tend to be bothered if you're just changing over to winter tyres on existing wheels.

[MaXX99]

I would be carefull with the above setup though ! a 295/40 has a 2% difference in circumference with the fronts. Our cars being basically permanent 4x4's, I am not too sure what the effect will be ....

http://www.miata.net/garage/tirecalc.html