Not the best picture but I thought it was kind of cool. Last night I was swapping over the 225/17's (type 277) for a staggered stet of 18's (type 124).

The 275 on the left has a Cooper Zeon RS3-A and the 225 on the right is the Goodyear RS-A that came with the car.

I'll be using the 225's in the winter and although the staggered set is for "fair" weather I still opted for the all season tires.

I don't know how you guys run 19" inch and larger rims without bending them constantly. The 275 tire only has 1.6cm shorter sidewall but it looks like a rubber band compared to the 225/50

I also went with a set of ORO-TEK aftermarket TPMS sensors for the 124's. Have to see how these work out long term.

The 275's definitely look like all business from the backside with the car on the ground! I'm glad I've got the proper XI specific 18" wheels with the proper offsets too (ET43 and 55 respectively). The tires are completely under the fender line as they should be (not sticking out like the non-X version of these wheels I was looking at recently).

 

I am not an expert, but was under the impression that you could not/should not put staggered wheels on an xDrive car. Would be curious as to your outcome.

 

The staggered wheels are a factory option on the 535i xDrive (M Sport package).

The issue with any all wheel drive/four wheel drive is that all four tires need to be the same diameter (assuming same final drive ration front and rear). This also applies to any xDrive Staggered doesn't automatically mean different diameters.

Let's to the math...

Fronts 245/40-18 = 25.7" diameter
Rear 275/35-18 = 25.6" diameter

The base tire option 225/50-17 = 25.9" diameter (just for reference)

The difference percentage wise is negligible and well within the allowed tolerance. You can buy two tires of different brands in the same size (not that you would do this) and get more difference in size than we have here. Hope that helps explain it.

So far I'm thrilled I did this. The difference is amazing. I'm liking the Cooper's too. Took a chance on them.. Great reviews and the price was outstanding. The ORO-TEK TPMS sensors were recognized right away and which was nice too.

Have to take it for a nice long ride later today.

 

Wow! The handling difference between the 225 RSA's (which are junk IMO) and the 245/275 Cooper Zeon RS3-A's is nothing short of amazing. I'm thrilled I got the staggered set of wheels and so far I'm very pleased with the Coopers. The RSA's will serve as the snow tires until they wear out and then I'll get a good Winter tire.

BMW supplies some crappy base size tires on the E60 xDrive vehicles