I just had 4 new tires put on the car, along with an alignment, within the last 1000 miles.

I noticed yesterday that the passenger seat seems to vibrate quite a lot on the road when the seat is empty.

Perhaps its always done this, but I just dont seem to recall it before the new tires and alignment.

Anyone........?

 

I got a little bit of vibration and noise when I put on some new wheels.
That went away after ~30 miles or so of driving.
Equaling out the rubber perhaps?

 

My '06 650i did that but my '08 550i does not. Did you get run-flats? That's what I blamed the 650i "surface harshness" and subtle vibrations on.

 

Yes - they are the OEM Bridgestone sport run flats that were replaced pursuant to the TSB for free.

The strange thing is that the original set of tires which were replaced were the same thing and do not do that...

Thanks for your thoughts. I wondered if it was just one of the "joys" of owning run flat tires.

 

I get no passenger seat vibration and I have Bridgestone RFTs - In the past, on my other BMW's, that almost always was a result of imbalance. It's not unusual to need a rebalance after new tires have been run in a bit.

 

My 2006 did it from the day it came home from the dealer as a brand new car... I don't really notice anymore. Dunlop RFTs.

 

Have the wheels balanced on a Hunter Road Force. It's an incredible machine. I recently had mine done at my dealer. Apparently BMW has spec'd the Road Force specifically for BMWs. They can "tune" your tire and wheel combination like nothing before was capable of doing. The end result is optimization of the wheel/tire balance and placement of the tire on the rim. In some cases they have to break the bead and turn the tire on the wheel to match it to the optimal spot.

 

Mine vibrates (and rattles a bit over bumps) and has done so since I brought it home, brand new. I have the OEM Continental ContiSport Contact 2 (where in the world does Continental get these names!!) tires.

 

Think of it as a free massage from BMW. I got it on my 90's E34 535i, the E34 M5, the two E39 tourings, and slightly on the 07 530Xit. On all of the cars, I was able to reduce it by replacing either tires, control arms or busing, or struts but was never able to get rid of it completely. I think it's partly the design of the back rest brackets in these cars.

 

More often than not, it's a result of imbalance of the tires/rims. I have had similar issues in other cars and it was either bad tires or imbalanced tires/rims.