I swapped some 19 x 8.5 and 19 x 9.5 (i was told staggered on awd is fine) and a week later I got the flat tire warning on the idrive screen and on center console. Weird that it didnt happen immediately, but a week later. From my reading my car being a 2006 it has FTM sensors in the abs vs TPMS sensors on the wheel. So am I getting this warning from running staggered tires / wheels? How can I get rid of it?





old wheel setup:

 

Have you reset it through iDrive when you installed new tires?
If you are sure it uses ABS sensors and not TPMS, then I would just double check the tire pressure and reset the TPMS in the car to see if the error would come up again.

However I have no idea if it might be AWD related (all my BMWs were RWD).

 

Yeah positive its not TPMS because the stock wheels had rubber valve stems. I suppose that one tire could have lower pressure, but I find it odd it says "FLAT TIRE" not "low tire pressure" maybe that is just the nature of the system.

 

I don't know what it would say on iDrive (never had it triggered on the 5er), but for non-iDrive BMWs I think you'll get the same TPMS error light, whether it is was low just enough to trigger the light or it is flat.

 

It doesn't know how "flat" the tire is - just that one wheel isn't going around at the same rate as the others.

 

What a difference those wheels make! Damn!

 

Mine is 2008 RWD and has TPMS in the wheels. When one is low it displays "low tire pressure". Recently got a flat and it said the same thing. Never said "flat tire". At least I don;t think so.

 

You aren't giving enough info. What are the actual tire sizes?

Here is the manual page for 2006 for station wagon. No staggered setup listed.


The sedan has a staggered setup listed:


For the sedan, the staggered setup front and rear have essentially the same revolutions per mile. I would assume that if you don't have the same revolutions per mile, you will damage the AWD system.

You can find tire calculators using Google. Here is one: http://www.gtsparkplugs.com/TireCalculator.html

As to the FTM, you need to go into iDrive and reset it. This is what you need to do when you fill the tires with air or change tire sizes. Otherwise, as the tires lose air at uneven rates for each tire, the FTM can go off falsely.

 

just take the car for a drive. While its on and running go into your settings into the Idrive and find your way into the tires section and select FTM. It should allow you the option to reset FTM module. Once you select that you have to literally drive it for a whopping 5 feet and it should reset.

 

Look for your tire size and type, front and back. Check the technical specs at tirerack.com. They should have identical or close to identical revs per mile. xDrive has front, rear and center differential, no? Tire size / revs per mile deviation and destroy differentials.