I too was going to switch them out to regulars once they were done, considering I have a spare, to save $, better handling, more tire choices, and the good old reason "how often have you really had a flat?"

For a decade I never had a flat.

Then this past year, I've had two already. The first time, the car was fully loaded with stuff, two kids and a dog in it, and I was luckily only 10 miles from home, so drove home, put on the spare winter tire in half an hour (it was the fall, so not too hot) as I have a jack for swapping my winters,and dropped off the tire to be fixed at the tire shop the next day. Since I'd barely driven on it, and the air pressure wasn't super low, they fixed it no problem. Didn't have to unload the car or anything, and pull out the crappy little jack in the trunk, which is a pain to get to by itself.

Then the other week, my wife comes home and said there was the low tire pressure sign on, and I see this huge screw in the middle of the tire. The tire pressure was down to 20 PSI, so I pumped it up to 40, drove 5 miles to the nearest tire shop, and the guy fixed it for me within an hour and I drove off.

I have to say, I'm thinking my next set for this car will probably now still be run flats. Especially since this is the family car, we go on occasional long trips with it in the summer, and are planning on going to the mountains every weekend this winter. So I think I'll pay for the extra insurance by running run flats still.

Thoughts?

 

Your story is a classic tale of the benefits of RFTs ... and I'm told that they are constantly being improved to make them less likely to contribute to rim cracks and more pleasant to ride on.
I'll bet, if there had been a forum like this when the first "balloon" time was introduced, there would have similar 'discussions'!

 

Yeah. Especially since the trunk's often full of stuff when we travel. By the time I pull all the stuff out in the middle of the road, if I'm close, I can drive somewhere and get it fixed.

In the latter case though, how would a regular tire have performed? Since it was a slow leak and the screw was still in the tire, do you think if it was a regular tire, I could have still pumped it up and driven on it with the leak for 10 miles? Or did having a RFT help in that case too?

 

I've been in that situation in the past. I carry one on those 12v portable air machines and if I got 40psi in a tire with a slow leak it's possible to get to a garage to fix it permanently.

 

I have had similar experiences to Lotus99 - RFT's are expensive, harsh ride and limited choice. But there are two key reasons why I have stuck with them on my E61.

Last year, my dad was driving home (BMW 120D on RFT's) on a dual carriage way, he was doing around 75mph, when he was overtaken by an Audi in a hurry. Some debris in the road ahead caused both cars to suffer instant punctures, the Audi suffered a serious blow-out and destroyed itself in bouncing off the central reservation and other cars in the space of 100 metres. My father was hard on the brakes to avoid the collision and with one tire going down gradually came to a nice straight stop.
Luckily the occupants of the Audi were ok, the car and two other cars were not. We are both convinced the RFT controlled the deflation in the BMW.

Also, there is some fine print in insurance policies here in the UK in terms of modifying the car beyond the manufacturer original specifications. I would not like to be in situation where the insurance company void my accident claim on the grounds of removing the run-flats that the car weas designed to operate with.

Just an opinion, not gospel.
J-PD

 

Wow, that's a great first hand story. Glad he was ok.

 

I have been pleased with RFT since first using them on a E91 I had for a while. Those were smaller tires and on 19" wheels but I thought even then the ride was fine so I don't understand all the people who bitch about "harsh" ride or poor handling. Maybe the staggered 19" set up made up for the handling and maybe I'm just tougher than they are in regards to the ride.

I have winter and summer wheel and tire sets, 5 each, such that I also bring along a matching full size spare. I secure the spare standing up against the left side of the cargo area. Being vertical, it doesn't really take up too much floor space and you can put things inside the wheel itself (it is oriented with the open side facing in, just like when mounted on the car) The roadside jack is so small you could leave it inside one of the compartments on the upper side of the cargo area rather than under the floor - so as to not be required to remove lots of cargo in the event of a spare wheel change.

Currently my summer tires, Bridgestone 960 Pole Postion All Season, are not RFT. This is because I couldn't find a high performance all season in RFT last spring but my winter set is Pirelli Sottozero 240 245/45x18. If the new 970 were offered in RFT, it would be my next set but I am getting great mileage out of the 960 so far so it will be a couple more seasons before I'm looking again. The Pirelli are wearing out faster, but I think that is due in part to one cross country trip last year that had me in warmer temps too long.

 

there seems to be more RFT tire choices in the factory e61 size of 245/40x18 than what I am using.

however, i have also started using the RFT on the audi I have. it's factory size is 235/40x18 but the 245/40x18 fits fine so i'm going with that now for the audi for summer size, winters will be sized narrower next time around.

 

fletchedpair, the runflats do not control deflation! they simply does have thicker wall sides so the tyre does not deflate all the way (not because of the air pressure!)
the issue I have I got OEM 19" M5 wheels, very prone to cracking. So softer tyres are the way to go on UK roads. You are not getting same life span out of the RTF and they way to expensive to change them that often.
on the another hand, no performance car has RTF`s, not even M5`s

 

But his point is the other car's tire blew out. I don't think run flats do, and that's specifically one of their advantages I believe (they don't blow out), so he's correct at the end of the day that his RFT's saved his dad's butt. No high performance cars have the tires. Practically all cars in BMW's lineup do now, and I'd certainly hope our cars are considered "performance" cars, by most standards and people's opinions!