Drove on a very low tire

[The Barvarian]

My e46 had 18s with 225/40-18 Michelin Pilots. I drove an unknown amount of miles (anywhere from 1 to 15 miles) with the tire very low. It was not flat but there is skuffing on the sidewall. It is time for a new tire as repairing this one may not be an option?

Thoughts?

:down::stupid:

[e30s52]

get a new tire. its better not to worry about it then to have all ways in your head. my 2 cents

[DCColegrove]

Replace it...

It's just not worth taking a chance.

[itsbrokeagain]

+3. You hit a pothole or something that tire and maybe the wheel as well, will be done.

[e30s52]

its not worth the risk of loosing your car over a tire.

[Raxe]

Any good tire shop would flat out refuse to fix it if they new it would be unsafe. Get a new one.

[DaveSmed]

Good advice here so far.

The problem is tires get hot during normal operation simply from the flexing the sidewall/tread does when the tire is properly inflated. Simply looking at your tires when inflated tells you that they don't flex a lot, but they do flex constantly. The flexing creates internal friction in the tire, and the components that make up the tire are designed to cope with "x" amount of heat.

Now enter a very low tire. You have a lot of flex, a lot of internal friction, and maybe the tire was low enough it was even rubbing on itself. When this happens, the tire overheats, fatigues the internal structure of the tire, and possibly wears away at the internals of the tire. A tell-tale is rubber dust inside of the tire. All tires produce the rubber dust with normal (or abnormal, think burnout) wear, but the wear is taking place on the tread, which is thicker and designed to cope with the wear until it is used up. Very bad news, and I know of no tire shop that would touch a tire like that w/o replacement.

[golde30]

yeah, even driving 1 or 2 miles on a flat isnt good. mite hold air again, but isnt really safe.

[jules_winfield]

ugh that is really unlucky because the tires are sooo expensive!

[MC Hammered]

Just get a new tire. Not worth risking a blowout over a few $$$

I drove for about 30 minutes at 50-60mph on a flat tire when heading to LA and I was so lucky that the tire held together in the mountain pass.

Sidewall was scuffed to crap and the rubber was hot to touch but the rim was undamaged.

[TDE30]

Tires are unexpensive wear parts, and E46 guys are rarely known for being over-the-top cheap (like us E30 owners,) just replace the tire.

[equate975]

Replace it, its not worth losing the tire and fucking up the rim.

FWIW though, I have taken tires down to nothing and they last a while. I was running some bald ass snows in the summer with a bent rim that would slowly let the air of the tire, sidewall had no lettering on it and it still held out for quite a while.

[The Barvarian]

The tire is going to the great tire fire in the sky.....

[rodrigo]

I would get a new tire as well.

be glad you do not have a Volvo with the 1st gen AWD system...then you would need 4 new tires.