[Portimao318]

My X3 has runflats. I sometimes travel from Hungary to Holland , which is a 1300 km trip. I usually make the trip on sunday, for than there is less traffic (no trucks).
If I would get a puncture, i would be in trouble. On the German Autobahn it does not help much if you can keep driving for a distance of 80 km on your punctured runflat. To drive where ? All workshops are closed on sunday. And even on a weekday, I would not know where to find one.

So I would like to have a space saver wheel. Can I order this at the official BMW dealer, or elsewhere? Of course, I would need a jack too.

[Pinewood]

If you look on realoem.com,you will see listed an emergency wheel kit for the F25, but it isn't something your dealer will order as it says for dealer use only!
You are better off buying a single 17" wheel from ebay. A 2 ton suv scissor jack, and tyre wrench will also be required.
See my threads on this subject

[poiuytre111]

I have a spacesaver bought from a bmw dealer but it was not cheap. If you look to other sources make sure your wheel and tyre are similar in terms of circumference. This ill probably mean using something designed for the X3 or X5 size tyres.

http://www.csgnetwork.com/tiresizescalc.html

[Tjalle]

I have gone another route, because I don`t want to change wheel at the roadside. So far this is only for my winter wheels, but I will soon buy new summertyres - non Run Flats.

I have slime and compressor from Amazone UK- the ones with compressed air and slime in a can are no-good.

Good tyre review at: "2016 AutoBild UHP Summer Tyre Test". King of the Hill is Conti Sport Contact 6.

[Pinewood]

Have you had to use the slime/compressor for a roadside puncture repair yet? Did it work?
Would love to ditch runflats (once current set are worn) if i could be sure of a reasonable solution to a roadside puncture :-/

[Tjalle]

No - luckily I have had no puncture on my X4. the three punctures I have had on other cars, were - probably - due to underinflated/overloaded tyres. First thing I do is to check tyre pressure with the TPMS.

You take out the valve and insert the slime buy squeezing the container - then install valve and fill up - quickly drive to spread slime. Should seal any "normal" puncture.

[poiuytre111]

Originally Posted by Pinewood

Have you had to use the slime/compressor for a roadside puncture repair yet? Did it work?
Would love to ditch runflats (once current set are worn) if i could be sure of a reasonable solution to a roadside puncture :-/

Now that we all have mobile phones the problem is reduced somewhat - plenty of roadside tyre change companies around, assuming the car is too far away for a family member to assist.

Looking back, I can recall my wife taking this approach (and buying a new tyre for a flat on the M4) when we had a brand new alloy/spare tyre available in the boot. Something about not wanting to unpack an overfull boot to get at the spare wheel with cars whizzing past at 80 mph. Recall the bill was £90 back in the '80s - seemed a bargain at the time.

[Pinewood]

So circa £200 today i wager :-)
I take your point on this being a "what if" scenario that doesn't happen very often. We hope that whatever provision we make, it doesn't leave us stranded on the side of the road.
BMW are not the only ones to use this philosophy of course, so it's no good thinking i should go buy a merc or rebadged vw!

[Peter_R]

According to this site, a spacer is available from...

http://www.alloywheelsdirect.net/opt...are_wheel_kits

although as stated previously, it does say not for retail customers...

http://www.realoem.com/bmw/enUS/show...74#36112187043

[Pinewood]

To the OP, as you can see we have many ideas and suggestions. Ultimately it is up to you which option you choose.
I still think for your cross borders journey, a full size spare (225/60/r17) would be the best option, as long as space isn't an issue.
Please let us know which option you settle upon

[Portimao318]

Originally Posted by Pinewood

To the OP, as you can see we have many ideas and suggestions. Ultimately it is up to you which option you choose.
I still think for your cross borders journey, a full size spare (225/60/r17) would be the best option, as long as space isn't an issue.
Please let us know which option you settle upon

thanks everyone for the suggestions. Pinewood, space IS an issue, for my 50 kg best friend travels with us. Otherwise I could simply bring one of my wintertires along. But it takes so much room in the boot.

[brissim]

My 2-cents worth on a spare tyre for the F25.

1. I suspect the reason why the F25 space saver spare is noted as being "not for retail customers" is that the quoted tyre size (135/80-18) is over 25mm (1") undersized compared with the OEM tyre size for the F25 (673mm OD vs the OEM size of ~702mm OD). Don't know what this would do if used in real life. Expect that's why its marked for service use only.

2. As I've noted in previous threads on the subject, I've run conventional tyres and carried a full size spare in the back over the 4.5 years and nearly 100,000 km we've had the F25. The full size spare does take up a fair bit of room although there's still sufficient room to carry luggage for two people in the back (in one of those previous threads I do have a picture of the boot with the full size spare). Don't have the issue of the OP because our somewhat smaller two dachshunds occupy the back seats.

3. Used the spare 3 times in those 4.5 years - that's a measure of the country distances I cover and the types of roads I drive on. 2 of those 3 times I was over 100km from nearest town of any size that would have a reasonable tyre shop. One time I was out of mobile phone range. Both of those occasions would have resulted in major delays if I had to rely on run-flat tyres alone.

4. Besides the already mentioned extras you will require (jack and tyre wrench) also invest in a pair of suitably sized wheel hangers. It will make the job of changing tyres just so much easier. Also a pair of gloves and some blankets. And when you have all these items together - do a practice run to make sure you know what is involved and what you may be missing - waiting until you are trying to change a tyre at the side of a busy road is not the time to find out you have the wrong size tyre wrench. Or if if have lock nuts on your wheels, where in the car the required attachment.

5. Also as I found out the last time, that the tyre wrench you choose has a sufficiently long lever arm to give you the power required to loosen overtight bolts. Had to end up calling for road service just to loosen the bolts to get the bloody wheel off - at 8 PM at night in light rain.

Tony

[Pinewood]

All good points, i particularly like the dry run scenario. The day after my children passed their respective driving tests.... I let all the air out of 1 tyre and asked them to fit the spare (VW golf 1.4), my daughter was better at it than my son who thought he knew it all :-)

[badgesnob]

Hi Guys,

After dwelling over this for a long time, I've decided to keep run flats, even though I've already changed the two front tyres to conventional. I will revert once they're done. I plan on giving the car to the missus later on.

But during this period of research, I've found that it is possible but not 100% sure you can use the space saver tyre from the e83 on the f25 as both cars use the same bolt pattern, lug diameter (5/120).

Thread size differs slightly between e83 variants but this shouldn't matter and centre bore hole size is also common.

The space saver for the e83 has a width of 4 inches and diameter of 17 and a positive offset of 18mm. 4BX17 ET:18.

Does anyone for sure know in relation to rim size, and offset if it will fit on the f25?

My reference comes from http://www.wheel-size.com/size/bmw/x3/2010/
http://www.wheel-size.com/size/bmw/x3/2014/