I just dropped off my car at the dealer here in NYC. Two days ago I went to pick it up at the garage, and one of the parking attendants showed me where the front left tire was coming apart from the rim. I've never seen anything like it. Luckily there is a Lexus dealer about 3 blocks from my apartment in NY.
Anyway, I just brought the car to the dealer, it has less than 17K miles on it, and he said that the run flats need to be replaced every 15K miles. In NYC, with the number of potholes and everything else it's a good idea to have the run flats. We had a blowout on the freeway with an M3 about 3 years ago and it was a nightmare.
I'm kind of *BLEEP*ed that he told me the tire was coming about from the seam due to "wear and tear". I said, what kind of wear and tear makes the seam come undone? And he said, "well if you were driving it on a flat that would make it do that"...to which I responded, "if I were driving it on a flat, wouldn't the indicator light come on?"... Well, now I'm just trying to figure out if I should pay for run-flats again or go with the other tire recommendations that you received..
Will Lexus replace tires that I buy from another place (other than the dealership?). I've also found that since I purchased the car at a dealership in California, the dealerships here in NYC are not very friendly... Shame on them, because I'll be looking for another car in early 2005...