Hit a pothole and got 2 flats on my Model 3 Performance

[Trackjack]

Short term the next step is that I'm going to look for the smallest space saver spare I can find to take with me on remote trips. But if I get 2 flats from a pothole I will still be screwed. Longer term when the existing tires need replacement I'm likely to get a new set of 19" rims so I don't need to run such aggressive sidewalls.

As for a spare, I went with the Modern Spare-complete kit......https://modernspare.com/product/2017-2022-tesla-model-3-spare-tire-kit-options
The complete kit includes everything you would need to change a tire if you have this unfortunate event occur again in a remote area.

I also changed out my 20" wheels for 19" rims on my M3P and went with 245/40R19 Michelin PS4 tires.... saved several pounds of unsprung weight, improved ride quality and added a bit more than .5" of rubber between the car and the road to hopefully protect both the rim and tire from carnage.

I also think that the 19" rim does not diminish the look of the M3P as compared to the 20" offerings, IMHO.

 

[tm1v2]

@Trackjack that looks great.

I should note I have a dual purpose for going all the way down to 18s. I'm planning to turn these 18x8.5 into my winter wheels later. I'm hoping that by running through a set of summer rubber on them I'll figure out whether I want my eventual summer wheels to be 18" or 19", and also if I want to go wider than 8.5"/245 (grip vs range).

If I wasn't planning to get different summer wheels I might have chosen 19s.

 

[Lacombeml1]

Yesterday I drove over a small defect in the roadway at about 35-40 MPH with my 2021 M3P that has 20" rims with Pirelli tires. It was a small rectangular section of roadway about 6" x 8" and maybe 3/4" or less deep that the asphalt was missing from an incomplete road repair. The sidewall on both tires got pinched and cut and the car had to be towed away. Despite this happening in one of the most populous and affluent areas of Southern California, the Tesla roadside service did not have loaner rims so they towed the car to the Tesla service center which was already closed, so I'm waiting until Monday to get new tires.

I was concerned over the very low profile M3P tires and this has just reinforced it more getting stranded within 3 months of ownership. (Have never had a pothole flat in 40 years driving a lot of miles.) The anxiety now comes from the fact that a few times per year I take a road trip where there are significant remote sections with no cell service. Before this happened I purchased a 12V air pump and a tire patch kit that I keep in the trunk. However, if you get a flat from a pinched sidewall you are screwed as you can't patch that. Get two flats at once and you are double screwed.

Short term the next step is that I'm going to look for the smallest space saver spare I can find to take with me on remote trips. But if I get 2 flats from a pothole I will still be screwed. Longer term when the existing tires need replacement I'm likely to get a new set of 19" rims so I don't need to run such aggressive sidewalls.

Curious if I just had very bad luck, or if this is not that uncommon of an occurrence, getting 2 flat tires by hitting a pothole. I've gone over potholes before with low profile performance tires with other cars and never had a single flat, much less 2. But how easily both tires went flat on the M3P, I'm thinking maybe this is not that uncommon? BTW, the rims look fine and do not appear to have bent.

Same happened to me except no flats. Seemingly small pot hole. 2020 M3P. No blowouts and both rim’s bent. Costly experience. Had the rims straightened and replaced the tires as they were clearly damaged with bulges and high vibration.

 

[MaskedRacerX]

Did Tesla opt not to increase the width of the tire to match the extra 1/2" width of the Uberturbine rims to avoid further decrease in range and extra tire cost?

It was an odd decision. If I was a making a bet, I suspect there was some plan to go to a 245/35 like the optional "track" wheels use, and something about range / supply chain / existing tire contracts, wound up putting the 235/35 Pirellis on the car.

Why bother to increase the wheel width, even with a new design, if you're not going to make use of the width, and an extra 0.5" adds weight for no reason.

bet putting 255/35 on the stock 20x9 wheels would provide usefully more protection. I have no experience to back that up though.

Yeah, I keep knocking around the idea of just keeping my 20" OEM wheels (which I really like in terms of design), and swapping out the 235/35 for some 255/35 - I'm thinking that those slightly larger sidewalls - and some spacers - might improve to the fender gap enough to where I don't even need to consider any suspension mods.

 

[KenC]

PM sent...

I wish the M3P still came with the PS4S. I also don't care for the stretched look on the stock Pirelli tires. To me it looks like the tire is too narrow or the rim too wide. On my AMG I was running 295/30/19 rear and 255/35/19 front. Decent balance between performance and ride comfort.

Photo shows the defect I ran over. I really would not have expected that this could pinch and cut the sidewalls had it not happened to me. While I like to drive spirited at times, I'm not looking to squeak out the very last bit of handling to go as low as the M3P sidewalls. If I did it over again I would have bought a set of 19" rims with PS4S tires and sold the OEM 20" set before using them.

View attachment 738480

Where's the pothole? You mean those cuts in the road to embed the sensor wires for the lights that they filled with tar or whatever they fill it with? If something as common as that can damage tires, maybe the tires were defective? Did you look carefully at the tires?

 

[Darmie]

I think you have a case against the Department of Transportation considering this was a fault of an incomplete road repair. That sounds like negligence on their behalf. Maybe get something written up from a legal office on their letterhead. I'd also include their fees as well.

 

[bedoig]

I think you have a case against the Department of Transportation considering this was a fault of an incomplete road repair. That sounds like negligence on their behalf. Maybe get something written up from a legal office on their letterhead. I'd also include their fees as well.

Just my opinion, but from the photos shown I don't think the roadway was left in a state that would make the DOT liable. Involving attorneys and hours of time doesn't seem like a great choice when the alternative is just buying $400-500 of new tires either, but again, just my two cents.

 

[Darmie]

Just my opinion, but from the photos shown I don't think the roadway was left in a state that would make the DOT liable. Involving attorneys and hours of time doesn't seem like a great choice when the alternative is just buying $400-500 of new tires either, but again, just my two cents.

Agree, the photo doesn't so much. I think those rims could be bent and would need replacing which could bring the expense much higher.

 

[Sam1]

I think you have a case against the Department of Transportation considering this was a fault of an incomplete road repair. That sounds like negligence on their behalf. Maybe get something written up from a legal office on their letterhead. I'd also include their fees as well.

Asked my gf about this (I was curious myself about specifics), and she said (she's an attorney) with these types of claims, you *usually* have to prove negligence. And that's where the city will blow you off and force you to go through court, because they know unless it's a massive amount of damage, no one will pursue those and let it go.

 

[Vines]

As someone who has cracked all 4 of my rims, I recommend that you replace the 20" with some 19". I personally do still run my 20" and have taken them literally across the country and back including crazy back roads like Titus Canyon.

I cracked all 4 of them on a large overpass transition somewhere on the east coast but still managed to make it back home another 4k miles. The rims had about 75k on them, and 1 had already been straightened from a previous pothole. The cracks were so slight, that they barely leaked at all, but as they slowly propagated I had to take them all off.

With the onboard TPMS I find you can get away with just a plug kit and a good compressor, and still feel very confident. Confident enough to have taken a 5k, 8k and a few 2.5k road trips. If you choose to run your 20" ALWAYS air them up to at least 42 psi cold, or risk greater chances of rim/tire damage.

 

[Alan2000]

OP, curious what your tire pressure was? Lower pressures will lead to more pinch flats.

Was at factory default of 42 psi. I'm used to a stiff ride from my prior vehicles so I may play around bumping pressure up to 44 or 45 PSI for some additional safety margin.

@tm1v2 - @MaskedRacerX 255/35/20 would have a 3.5" sidewall. Same size sidewall I had on my AMG that was 100 lbs heavier than M3P and never had any issue with damaging rims or tires. Curious to know how much that would impact range. Then again, if I needed to increase range on a trip, slowing down would have far more impact than the contact patch size.

@Trackjack - I really like the look of the rims/tires on your pic. Are those factory or aftermarket rims?

@KenC - The tires just got pinched between the rims and edge of the hole ripping a small slit in the sidewalls.

@Darmie - Unfortunately the govt agencies pretty much deny all claims. Here in SoCal you often have to appear in court for a couple of days to present a Small Case suit. They overbook and sometimes you come back 2 or 3 times until your case is heard. Not worth the time it takes to go after them.

@Vines - 4 cracked at once, yikes! I also carry a compressor and patch kit, (the licorice sticks type). Although I don't know if it would work to patch a leak from a slit in the sidewall. If I didn't have another option I'd try plugging the sidewall to limp to where I could replace the tire.

 

[MaskedRacerX]

@tm1v2 - @MaskedRacerX 255/35/20 would have a 3.5" sidewall. Same size sidewall I had on my AMG that was 100 lbs heavier than M3P and never had any issue with damaging rims or tires. Curious to know how much that would impact range. Then again, if I needed to increase range on a trip, slowing down would have far more impact than the contact patch size.

I'm not super worried about range, er, you know, unless it was a 30-40% hit. Our common destinations of MCO/Orlando/Universal I'm not able to (would prefer not to) round trip on a single charge, but even a 20-25% reduction is still plenty of range one way.

FWIW, here's the two tires compared:

So pretty close, and what some people have done running that size is to select the track wheel setup in the car config, which is a 245/35-20 which is only 0.7% difference in diameter.

 

[jwharnish]

OP, curious what your tire pressure was? Lower pressures will lead to more pinch flats.

Especially in colder areas over winter where tire pressures will drop due to colder outside temps. Too low tire pressure will increase chance of rim damage due to road hazards.
My M3P came with the 18" when I bought it in 2018, I didn't like the 20" rims and they were too heavy, which is why I did not chose the PUP option. Car has 30k on it, hit plenty of road hazard defects, and no rim or tire damage as of yet.
I keep my pressures at 42 cold.

 

[Scubadriver]

This thread makes me glad I immediately switched to 18x9.5 wheels with 265/40R18s. Great look and great protection.

 

[Vines]

@Vines - 4 cracked at once, yikes! I also carry a compressor and patch kit, (the licorice sticks type). Although I don't know if it would work to patch a leak from a slit in the sidewall. If I didn't have another option I'd try plugging the sidewall to limp to where I could replace the tire.

On the same road trip I saw what happens when a set of wheels of a massive oversize load of a pre-manufactured house fails under the load.

Small threadjack- we had been playing leapfrog with a convoy of semi's pulling a 3 or 4 part pre-manufactured home. Since we have to charge it's common to leapfrog the semis as you travel.

One of the rigs must have damaged one or 2 tires somewhere on the trip, and our only warning was the basketball sized chunk of metal that rolled in front of us at 85 mph. Luckily it was right on the white line and sort of stopped. That ball of metal was what was left of one of the truck rims that had been on the left side of the trailer. It was balled up from playing ping pong along the interstate, going under cars and bouncing off of them. That would have been a battery killer.

A few hundred feet up, we see that rig with no tires under his load on one side and the home sort of listing as the whole thing was parked in the emergency lane.

 

[Alan2000]

This video popped up on my YouTube feed. Good comparison of 20" vs 18" rims. You reduce your 0-60 time by .08 seconds which is a decent increase in addition to the durability benefits. I think 18" looks a little small but I might consider it. Braking from 60-0 was slightly worse increasing by 2 feet.

And one more on tangential range vs wheel diameter impact:

 

[jackmott]

Keep in mind that unless the same model and size of tire is used in wheel diameter comparisons, the differences are usually mostly due to tire differences, not wheel diameter. In that particular test I believe it was more efficient tires on the smaller wheels, which is why stopping distance got worse and range got better.

 

[Alan2000]

20" tire was Tesla spec PS4 tires and 18" was generic PS4 tires so they should be very close in compound characteristics. I was most surprised at the increase in range between 18, 19, and 20" rims with the M3P. (Chart in 2nd video shows range change at various speeds based on Tesla data.) I still don't quite get why the large difference. The width of the tires are the same, as is the overall diameter. The main difference is the weight and amount of sidewall, which I would not have expected that much change in range over that. For example at 65 MPH the range goes from 311 miles with 20" to 362 miles with the 18" rims, a gain of 51 miles, which is a a 16% improvement in range.

 

[Apprunner]

20" tire was Tesla spec PS4 tires and 18" was generic PS4 tires so they should be very close in compound characteristics. I was most surprised at the increase in range between 18, 19, and 20" rims with the M3P. (Chart in 2nd video shows range change at various speeds based on Tesla data.) I still don't quite get why the large difference. The width of the tires are the same, as is the overall diameter. The main difference is the weight and amount of sidewall, which I would not have expected that much change in range over that. For example at 65 MPH the range goes from 311 miles with 20" to 362 miles with the 18" rims, a gain of 51 miles, which is a a 16% improvement in range.

Don't believe it. I have the 18 inch PS4S and recently switched from 20 inch PS4S. Range isn't all that much different. You lose a little precision in steering feel but you gain a TON of ride quality. Its just way more comfortable on bad roads...also the grip during hard cornering is about the same. I had a couple incidents where I had to get the tire fixed because of bad roads...the tire pinched against the rims on some pot holes so the 18s will pretty much eliminate that worry. Glad I did it.

 

[jackmott]

20" tire was Tesla spec PS4 tires and 18" was generic PS4 tires so they should be very close in compound characteristics.

I don't believe that is correct. Are you basing that off the tires visible in his garage? Because that isn't what the tesla data is based on that he used for the math.