LlBr

That's the point.

Cut off the flat tire. Leave it on the side of the road.

Easier to then throw just the wheel in the car (if more room needed).

Then call "Porsche Roadside Assistance" to find and pick up the wasted tire remains

stevepow

old tire= 4mm tread, new tire 6mm - so my older tire is 33% gone.

So, yes, I'm just over the border - Hennessy Porsche says "don't worry about it, you probably get a nail in the other one soon enough." . A precipitous prediction, just the wrong "other one".

I don't notice any handling issues, although I could see how wet road traction could be impacted.

No HTwo O

Are you sure this is right? A new tire is about 9-10/32's. And tire wear is not linear with the mileage.

Every Porsche owner should have one of these:

stevepow

I'll PM you my address - thanks.

tooloud10

I'd have sourced my own rollback, tire shop, and tire. Waiting on the side of an unfamiliar road for hours for Porsche Roadside "Assistance" would have been unacceptable to me and I'd have sought out my own solution while it was still light out. If nothing else, owning a Porsche in rural Iowa has taught me to be a lot less (as in, "completely not") reliant on Porsche dealers, especially for a simple tire problem. I don't see any reason why anyone would have to have traveled from several hours away to fix this issue for you.

Much of the delay in getting the problem resolved seems to revolve around the involvement of anyone affiliated with Porsche. Remember, the only thing special about this entire scenario is the specific tire needed until you start dealing with Porsche and their RA program. Nobody (even the Porsche dealer) is going to have the tire in stock, so one of the first steps would have been calling Tire Rack (distribution center located in Georgia) to get one on the way.

I'm not saying you did anything wrong, it's just that I would have been extremely uncomfortable relying on Porsche to get this done. Glad that everything worked out for you.

Minok

So your thought was, based on location and time from Porsche RA, tell them to hold off... and hang up.
Then call Tire Rack from your phone directory and find out from them where they can get the tire to and when (still an overnight issue anyway, but not sitting at the side of the road as long)....

But the question remains, would Tire Rack direct you to a nearby town with hotel and shop and provide you their phone numbers?

Then would Porsche RA, when you called them back, tow you to the location you want to go to that will have the tire in the morning, or will RA only tow you to approved Porsche facilities?




For me, the critical issue is still, what to do with that takeoff wheel. (and why Porsche doesn't sell the spare kit over the counter -spare, styrofoam insert, jack, wrench, bag, etc)

If I'm stocked with collapsible spare, jack, breaker bar, socket, etc in my Targa 4, the frunk is pretty small; the spare is not laying flat. So my luggage would be in the back seat. I have luggage cause I am out in the middle of rural-town and not just day-tripping it. If its just me driving cross country, there is room for the take-off rear wheel in the front seat (need to make a heavy bag that is puncture proof to put that rear wheel into ... maybe those tirerack tire/wheel storage carriers?).. but if I've got one passenger, now the back seats are folded down with luggage on the loading surface.

Where would the big takeoff wheel go? (Need to get that tow-receiver-wheel-mount project going...)

stevepow

It's a bitch no doubt. And tooloud10 is somewhat correct and I did attempt this. The most likely tire shop was 100 miles away and RA would have tried to get me there. Although, at that time of day no one could verify if the shop could get a tire and do the work. Turns out they could have and that's why I say that it is probably a good idea to look at your route, figure out where the good tire shops are, and make a list of flatbed towing resources in addition to knowing the closest Porsche dealers.

I do this route often and I plan to not only find out where the tire shops are, but drop by and meet with them and get their recommendations on flat-bedding. RA would probably work with this, but they are not resourceful enough to pull that off in an emergency - they have contracted services in major cities lined up with Porsche dealers. Anything out of that norm becomes a lot of leg work - I was on the phone solid for the first two hours with Hennessy, Jack Ingram, and RA - the time wastes away quickly.

tooloud10, I agree with your resolve to take things into your own hands, but with no pre-planning as I have described, I think you'll be pretty screwed unless you get really lucky.

Also keep in mind the cost of flat-bedding one of these cars for a couple hundred miles. I have not shopped around yet, but if $800 is the real deal, there's something to be said for being patient and working within the system - frustrating as that may be.

As for using a spare and what to do with the take off wheel - if it doesn't fit in the car, once you are mobile again, there could be other ways of dealing with that - finding a place to ship it from or securing it for RA to pick it up. In my case, I was near a gas station, restaurant, and store in a small town. With a spare, I think I could have sorted something out to do with the wheel.

LlBr

Get these nice covers. Envelope flat tire in them. Then put all luggage on side of road. Re-fill car with it based on looks. Leave stuff that looks crummy (Un-Porsche-like*) on the side of the road?

OR?

Jettison luggage itself and stuff it's contents in all the cracks around the tire in back seat.



* or "un-Carl-Farbman-like (Seinfeld episode)."

LINK:

brt3

... and begin using trash bags for luggage -- just in case...

No HTwo O

You guys do realize that Tire Rack IS Porsche's North American tire distributor? I am sure one of the first calls Porsche Roadside Asst. was to the Tire Rack to check inventory of your tire.

LlBr

We were discussing above cutting off most of the rubber from the trashed tire by knifing thru the sidewall. That would eliminate A LOT of "bigness" of the flat and leave you with only the wheel to carry in the car.

I found out sidewall has NO steel belt: only fabric.

Just found this pic showing the sidewall in a destroyed state. This gives a further clue as to how easy it would be to cut off most of the tire thru the sidewall and leave it on the side of the road for Porsche Roadside Assistance to pick up

stevepow

Why would you be so sure of that? Let me reiterate that wishful thinking is not going to help with this sort of problem. When the rubber meets the road, or no longer does, it becomes an inconvenient truth that you are in for a different sort of journey than you originally embarked upon. A journey into a wondrous land whose boundaries are that of imagination. Next stop, The Twilight Zone.

You have to realize that Porsche Roadside Assistance is not really Porsche - think of tech support in India, but not that bad...yet...but give it some time.

RA has little idea of Porsche tire requirements or tire shops that are not PCNA dealers. They do realize that only some flatbebs can get the car onto them - even my car scraped the muffler clamp on the side with the flat tire - it is that low, and the incline onto the trailer is that steep.

RA's protocol, from my experience, is to locate the nearest dealer, dispatch an approved tow service to you, and then haul you in - riding in the tow truck (check out a tow truck cab if you haven't)...your unlucky and unwitting passenger rides where? Yes, good question...

The guys who found my tire availability, who called multiple resources and really were on top of it, was Jack Ingram Porsche - specifically Greg Stillion who I thought was in service at the time, but is actually the sales manager. They (he) really stepped up. Google him - he turns out to be a pretty interesting fellow.

And I don't mean to criticize RA at all - they were responsive and helpful and stayed on top my situation - it is just important to be realistic about what to expect from them...and that is really why I wanted to share this experience.

This is also not a Porsche only issue as others have noted. Spare tires are rare in modern cars. Although most have ruflats. My last BMW 550i (e60) had both a donut and runflats, but I think the f10 has only runflats. The M cars have "BMW Mobility" which is can-of-goop-immobility and last time I had to use that, I was also soon onto a flatbed. Fix-a-flat is just to give customers a false sense of security - make 'em think they have something like a spare. And Roadside Assistance is not far beyond that. A very "non-luxury" fixture on these high priced luxury cars.

I'm from a time when real men got out and changed the tire - and when real cars actually had a tire to change. The age of the donut was plenty injury - can-of-goop is rubbing salt in it. RA, flatbed rides, and motels is...Twilight Zone.

Think about this when you get out onto the road with your loved ones in your car with you - have a real plan - not a hope or wish.

brt3

At least, with Mercedes-Benz, they will dispatch a dealer-based RA vehicle to try and help. Now, I realize M-B sells a lot more cars than Porsche. However, with the Cayenne and Panamera now boosting sales figures -- and VW in charge -- maybe they'll start deploying Cayennes in the same way that M-B RA uses E-Class wagons...

stevepow

What would make sense is that the dealers keep spares (not donuts but a real tire) on hand, dispatch them with RA - no tow truck needed - way cheaper. They return the take-off to the dealer to install a new tire, then ship you, if necessary, the wheel/tire and you return the spare. If a tow is really $800, there's got to be a cheaper way to handle a flat tire - save the tow truck for a serious problem where the car won't run.

stevepow

Towing rates - just a quick Google - $45-$75 hookup fee. $1.50-$3.00 / mile over 10miles depending on after hours or not. So that works out pretty well in line with the $800 the driver quoted me. A 4-hour round trip for a wrecker is not going to be cheap. In fact, anything out of town - even 60 miles, you'll be glad you have some sort of RA plan through Porsche, AMEX, AAA, insurance,....something.

For a flat tire, I still think that what Porsche (and other auto makers too) has envisioned as a solution is absurdly and unnecessarily expensive and inconvenient. Seems conceived by people who do not drive these cars.