Alan
December 14th, 2003, 11:04
Driving the Saw Mill River Parkway on Friday, I rounded a curve and with the suspension loaded up on my side and struck a pothole. The pothole was a minor one, I felt a small jolt and then the car began shuddering. Figured I blew a tire so I stopped to find that the brand new front AT alloy/snow tire was clearly bent. It was bent so bad that it was rubbing the brake caliber. I limped the car home and got it to the dealer who reported that both the front and rear wheels were bent and the tires damaged. Car was also out of alignment, but fortunately there was no damage to front brake caliber
I called Tirerack to get 2 new AT wheels and Dunlop M3's and found out that there are no more Dunlop's available - all sold out for the year. They could offer me 4 new (more expensive) snow tires and the 2 wheels.
I was absolutely shocked at the amount of damage that such a small jolt could do to the AT wheels. For that reason I decided to switch to the last set of Audi OEM wheels/snow tires that my dealer had in stock. After the installation and an alignment, the car seems fine.
I am hoping that this experience is just bad luck, but I have never had such a minor impact do so much damage. I think that the combination of the suspension being compressed at the same time and on the same side that the wheels struck the small pothole, combined with the low profile snow tire/wheel combo was the cause of this mishap. My dealer said that the AT wheels look less rugged than the Audi OEM wheels but, who knows.
I called Tirerack to get 2 new AT wheels and Dunlop M3's and found out that there are no more Dunlop's available - all sold out for the year. They could offer me 4 new (more expensive) snow tires and the 2 wheels.
I was absolutely shocked at the amount of damage that such a small jolt could do to the AT wheels. For that reason I decided to switch to the last set of Audi OEM wheels/snow tires that my dealer had in stock. After the installation and an alignment, the car seems fine.
I am hoping that this experience is just bad luck, but I have never had such a minor impact do so much damage. I think that the combination of the suspension being compressed at the same time and on the same side that the wheels struck the small pothole, combined with the low profile snow tire/wheel combo was the cause of this mishap. My dealer said that the AT wheels look less rugged than the Audi OEM wheels but, who knows.