Hi All,
Now this is much delayed because it's taken me an age to find the motivation, truth be told I'm exhausted with dealing with car issues from previous experience and just want this to be as painless as possible.
So some may remember that I was one of those who has suffered the dreadful wear on our P-Zero's on the Facelift RS3, such wear was causing the inner ply of the tyres to be exposed on the inside edge.
Below are pictures of the wear on my tyres:
My car had wheel alignment 3 times in an 11,000 mile period yet still had this issue, never out of specification and when Pirelli checked my car at 11,000 miles they were genuinely shocked to see how well set up it was. All was green, a slacken of one of the track rod end lock nuts was enough to perfect my alignment.
It all started when I went in for a service and Audi found the wear, it is scary because I wouldn't have noticed it knowing in my mind I had a good 3.5mm+ of tread not triggering me to check the inside edges. I contacted Pirelli who were superb from start to finish, they put me in touch with one of their Field Engineers who came to the house to carry out as much of an inspection as is possible on a sobbing wet day with the car on the ground. Their engineer took my tyres back to their factory and testing facility in Burton-upon-Trent where the tyres were "cut, sectioned and shaved" for analysis. No defect was found with either tyre, I was assured beforehand if there was an issue it would be address / adequately compensated because of the pride in their brand and the kind of cars they are proud to work on.
Below is the report as received from Pirelli (Ignore the RO1 Spec stated, the tyres are RO2):
From this it was agreed I would pay a visit to the 'UK Leading' tyre centre, which is the purpose built Pirelli Performance Centre in Burton-upon-Trent outside the factory. A tank of fuel later I made the trip up and back, the same field engineer also made the 5+ hour round trip to be there with me on the day. They fitted two new rear tyres as these had limited tread remaining and they preferred to do a setup on 4 new tyres. They rebalanced all 4 wheels on their road force balancing machine so the car as far as wheels and tyres were concerned was spot on when I left.
They inspected the footprint of the tyre on the road and found how the car seems to lean heavily onto the inside and outside walls when on full lock on some gradients, which they believe could be causing the wear as when the inside edge is the only 1/3 of your tyre on the tarmac, it doesn't take a genius to work out this is an issue.
The Performance Centre was incredible, you won't have ever seen a tyre shop like it and the investment into the equipment there is second to none, as the photos should tell you:
I've gone back to Audi who have said they can't do any more than what has been done, new tyres, rebalanced and alignment is 100% perfect and if the wear persists as Pirelli have said "is a characteristic of the chassis". I have pushed however and am trying to get the technical department of my local Audi Centre to lend a helping hand to get me in touch with the big guns. I've been assured that Audi have their own field engineers and although they don't like to send them out they are available to inspect the car and progress from there.
I will try when time allows but Customer Service will be a total waste of time as they usually are and won't be able to help with this issue other than to get the car into Audi for an inspection and alignment, which has been done.
I fear this is a characteristic of the car and a major design flaw, hence would require a major repair to rectify the issue. If it is a characteristic, it isn't one that Audi had actively worked to design into the car now is it? It is an issue and an unforeseen problem in the development. If Pirelli get enough people complaining, it will be raised at their Head Office in Italy and then they Dan make the awkward decision whether to contact Audi themselves and raise the issue, but for this it will take numbers! Can you imagine how awkward it would be for the tyre supplier to contact the manufacturer and tell them “we think you’ve made an issue in the design of your car”, it may rock the boat.
Truth be told, I really can't see us getting anywhere as owners and can see this as another opportunity for Audi to let us down again, but all I can ask of you all is to contact Pirelli and Audi yourselves when and if you experience this issue. Please contact Pirelli who will follow the same process as they did with me, inspection and report. Numbers is going to be the key part to play in this, if enough of us come forwards and enough Audi Centre's come forward to Audi Technical I can only hope that this will be looked into.
Pirelli Contact: contactcentertyres.uk@pirelli.com
Audi Contact: please visit your local dealer or contact Customer Services on 0800 699 888
My next port of call (really don't know if it will work) is to contact the Driver Vehicle Standard Agency 'DVSA' who have the power to force a recall on a manufacturer if a safety issue is found, in my eyes this is a safety issue because of the condition we are all finding ourselves driving our cars in.
Thanks all for your time and I hope that anybody who has this issue will take the time to photograph, document and raise a complaint with both parties on this matter in the hope of some light at the end of the tunnel.
Thanks in advance,
Matt.
Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk
Now this is much delayed because it's taken me an age to find the motivation, truth be told I'm exhausted with dealing with car issues from previous experience and just want this to be as painless as possible.
So some may remember that I was one of those who has suffered the dreadful wear on our P-Zero's on the Facelift RS3, such wear was causing the inner ply of the tyres to be exposed on the inside edge.
Below are pictures of the wear on my tyres:
My car had wheel alignment 3 times in an 11,000 mile period yet still had this issue, never out of specification and when Pirelli checked my car at 11,000 miles they were genuinely shocked to see how well set up it was. All was green, a slacken of one of the track rod end lock nuts was enough to perfect my alignment.
It all started when I went in for a service and Audi found the wear, it is scary because I wouldn't have noticed it knowing in my mind I had a good 3.5mm+ of tread not triggering me to check the inside edges. I contacted Pirelli who were superb from start to finish, they put me in touch with one of their Field Engineers who came to the house to carry out as much of an inspection as is possible on a sobbing wet day with the car on the ground. Their engineer took my tyres back to their factory and testing facility in Burton-upon-Trent where the tyres were "cut, sectioned and shaved" for analysis. No defect was found with either tyre, I was assured beforehand if there was an issue it would be address / adequately compensated because of the pride in their brand and the kind of cars they are proud to work on.
Below is the report as received from Pirelli (Ignore the RO1 Spec stated, the tyres are RO2):
From this it was agreed I would pay a visit to the 'UK Leading' tyre centre, which is the purpose built Pirelli Performance Centre in Burton-upon-Trent outside the factory. A tank of fuel later I made the trip up and back, the same field engineer also made the 5+ hour round trip to be there with me on the day. They fitted two new rear tyres as these had limited tread remaining and they preferred to do a setup on 4 new tyres. They rebalanced all 4 wheels on their road force balancing machine so the car as far as wheels and tyres were concerned was spot on when I left.
They inspected the footprint of the tyre on the road and found how the car seems to lean heavily onto the inside and outside walls when on full lock on some gradients, which they believe could be causing the wear as when the inside edge is the only 1/3 of your tyre on the tarmac, it doesn't take a genius to work out this is an issue.
The Performance Centre was incredible, you won't have ever seen a tyre shop like it and the investment into the equipment there is second to none, as the photos should tell you:
I've gone back to Audi who have said they can't do any more than what has been done, new tyres, rebalanced and alignment is 100% perfect and if the wear persists as Pirelli have said "is a characteristic of the chassis". I have pushed however and am trying to get the technical department of my local Audi Centre to lend a helping hand to get me in touch with the big guns. I've been assured that Audi have their own field engineers and although they don't like to send them out they are available to inspect the car and progress from there.
I will try when time allows but Customer Service will be a total waste of time as they usually are and won't be able to help with this issue other than to get the car into Audi for an inspection and alignment, which has been done.
I fear this is a characteristic of the car and a major design flaw, hence would require a major repair to rectify the issue. If it is a characteristic, it isn't one that Audi had actively worked to design into the car now is it? It is an issue and an unforeseen problem in the development. If Pirelli get enough people complaining, it will be raised at their Head Office in Italy and then they Dan make the awkward decision whether to contact Audi themselves and raise the issue, but for this it will take numbers! Can you imagine how awkward it would be for the tyre supplier to contact the manufacturer and tell them “we think you’ve made an issue in the design of your car”, it may rock the boat.
Truth be told, I really can't see us getting anywhere as owners and can see this as another opportunity for Audi to let us down again, but all I can ask of you all is to contact Pirelli and Audi yourselves when and if you experience this issue. Please contact Pirelli who will follow the same process as they did with me, inspection and report. Numbers is going to be the key part to play in this, if enough of us come forwards and enough Audi Centre's come forward to Audi Technical I can only hope that this will be looked into.
Pirelli Contact: contactcentertyres.uk@pirelli.com
Audi Contact: please visit your local dealer or contact Customer Services on 0800 699 888
My next port of call (really don't know if it will work) is to contact the Driver Vehicle Standard Agency 'DVSA' who have the power to force a recall on a manufacturer if a safety issue is found, in my eyes this is a safety issue because of the condition we are all finding ourselves driving our cars in.
Thanks all for your time and I hope that anybody who has this issue will take the time to photograph, document and raise a complaint with both parties on this matter in the hope of some light at the end of the tunnel.
Thanks in advance,
Matt.
Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk