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Tire Availability: Anyone about to config their car - read this!

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If I were you, though I love the look of the 21" grey wheels, I would order the 19" wheels if I had the choice.
I hit a pothole yesterday and had the sidewall of the tire rupture. I waited for the tow truck and now am finding that:

  • this Continental is a hard ass tire to find. Two dealers said that it is discontinued and another just told me that it is hard to get since no one stocks it.
  • The West LA Tesla svc center does not answer the phone on Saturdays and the toll free number does not have a dedicated line to their service centers. What does that mean? It means that even if you call the toll free # and they want to help you, they have no higher priority than you for getting a hold of the service center.So far it is 2:30 in the afternoon and it looks like the car is out of commission until at least Monday.
The 19 inchers have a longer life, I'm almost sure would have a lower tendency to rupture, will cost much less and will be easier to find.

The grey 21" do loook SWEEEEET though. :wink:

My 2¢
 
I'm not sure where you are looking exactly, but tire rack has them in stock today, so they are quite available.

Tire Search Results

If I were you, though I love the look of the 21" grey wheels, I would order the 19" wheels if I had the choice.
I hit a pothole yesterday and had the sidewall of the tire rupture. I waited for the tow truck and now am finding that:

  • this Continental is a hard ass tire to find. Two dealers said that it is discontinued and another just told me that it is hard to get since no one stocks it.
  • The West LA Tesla svc center does not answer the phone on Saturdays and the toll free number does not have a dedicated line to their service centers. What does that mean? It means that even if you call the toll free # and they want to help you, they have no higher priority than you for getting a hold of the service center.So far it is 2:30 in the afternoon and it looks like the car is out of commission until at least Monday.
The 19 inchers have a longer life, I'm almost sure would have a lower tendency to rupture, will cost much less and will be easier to find.

The grey 21" do loook SWEEEEET though. :wink:

My 2¢
 
I had sidewall blow out due to pothole on 21" wheels as well.

Tire Rack is the best place to buy any tires, period. They have almost everything in stock, ship immediately, and can deliver overnight direct to authorized installer if you so need. In my case, Tire Rack and local Tesla Service center both had in stock, but Tire Rack price was $111 less expensive. Tesla also quoted me over $100 to install new tire, and a week to schedule me, whereas going rate for a premium shop that knows how to handle expensive tires/rims etc is <$35 and they can do it any day. So, I save about $150 using Tire Rack and a local installer, plus it gets done as soon as UPS shows up with the tire.

I had a lot of confusion regarding warranty. The Continental tire has a 1 year or 2/32" of tread warranty for road hazards, which includes pothole damage. It took me about 2 days to talk to all of the parties, but here's some info:

* First cust svc rep at Continental said that Tesla would have to submit any warranty claim, since technically they sold the tire OEM to Tesla (not me).
* Tesla (both local service center and galactic headquarters) had to circle the wagons to determine if there was warranty or how to handle. Apparently, this is not something they've figured out yet.
* Tire Rack said if I send old tire back to them, they'd submit to Continental, but I was dubious due to what Continental said.
* I called back Continental, and 2nd service rep said there's NO road hazard warranty on the OEM Tesla tires - though there is one if you buy aftermarket... another good reason to buy it at Tire Rack. Rep said nonetheless they would start a file for me, and if I wanted to have my installer call in the tread wear information and serial number on the damaged tire and I submitted invoice for new tire, they'd think about helping.
* I'm going to send the old tire back to Tire Rack to submit for warranty. I figure they have more leverage with Continental than I do.

So, at worst, I'm out about $325 and 3 days use of car.
At best, I'll have $288 (price of tire) refunded.

I'll post result when this is all done.
 
Sears also has the Conti 21" for $204 on their website, not sure which, if any, stores have inventory. Finding large, low profile tires locally has always been a challenge. Even in LA/OC if you did find a store that had them, they were so ridiculously overpriced and far away enough to not make it worthwhile.

I wonder if it's worth keeping a spare tire in the garage for such occasion. I'd imagine it would sit for no more than a year or so before you need a new set of tires and rotate the spare into the mix with a new set of tires and place a new tire into "spare" status. It's easier for me since we'll only have the need for 21" tires in our household.
 
Sears also has the Conti 21" for $204 on their website, not sure which, if any, stores have inventory. Finding large, low profile tires locally has always been a challenge. Even in LA/OC if you did find a store that had them, they were so ridiculously overpriced and far away enough to not make it worthwhile.

I wonder if it's worth keeping a spare tire in the garage for such occasion. I'd imagine it would sit for no more than a year or so before you need a new set of tires and rotate the spare into the mix with a new set of tires and place a new tire into "spare" status. It's easier for me since we'll only have the need for 21" tires in our household.

I called Sears.com about this deal before and they said while it is on their website, they don't sell that tire in 21" size anymore.