[MikeElmendorf]

Hi -

Got new tires on my M60 today (after a year and 13K miles--I guess that's the price of all that weight and horsepower).

When I got the car, iDrive is no longer recognizing the tire type (from the factory, it showed Pirelli whatever in iDrive and the app and the app showed tire wear, which may not be too valuable because it still said they were good although they needed to be replaced).

I tried the automatic recognition and failed. Dealership is trying to figure it out, but iDrive is telling me, "Automatic tire recognition only possible for tires marked with a star and if programmed by a service center."

The old tires were replaced with the same Pirelli tires and they are star marked.

Any ideas here?

Thanks.

[LVBMW]

Originally Posted by MikeElmendorf

Hi -

Got new tires on my M60 today (after a year and 13K miles--I guess that's the price of all that weight and horsepower).

When I got the car, iDrive is no longer recognizing the tire type (from the factory, it showed Pirelli whatever in iDrive and the app and the app showed tire wear, which may not be too valuable because it still said they were good although they needed to be replaced).

I tried the automatic recognition and failed. Dealership is trying to figure it out, but iDrive is telling me, "Automatic tire recognition only possible for tires marked with a star and if programmed by a service center."

The old tires were replaced with the same Pirelli tires and they are star marked.

Any ideas here?

Thanks.

Were they replaced at the dealer? I am guessing there is some sort of programming they need to do in order for the recognition to work.

[MikeElmendorf]

Yes. Done by dealership. They said they should they programmed it, but I think they just reset the TPMS. They are looking into it…. Anyone else replaced their tires yet?

[Blue Sky]

I think that this feature is not intended to just recognize whatever tire you put on, as though it were reading the sidewall info or QR code.

I think what it is intended to do is to automatically recognize when you switch between sets of tires (like winter/summer) and then set the appropriate information for you in iDrive. So probably for each new set you have to visit the dealer to have it programmed, not sure, I don’t have any car that does this. My guess would be that it reads the rotational rate of the wheels to determine their diameter (which includes tread height) based on some other distance sensor or calibration, like GPS maybe. The old flat tire monitor used to do a variation of this by checking if a tire rotated at a different rate than the others (deflating).

So my guess is that this system once setup with two sets of tires will allow you switch from one to the other at home and auto recognize the set, because it knows what the size measurement was when you took it off. It would get confused if the two sets are exactly the same size when you switch, or when you put on new tires, because the size is suddenly larger than your previously stored sets.

[Scrapula]

I have non-star Nokian winter tires. I didn’t expect them to be recognized, but the TPMS is working fine. When I swap back in the spring, I doubt that the car will know that the Pirellis are back on. Does it matter as long as it works?

[1987illini]

I had my original tires removed so the wheels could be powder coated and when they reinstalled the tires the system couldn't automatically recognize them any more. I had to manually put the info in. The pressure monitoring works fine.

[MikeElmendorf]

I have TPMS working again too, but with it not recognizing the brand etc of the tire, the MyBMW App is no longer indicating tire condition. Again, don’t think that worked well anyway because the app did not tell me the tires needed to be replaced, even though they did. Still, seems like it should still work like it did from the factory.

[nf0rc3r]

It doesn't matter just make sure u put in the right rear wheel specs. I believe they only recognise OEM wheels with the "star" logo.

[MikeElmendorf]

They are OEM tires with the star logo.

[AlteBMW]

How could the car possibly know what brand tires were on other than those manually programmed into the system, assuming entering the brand is possible other than at the factory or at a dealer? What sensors are there to read the brand off the sidewall or otherwise? And can't you manually enter the type in iDrive (eg "winter" or all-season or performance)?

[MikeElmendorf]

Really good question, Alte, but according to iDrive (and the way it worked before the tires were replaced), it does. If you have your original tires, check and I bet it will show you what the brand and model of tire is.

However that works, it also allows the car and app to somehow track tire condition (not very accurately, in my experience).

[paprmkr]

Originally Posted by MikeElmendorf

Hi -

Got new tires on my M60 today (after a year and 13K miles—I guess that's the price of all that weight and horsepower).

When I got the car, iDrive is no longer recognizing the tire type (from the factory, it showed Pirelli whatever in iDrive and the app and the app showed tire wear, which may not be too valuable because it still said they were good although they needed to be replaced).

I tried the automatic recognition and failed. Dealership is trying to figure it out, but iDrive is telling me, "Automatic tire recognition only possible for tires marked with a star and if programmed by a service center."

The old tires were replaced with the same Pirelli tires and they are star marked.

Any ideas here?

Thanks.

Wow you must drive fast I got 27k miles and still had 4/32nds. Even wear.
But when I replaced them same from dealer had to recognize in manual. Then I install MPerfomance 943M wheel 21” and car detected automatic once I drove off. May be 20” eve though star on tire not design to auto detect.

[AlteBMW]

Originally Posted by MikeElmendorf

Really good question, Alte, but according to iDrive (and the way it worked before the tires were replaced), it does. If you have your original tires, check and I bet it will show you what the brand and model of tire is.

However that works, it also allows the car and app to somehow track tire condition (not very accurately, in my experience).

Fascinating. I know it can detect change in wheel or tire size because of rotation differences, and I suppose wear on tires too. But the brand? I know idrive 7 did not - we replaced a tire on our X3 and there is no indication that one tire is different. idrive 8.5 is smarter but is it smart enough to know the difference between Pirelli and Continental?

[paprmkr]

Eve though I did my Pirellis tire manually it gave me a measurement at 4/32nd. And that’s what tires did measure. So that sensor was right on
Also never had BMW car wear tire even. Must be the lbs on this baby tires even wear edge to edge

[RichardInCA]

Originally Posted by paprmkr

Eve though I did my Pirellis tire manually it gave me a measurement at 4/32nd. And that’s what tires did measure. So that sensor was right on
Also never had BMW car wear tire even. Must be the lbs on this baby tires even wear edge to edge

Good wheel alignment too. Excellent to hear.

[tsbrown]

Many tire manufacturers supposedly insert RFID tags in their tires (all tires or just some of their tires, who knows). This is pretty much the only way to automatically detect - if a sensor exists in the car to do so - what tires are on the car and update iDrive accordingly. If not you have to set that manually as in iDrive7 and prior BMWs.

The purpose of the setting in iDrive is to compare the recommended PSI to the actual PSI reading from TPMS and tell you if you're over or under inflated, especially under-inflated to warn of a potential safety issue. As long as you have a functioning TPMS sensor the car should be able to tell you what your tire pressure is, regardless if there's a recommended PSI to compare it to or not.

[dubb13]

So basically if you get the tires from a random tire shop you still have to have the dealer program for the software to work properly it's almost a way to get money out the consumer

[paprmkr]

Also on my new 21”
Wheel it came with Contixontact Q6 EV tires. America’s Tires didn’t have them on their lineup. They had to search to get the value so I can get their haz ins.
First time the front tire were
More expensive than rear even though smaller size.

[AiredaleDad]

With Bimmer Utility you can do it as well.

[MikeElmendorf]

How do I set the tire type in Bimmer Utility?

[tsbrown]

Originally Posted by MikeElmendorf

How do I set the tire type in Bimmer Utility?

Curious about this as well. May see if it works on older idrive too.

[AiredaleDad]

Originally Posted by MikeElmendorf

How do I set the tire type in Bimmer Utility?

If you go to the FA you can select the size of the tires and whether or not they are BMW STAR or not, Summer or All Season, and save.