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just been for MOT and the tester has pointed out that the inside edge of the nearside rear tyre is split around the shoulder. these are 8k miles old tyres fitted as a full set 9 months ago. never been punctured or run on anything other than the correct pressure. he thinks it could be a manufacuring defect as all the other three tyres have a date code of 4905 signifying week 49 of 2005. the split one is week 43.

might be worth checking if your running Avons as it is ready to let go, the date code is stamped into the tyre on the sidewall and is a 4 digit number as stated above.

fortunately they fitted the tyres for me so they are replacing it and sending it back to Avon for assessment

Lucky escape. Lets hope that other Avon users read this!

Wonder if it applies only to a specific tyre size?

wow thanks for the notice

dunno, mine are 225/45/17. seriously scared me and i don't scare easily. the whole sidewall was ready to come adrift from the tread.

Just recieved a reply from the UK agent informing me "without prejudice" that they will be reimbursing me 80% of the cost of the tyre so they're not admitting it's a manufacturing defect. read into it what you will.

What's the load rating of the ZZ3's?

91Y so that's loads up to 615Kg. they should be well within spec for the maximum weight of an S4

I see some tyre manufacturers now offer an XL (I can only assume this means extra load) rating on their tyres - Michelin is one of these.

yup, avon also offer that in certain sizes, i suppose they're for the likes of the RS6 etc

What did you replace it with or are you still on the Avon?

still on avons, i wanted a matched set, obviously the fact that they're not matched anymore will be forming the basis for a further letter........

obviously the fact that they're not matched anymore will be forming the basis for a further letter........

and now for the update........

i received a cheque for the tyres that was damaged back in June. i followed that up with a letter complaining that it'd taken them over 6 months to issue the refund and i was dissapointed that i no longer had a matched set of tyres. i asked that they take all four tyres off the car and replace them with a brand new set. i did offer to pay for any wear based on their criteria for refunds.

First thing Monday morning a customer services manager from National tyres rang me to say they were terribly embarressed by the whole saga and the manager of the local branch would be ringing me to make arrangements to do whatever was necessary to make me happy. i explained i was prepared to pay the difference but he said he didn't think that would be necessary. so after speaking to the manager at the local branch i'm taking the car in friday afternoon.

so all in all it looks like a good result. they got off to a slow start but now it looks like their customer service has really come through. have to see what happens tomorrow but at the moment it's a big

they checked the tread depth on the rears (which are the new ones) and found them to be 7.0mm in tread, a new one comes with 7.5 so we agreed that they just change the fronts, it seemed a bit petty to ask for 2 rears on the strength of half a mill so i'm now back to where i was 6 months ago, they even threw in a tracking check and alignment as one of the fronts was scrubbing off the outside edge

Great work, well done!