I own a 2007 BMW 550I sport. I ran over a raised road marker while in atlanta and ruptured the side walls of both left side tires, while also bending the factory 18" rims. In my judgment the contact was not significant enough to cause the damage that occurred. Once I had the tires removed I noticed that the inside portion of each rear tire was worn down to the metal mesh embedded in the tire. The outer portion of the tires showed at least another 10K miles on them. This was/is very disconcerting and alarming to me. I see it as a design flaw, and a significant safety concern. One should not have to have their car lifted into the air every 3-6K miles to inspect for this issue. This is a $60K + automobile. While extremely satisfied with some aspects of the vehicle, and satisfied with others, this is a deal breaker for me. If I ever recommend a BMW 550I to anyone, it will be with the caveat of be careful when it comes to the factory wheels and any type of tire that you mount on it because of the ongoing rear alignment issues. I had the same exact problems with an otherwise great 99' 525I sport. The realignment wore out 2 Michelin Pilot sports/rear in less than 10K miles.

- Zebulon, NC, USA

I have a 2007 550I that I bought in 2009. I several problems with the wheels, all of them are some what bent, but the rear left wheel is cracked. There have been several issues with many BMW owners regarding bent rims. I suspect there is an issue, as wheels don't just have hairlines, straight cracks on the inside wall without some sort of bend in the wheel. Even the tire guy, where I bought my tires, said it looks a little suspicious. This crack is about 1 inch long on the rim edge.

- Jacksonville, FL, USA

Have had this BMW 550I for about 2 years, and in that time I've had 3 bent wheels and one cracked wheel. I have cars with similar, aluminum alloy rims and lower profile tires on them - and have not bent or cracked a wheel on the other cars. The rear wheel cracked, but it was along the inner edge - and was not noticed. The only reason it was checked was because the tire kept leaking air. Luckily it was caught before the wheel cracked even more (it cracked for about 1" long from the rim edge to just past the tire bead). Updated 12/02/10 updated 12/07/10

- Germantown, MD, USA

I have just suffered my seventh cracked wheel in 13K miles / 18 months! according to wheel wizard in atlanta, they see an inordinate number of BMW 550I, M5S, 650I, M6, 750I cars. They subcontract for all the majors - Porsche, Jaguar, BMW, ferrari etc. Wheel wizard believes that the bmws (particularly with run flats), chose an alloy for the wheel that is defectively soft or and prone to cracking given the weight, power and suspensions on these cars. I agree!! 7 times in 18 months. I work out of my house and do not drive my car hard. Over the last 30 years I've been driving, I've owned Mercedes (clk430), Jaguar (XK8), Toyota, 3 Ford SUVS, an infiniti and have never had a single cracked wheel or rim in 30 years! (if it were my driving - there would be at least one other instance in 30 years). But not once. Now, since November 2009, I've had 7 cracked or bent rims! this is beyond statistical probability of just bad luck. I have had other BMW drivers tell me similar stories. A very good friend had a 650I then an M6 - he had bent or cracked rim problems on his bmws. A friend has a 550I - he has had bent or cracked rims in the first 12 months. Wheel wizard, when I was in last time, said they had seen 5 to 7 5, 6 and 7 series in the previous 5 days. And they said that BMW has an unusual high frequency of bent and cracked rims on the 5, 6 and 7 series post 2005 models. Today, the manager said he thought bmws, particularly those with run flat tires, experience a much greater than normal bent and cracked rim problem (something that makes his business money - repeat problems). I am hoping the ntsb will open up an official investigation. BMW national tried to tell me they have good engineers. I responded, that's what Toyota said too when they denied safety problems even though we now know they were lying. That's what Ford said when people were having high number of roll over crashes in their SUVS. You can't trust these car companies. Please investigate!

- Atlanta, GA, USA