Car makers love them as they are expensive (more revenue) and more maintenance so more $$ there as well. It takes effort to actually find a mechanic who can repair them. What is for consumers? How do people find them? I have been driving/owning a car for 8 years now (with normal tires) and never had a flat tire. May be just lucky or may be normal where I live.
The main benefit to consumers is no spare tire taking up space. Mgr’s can find good use the space a spare, jack, and tools take up. The car weighs less and gets slightly better mpg and performance.
Downside for consumers comes in high replacement costs, less miles before replacement, and harsher ride.
For myself I’ll stay away from run flats for now. Perhaps with more development some of the current disadvantages can be eliminated making run flats more desireable.
I think the majority of drivers don’t have issues. It’s only when you do get a flat is when it sucks. A lot of people are lazy and don’t care to have to put on a spare. Easier to just drive to the next place that that can help them out. Many people don’t maintain the spare and it becomes useless. Another thing is that some cars are built so compact or sporty that there just isn’t room for a spare. In those cases, I certainly would want the peace of mind to know I wouldn’t be stranded.
I would consider them special use tyres. I would only consider them if I had a situation that a flat tyres would be a very serious problem. For normal driving, I would not want them. If I had them I would replace them.
I would avoid them. If you use some of the extra $$ and buy an AAA membership you will never have to worry about having to change a tire. Since 1996 we have had 4 flat tires on our 2 cars. That’s about one very 4 years. I changed them myself, but my wife would simply have called the AAA.
“Car makers love them as they are expensive (more revenue) and more maintenance so more $$ there as well.”
The real reason why some car makers use Run Flat tires is that some cars/minivans do not have sufficient room for even a compact, temporal spare tire. (The AWD version of the Sienna minivan comes to mind, but there are others, as I recall.)
So, rather than refine the design of their vehicles, they equip them with expensive, fast-wearing Run Flat tires. It is not a revenue issue for mfrs in terms of added maintenance costs for the consumer, but rather, it is a revenue issue for mfrs in terms of not having to redesign certain vehicles in order to accomodate a spare tire.
I recently refused to buy a decent used AWD Sienna for the same reason, run flat tires and AWD means that each flat tire costs ~ $800 because you will have to change all 4 due to the AWD. I guess one could still buy a spare and a jack and squeeze it some where in the back of the car, but they will have to sell the car to me with a very steep discount for that to happen.
OK, I haven’t checked, but if you can get all 4 for $800, then they’re not that much more expensive than regular tires. Tires for my Jetta cost ~$660 (at Costco, with a discount), and my 4Runner were almost $800 (with a 10% military discount). There’s nothing wrong with repairing a flat on those, unless you actually use the run-flat portion and destroy the tires. IMO, the run-flat purpose is for emergency use only, not to drive on. Get off the road, just like you would with any other tire, and get it fixed. It’s there to save your life, so a blowout doesn’t cause you to wreck, not to toodle the rest of the way to a repair shop on.