It's the reasonable expectation these days for tires to last up to 60,000 miles or more. My Touareg is the fourth car I've leased and the first I have ever had to buy tires for before --WAY BEFORE-- the lease is up. I think it was reasonable for me to expect these tires to be at least as good as the ones on my Audi, Acura, and Mercedes SUV. Yet, VW takes no responsibility for this poor engineering. No more VW's for me!

The warranty expressly excludes tires (for precisely the reasons you stated), and the tire manufacturers didn't choose to have their performance tires put on a 6000 pound truck. They've knowingly put performance tires on a heavy truck--knowing full well how long they will *not* last.

So, VW gets great reviews on their handling and performance, customers love the test drive and the initial experience, and then within a *Very* short amount of time, the customer realizes that retaining that initial level of satisfaction is going to cost a fortune in rubber to keep going. The score? VW wins, and the customer loses. Unless the information becomes VERY public, or unless the system changes to let buyers know what they should expect.

It's a shame, and it's not disclosed to the buyer. Now, if they were upfront about it, and said, "we've outfitted your car with performance tires--which will handle great for 10,000 miles or 6 months at a maximum, and then they'll need to be replaced at your cost", well, that would be a much much different scenario-- but a much more *just* scenario, indeed.

The problem is that the system allows both the car and the tire manufacturers to claim "Not my problem" and there's no system or regulation or expected lifespan of the tire at the time of purchase. The result is that the tires need to be replaced much more quickly than the majority of customers would expect.