Tire balancing question

I have balanced many tires and have used anywhere from nothing up to 3.5oz of weight on a tire and rim assembly. The amount of weight to balance a tire depends on many things. Aside from the obvious (does the guy doing the balancing know what he is doing?) the type and brand mean a lot as do the condition of the rim and weather or not there is a wad of dirt or grease stuck to the inside of the rim or is the rim clean and true. If I were you I would tell the dealer about the problem you encountered, drive on these tires for a few days then have them rebalanced . Mike

meant that the new tire may be marginally defective (assuming a clean = rim). Does a #40 plus a #50 weight equal more than 3.5 oz.? =20

I'm assuming the 40 and 50 are for grams (sometimes the number listed is the part number of the weight). 1 oz. is about 28 grams, so 40 grams would be about 1.4 oz. and 50 grams would be about 1.8 oz. These would be smaller than what it sounds like you have described.

I didn't make note of the size of the weights, but I had a similar experience after getting new tires installed on my wife's car (again, not sure of size, but there were 2 or 3 large weights on the outer rim of one wheel measuring 5-6 inches long when measured end to end). The car never ran more than 1000 miles or so before it would shake. I have no idea of the true problem, but if I ever see this on another new set of tires, I will insist that they install a different tire before I leave the shop as I do not believe the argument that it "is normal".

I agree. The instructor in my automotive trade school class told us 3.0 oz max or there was something else wrong. One trick is to remove the air and break the bead and move the tire to another spot on the rim (like 180 out) and try it again. Sometimes you hit the low spot on the rim and the low spot on the tire too. It has made a difference in some that I static balanced years ago. We did it just as an experiment to see how it worked out.

Steve m...

of weight on a tire and rim assembly. The amount of weight to balance a tire depends on many things. Aside from the obvious (does the guy doing the balancing know what he is doing?) the type and brand mean a lot as do the condition of the rim and weather or not there is a wad of dirt or grease stuck to the inside of the rim or is the rim clean and true. If I were you I would tell the dealer about the problem you encountered, drive on these tires for a few days then have them rebalanced .

Agreed

It should NEVER take more than 4.0 oz. to balance any wheel/tire assembly. At the college where I taught, we stressed 3.0 oz or less as the goal.

Thanks to everyone. Bobby, I went back to the dealer today and asked him to dismount the tire from the rim and remount it 180 deg from its original point, in case the wheel and tire were heavy at the same point. Sure enough, he was able to rebalance the same tire/wheel with much less counterweight (30 vs. 90). --- John

I didn't think about asking them to remount as Steve suggested. Sounds reasonable and may suggest it when/if I run into the situation again.

Thanks, bb

John wrote: