Wheel Balance issue solution - Lateral-g Forums

camaro2nv · #1 09-24-2009, 04:26 PM

Good info, skip it all and use a Road force machine! Say goodbye to any problems!

NOT A TA · #2 09-24-2009, 05:49 PM

Thanks for posting this Greg.

I recently had a tire go bad on track at Sebring late in the day on a Saturday and bought 2 new front tires at a local tire shop on a Sunday morning. Not the tires I would have bought by choice but early on a Sunday morning to find any kind of high performance tires in a 275 40 17 was lucky. They were fine all day, trailered the car home and put it in the garage.

I then put some new racing brake pads on the car, bedded them on the local streets and then a few days later drove the car about an hour to the Palm Beach International track. The brake pads worked very well! Much better than any I've tried so far. I kept going deeper and deeper at the end of the straights before hitting the brakes and hitting the brakes harder and harder.

About half way through the day thought I sensed a very slight vibration in the front only at the highest speed section of the track where I was hitting about 110 MPH. Checked everything over in the pits and everything seemed tight and fine. Then during the last hot lap of my last session I hit a little higher speed there and decided there was a small vibration from something for sure. Checked everything in the pits again with nothing out of the ordinary. Then had an uneventfull ride home at highway speeds with no vibration.

I figured I'd double check everything in the front and have the balancing of the front tires checked this week before I run up at Sebring again next weekend.

Now I read this! I've had drag cars with tire screws in the slicks but never really considered braking hard enough to cause tire slip on the wheel. That may very well have been what happened to my car. I'll bet the local tire shop figured they'd lube up my wheels and the new tires "really good" so they wouldn't mark up my wheels. Then with the much higher braking force of the new pads and practicing trail braking into turn 1, one (or both) tires may have slipped just a little bit on the rim.

After I get the tires rebalanced (if they need it) I'm going to mark all the tires before I run the car at Sebring and see if any of them move.

**GregWeld** · #3 09-24-2009, 05:57 PM

Interesting huh John!!

I'd never ever given any thought to the tire moving on the rim... except as you said - in drag racing and then only the slicks!

Big 4 X 4's have "rim lock" wheels.... They run low air pressures... so I could see where they might spin a tire like this... but sure never thought about it on "high performance" tires like we use.

Thought I'd post it up - and let people read it or not. I claim no merit on the article - only that it seemed to be informative and something to "think" about.

Will be interesting to see if you mark the tire/wheel if they "move" at all...

**GregWeld** · #4 09-24-2009, 06:00 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by camaro2nv

Good info, skip it all and use a Road force machine! Say goodbye to any problems!

I've used the road force 'balance' system and have found "out of round" tires etc --- but that machine wouldn't keep the tires seated on the rims --- because you've already mounted the tire up. And that is where the problem is - the use of mounting soaps etc.... and then going out and hammering the combo.

camaro2nv · #5 09-24-2009, 08:52 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by GregWeld

I've used the road force 'balance' system and have found "out of round" tires etc --- but that machine wouldn't keep the tires seated on the rims --- because you've already mounted the tire up. And that is where the problem is - the use of mounting soaps etc.... and then going out and hammering the combo.

I ran a wheel shop with this machine. The drum will come down and seat the bead on the rim. It will say "seating bead" on the screen. Once that is done it will stop the rim and spin it the other direction still on the drum. We did a LOT of high end cars and never once had a problem. Its really the best money can buy!

**GregWeld** · #6 09-24-2009, 08:56 PM

This was EXACTLY the machine quoted in the info I posted.

Nice machine.

NOT A TA · #7 09-29-2009, 03:38 PM

Well I just had the new front tires I'd posted about checked. One of the tires appeared to be bad. It was out of round like a clown bike wheel. However dismounting and remounting the tire seemed to cure the problem. Apparently the tire had indeed shifted on the rim and was no longer concentric. Even a novice would have noticed it so when the first place mounted and balanced the tire it couldn't have been like that. (and it would have shaken the tire machine)

The other tire was also off balance but not by a lot. They only changed one weight. I should have looked more closely at the machine they used today but it looked very similar to the one shown in the previous post.

I'm going to run Sebring this weekend. I'm headed out to the garage now to put the wheels back on the car and I'm going to mark all of them. I'll post up my findings next week.

**GregWeld** · #8 09-29-2009, 04:30 PM

You know John -- I posted this up == thinking that it "may" have some interest. There's a lot of people on this site with big HP/TQ and big ol fat tires... so I thought - "WHY NOT!" and if it helps one person - then it was worth the small effort...

Can't tell you how many times I'd have tires mounted and balanced - and it seemed they'd go out of balance within a day or two... now I think I might have a fighting change of understanding why!

Good luck at the track!

NOT A TA · #9 09-29-2009, 10:13 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by GregWeld

You know John -- I posted this up == thinking that it "may" have some interest. There's a lot of people on this site with big HP/TQ and big ol fat tires... so I thought - "WHY NOT!" and if it helps one person - then it was worth the small effort...

Can't tell you how many times I'd have tires mounted and balanced - and it seemed they'd go out of balance within a day or two... now I think I might have a fighting change of understanding why!

Good luck at the track!

I only WISH my car was a big power car! The reality is that it's more of what track guys would refer to as a momentum car, kind of like an oversized Miata! LOL

I'm sure some of the cars I ve seen here with big power and/or killer brakes could rotate the tires on the rims. Mine has neither, so if it can happen to me....................

Thanks Greg!