Hey all, new to this forum and this might be a dumb question, but when you all spoon your tires on, do you get them balanced? Seems that since the S10 is a bike that can see some significant highway miles, and speeds, this is a necessity? I have some Shinko 804/805's that I'm getting set to mount and was wondering. Thanks!
Tire question - balancing
- Thread starter bushman66
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racer1735
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If you do any kind of on-road riding, you will definitely want to balance your tires. I use a simple stand sold by Harbor Freight that costs less than $50 and is easy to use. And you can get stick on wheel weights at most any auto parts store, in a color to match your wheel. The weights come in pre-marked weights. You simply put your wheel/tire combo on the balancer, find the heavy spot (that spot will rotate to the bottom...do it several times to ensure), snip off a portion, stick it on the flat part of your wheel (clean with alcohol first) and re-check your balance. You do this several times to make sure you haven't simply changed the heavy spot. Easy and much cheaper than having a shop do it for you.
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scott123007
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It's obvious to those of us that have done it, but to be clear, the weights are installed at the top of the rim, (180 degrees) where the wheel comes to rest at its heaviest point.racer1735 said:
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Start out by taping the weights on the rim. Tape an once on and then adjust up or down until the wheel finds a happy spot. With the old lead weights you could snip a little at a time off and get it perfect, but most all the weights now are steel and fine tuning the weight is a hassle.
I'm gonna buck the trend and say it's not really necessary.
I've been fitting my own tyres for years now on a variety of bikes. I've got the kit to balance them, but have found its just not needed. If of course i got some vibes from the fitted new tyre i'd take it off and balance it, but it's never happened.
I've been fitting my own tyres for years now on a variety of bikes. I've got the kit to balance them, but have found its just not needed. If of course i got some vibes from the fitted new tyre i'd take it off and balance it, but it's never happened.
vapexpr
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Has anyone tried Ride-On in the Tènere tires? I used it with my last bike and it worked great to balance the tires, but that bike had aluminum wheels so I didn't worry about corrosion.
fredz43
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I did an experiment with Ride On with my KLR. I checked the balance first and noted how much weight it took and where and then removed the weights, installed the recommended amount of Ride On, then rode 10 miles, removed the wheel and checked for balance and it took exactly the same weight in the exact same place as before. Sealant maybe, balance no, IMHO.vapexpr said:
wtwill
New Member
It installed tkc 70 this weekend and used dyna beads. Rode 100 miles today on the interstate and noticed no vibration. But im not sure if it was unbalanced before.
yz454
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Never balance tires , If it,s out remount it , if still out ,take it back. I have so much dirt on the wheel it,s a wast of time .
Dont bother with it. If you just mount them and ride they will wear in to balance. It's easy to see if it's working, there will be a spot on the tire with way less tread than the rest of the tire. That "was" the heavy spot.
cosmic
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I never do it,as I never felt any difference. Most of the guys I know, that use the big bikes for offroad too, don't really bother with balancing.
Don in Lodi
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Wear into balance? That's new to me.
Me too. Interesting idea.Don in Lodi said:
tubebender
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I think he's being sarcastic >
Don in Lodi
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Ha! Another emoticon we need; sarcasm. : ?
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SilverBullet
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Both Ride-On and Dyna Beads are dynamic not static balancers. Your test results above were to be expected. However put the wheels on a high speed balancer like car shops use and the results would have been completely different. I've used Ride-On for many years on all my bikes and it has always balanced perfectly up to triple digit speed. As a sealant though it doesn't do much except for thorns and preventing air loss with the nail or screw left in the tire.fredz43 said:
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fredz43
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Perhaps, but my balancer is I guess what would be called a low speed balancer, not static and it would seem improbable that in the short time from when I stopped riding and put it on the balancer, not all of the sealant would have settled, as dynabeads would. It seems strange that with the sealant in it, it took exactly the same weight and in the exact same place as before the sealant was installed. Enough of an experiment that I chose not to use it again. It is fine that it worked for you, just as some say that not balancing has worked for them. Makes me wonder how a rider could tell if a tire were out of balance with the suspension components absorbing any small vibration type bumps while riding. How does one determine which bumps are road irregularities and which are induced by tire imbalance. I know a severely imbalanced tire will cause severe vibrations, but not one that is only an ounce or 2 out.SilverBullet said:
Just my natural skeptical personality, I guess, but I went back to normal balancing.
thats because a small imbalance will make sweet F A difference to a bike or cause vibration, think about it like this if you had a perfectly balanced tyre and then you get a rock stuck in the tread or pickup a screw or a nail, your tyre is now no longer balanced and you would never know.fredz43 said:...just as some say that not balancing has worked for them. Makes me wonder how a rider could tell if a tire were out of balance with the suspension components absorbing any small vibration type bumps while riding. How does one determine which bumps are road irregularities and which are induced by tire imbalance. I know a severely imbalanced tire will cause severe vibrations, but not one that is only an ounce or 2 out.
Just my natural cynical personality, I guess, but I went back to normal balancing.
If the tyre makes no perceivable vibration then its not going to bother the bike or the rider so why bother balancing it? When I started changing my own tyres I bought all the gear including a static balancer, but then i started getting told by a bunch of people its not necessary. I tested this myself by sticking a strip of tyre weights to the rim to deliberately unbalance the tyre and it took a whole strip to actually feel a difference at highway speed. if a wheel was that unbalanced I'd be looking for damage to the rim or suspecting a defective tyre.
The other issue is that the static balances people use for motorcycle rims are nothing like the machines used for car rims, you could never get the tyre perfectly balanced due to the amount of friction between the axle and bearings that these balances employ as opposed to the automotive balancers that spin the tyre up and measure the vibration.
I'd also say each to their own, if people want to balance motorcycle tyres its not going to do any harm so knock yourself out. My experience though is that with 3 bikes and chewing through tyres every few thousand km's over about a decade I have never experienced any unusual vibration or handling nor had problems with axles, bearings or suspension components wearing prematurely. and the guys who told me not to worry about it are track junkies who chew through tyres pretty regularly and do some high speeds.