Want to buy tire changer & balancer . .. feedback?

In my experience, unless your balancing ultra wide steam roller tires you cant really do any better than a good bubble balance. If they can balance the propellors on turboprop airplanes, the rotors on helicopters, and the wheels on Craig Breedloves 650 mph rocket car with a bubble balancer, it should work reasonably well on a car wheel, lol. I have an older service station type, the three sided pyramid with the lift lever. I like the lil guy. But there is an art to it, you have to KNOW how to balance tires with it, by splitting weights and angles. Ive seen bubble balanced wheels as smooth as glass at over 100 mph, but I cant do it that good yet. Close though.

I also have a manual tire changer. Not cheap, it cost me over $600 with the base and some decent tire tools from NAPA, but its more than paid for itself both in costs to change tires as well as convenience. I can change little 4 inch wheels off a wheel barrow, I even replaced the heavy 10/16.5 tires on my skid loader. And when im done with it I can unbolt it from the floor and stuff it under the work bench with the bubble balancer. You wont be doing that with any of the big automatic commercial stuff. If I were changing tires steady all day long, there is no question I would want an automatic machine. But they sure suck to be tripping over all the time if your not using it. I figured that at $16 a wheel to change tires, I only needed to change 7 sets and it was free. Some places want $20 around here now, its gotten really crazy. And they can tear up your beads and scrape up your wheels much faster than I can watching what im doing. Good workout too

 

Difficult question. How long does it take? Well, you do have to put some muscle into it, I'd be lying if I said you dont. But its more brains over brawn, you HAVE to use lubricant or you wont get anywhere, even a lil bitty tire will fight you really hard if its dry. And ive seen guys tear up beads on brand new tires with the modern equipment, the type that turn the wheel against the stationary arm, so your not winning anything blowing $2K on a big machine if you dont know how to change tires. Lube, lube, lube...

Ive R&Red the 50 series tires on my 9X16's on three piece rims, and it wasnt at all hard to do. The hardest yet were a friends 205/50/15's, a few were harder even than the skid loader tires. But another friends tires on her Chrysler Sebring, I think those are 18's? They were easy. But again, some heavy soap water and patience, sometimes spooning the edge down, even hard tires will go on and off. I worked in a tire shop when I was young, and on saturdays would sometimes get stuck slamming tires on and off for hours on end. Its hard work even on an automatic machine, and if you dont lube them up its 10 times as hard of work and youll tear up the beads every time.

So, in answer to your question, if I could only have one machine, I would keep this manual machine. Given an option, I would have an old Coats 20/20 or something in a shed out back for stuff I didnt care a lot about. But for the day to day things you would run into around the house over a lifetime, and for automotive wheels and rims you dont want to damage, this little guy cant be beat if your careful. You certainly could pay the clowns at the tire shop $20 a wheel to wreck them for you. And you wont ever change a small tire on an automotive tire machine, they wont fit.

If space is not a concern, and if your going to buy a powered machine, buy the type that rotate the rim against the vertical bar. And without knowing anything else about the competition, buy a machine built by Coats. Might be better to buy an older used machine for $2K, than a no-name new one for the same amount. As far as a balancer, I wouldnt spend $50 to have a spin balancer taking up even one foot of floor space. Ive seen bubble balanced wheels roll smoother at high speed than any spin balancer machine could achieve no matter how many times you tried. When you see guys bubble balancing race car wheels at the race track on stuff that can hit 200 mph, you know it works.

 

Paul,

I'm with you 100%. I also bubble balance. Tire monkeys with spin balance machines who are not inputing diameter and width of wheel/tire and the machine defaults to static balance. That's why we static balancers seem to get just as good a result.

I got a question for you. I have one brand/model of tire that when it goes on my wheel will kink when the upper bead is placed on the wheel. one side will almost be seated without air but the side 180 degrees opposed will fold into the middle wheel well. Then of course the tire will not hold air to seat the bead. I watched pros have the same problem with this wheel tire combo and they packed a bunch of moldable soap they would normal thin with water for their lube. This soap was thick like the driest cookie dough and they sealed the hole which allows the tire to hold air thus seating the bead. The problem is this soap melts when the tire gets hot and then the balance goes all to heck because they use so much thick soap and it gets trapped in the tire. Have you ever had this problem and do you have a solution? I have tried to get the tire to sit evenly flat with the wheel so that initially no part of the bead is seated and then if the upper bead is just off the wheel well it would hold air. promblem is the need to use lube makes the tire slick and it puckers up and I get the one side in the wheel well and one side almost seated.

 

I've always thought the best way to balance tires was on the car with the machines than spin the wheel. That way you balance everything that spins including brake rotors etc. I agree bubble balance should be fine, most racecars bubble balance only. The best thing about doing them yourself is if you take your time you can minimize the need for weight. If a balancer wants me to put a lot of weight on a tire I'll break the bead and spin the tire on the rim and re seat. Usually I can get it to where it requires very little weight and only on the inside.

 

fatbillybob - I'm trying to figure out the problem you are having - is this it, or did I misread? Back when I mounted tires for a living (yes, I was a tire monkey in highschool and some of college) we would help seal it with a bit of tar on the bead, have one person hold up the tire and used a compressed air can to shoot air into the side of the bead which was open, while also going full blast into the open valve (core removed from valve).

 

I am assuming you are taking the valve stem completely out when trying to get the bead to set? (yes?) And by completely out I mean just unscrewing the little valve inside the rubber stem. That will let the the air help "blow-up" the tire sidewalls quickly with more pressure. One trick I have seen and used is a strap around the center of the tire to help seat the bead. A few extra hands never hurt either. I busted tires for F-stone and Goodyr when I started out many years ago, Scott

 

FBB. As noted above there are inflatable straps that can go around the tire center which will help bring the beat against the rim. The problem is they never worked as well on radial as they did on bias plies. I have seen with my own eyes, guys put lighter fluid in the tire and light it off. Bad idea as far as I am concerned (run away as in "Monte Pythons Holy Grail"). Do make sure the valve core is removed, it increases air flow to help seat the beat, also as noted above. Another method is the blow tank. A steel tank of about 1 cu.ft. capacity is charged to about 140 psi. Out the side of the tank is a big 2 inch ball valve and a nozzle. You hold the tank against your abdomen, aim the nozzle into the tire, and throttle the valve open. The air blast is supposed to seat the tire. The only time I seen it work was on a large implement tire, but it took two other guys to hold onto the tank man because it wanted to blow him across a shop. But it worked!

When I was at Vo-Tech many moons ago, we had three spin balancers and an on the car balancer. The on the car types I have never seen work even remotely well. If your center hub and brake assembly is that out of balance it should be dealt with another way. The spin balancers did an "okay" job, but the smoothest by far was a guy I knew with a bubble balancer. What I found though is that all the wheels I have put on the bubble balancer over the years that were spin balanced, are NOT statically in balance. Not 30 years ago on the Vo-Tech machines, and not from any tire shop I have seen since. Not one. As I said above, I cant do it as good as he could, but im close. Unless I had something I was having trouble with I will probably never have my wheels balanced any other way. It wont work on my stock 308 wheels though, the center hole is too small to fit over my balancer head. As far as I am concerned, the spin balancer is a gimmick that tire shops bought into to sell tires and service, and Joe Average bought into the hype. They work well enough for the average guy, but thats about as good as they get. And thats if thier calibrated regularly. Many of those machines havnt been serviced in years. But bubbles dont lie.

 

I use a machine's from Harbor Freight.com

They have the rim clamp changer on sale for $999 all of the time and you can find a 15% coupon and use it also.

The bubble balancer is ok but Harborfreight.com also has the Electronic Balancer for $999 and again find the 15% coupon and use it.

I have had both of these machines in my business for over a year no problems out of either.

Also, on the balancer to use the Sticky weights make your inputs (width, backspacing,rim size) and leave the machine on Dynamic, add the Sticky weights on the inside of the wheel where it says to beat the weights on. It will take 2 or 3 times to get perfect . Then push the Fine button, it tells you unbalanced portion down to 1 gram instead of 5 grams. I did my 360 wheels this way and there is no vibration at any speed. perfect..


Tire changer
http://www.harborfreight.com/cpi/ctaf/displayitem.taf?Itemnumber=45656


Balancer

http://www.harborfreight.com/cpi/ctaf/displayitem.taf?Itemnumber=47211

 

I've used a rachetting tie down around the circumfrence of the tire and had good luck on certain tires. Also heard about guys putting lighter fluid or starting fluid inside the tire and throwing a match at it but have never seen it done and would want to see someone with experience try it first. Talk about irresponsible posts! Maybe we can get them to try it on Myth Busters

 

No myth to it, it works. But these guys dont realise what would happen if the mixture was off, they're making a bomb. Proper tools always work best. I guess in hind site I shouldnt have even mentioned that, some dumb kid might try it. Sorry guys.

 

I've bought the second combination changer/balancer from Greg Smith on the web and have used them for 15 and 16 inch porsche and bmw rims with 60 series tires. I recommend buying the changer with the robot arm assist for extra $600 at their site: http://www.gregsmithequipment.com/Articles.asp?ID=258

They work well but the 55 series tires that I tried mounting needed a tire mounting holddown bracket (sold elsewhere at Gembler's) for extra $60 which helps keep the lip from popping off as the platter rotates during mounting. The bead blast feature in their midline models offered on that site works well and safely.

Good luck, you can also call them and speak with the sales people about what might be best for your need present and future.

Tom

 

Sean,

You have a PM. (sorry to highjack)

Edwardo