Wheel Balancing
 

I thought I would take the time to post my experience in order to save someone else a headache.

I have been pulling my hair out trying to get a couple of sets of Ralley II's to balance out correctly. Up until recent, I was using a couple of shops to handle the tire work for my shop. Frustrated with the results, telling me the tires are out of round, the rims are bent, etc........I bought my own balancing equipment. I have also found out on the Ralley II's, there is no real consistent or concentric way to mount the wheel to the balancer using the cone method. If you rechuck the wheel, the balancer would give you different readings.

Using a pin plate (like you have to for Honeycombs) is the most accurate way to mount the wheel to the balancer, as you are replicating how its mounted to the car. I also rechucked the wheel indexing it differently than how I balanced it, and the results are the same

While some of you may already know this, I thought I could save someone the BS of getting the vibrations out of your car. I'd ask the question to your tire shop and request that pin plates are used (otherwise known a lug centric balancing). It is a bit more labor intensive, but the results are worth it.

Tim

Interesting. Thanks.

Well done, you.

I especially like that you did a repeatability study.

K

Good info.
Can you tell us more about the balancing equipment you bought?
Brand/price/overall size pic?

Tim I just went through 2 different tire shops myself with new repo ralleys. I was at the point of throwing airsoft beads in and calling it good. The second shop did finally get them close enough, but like you say they claimed my wheel was out of round. I then mounted them to a spindle and dial indicated the tire. They were only .030 out of round, to confirm the need for "lug centric" balancing.

I purchased a Hoffman changer and balancer. I was drawn to the brand for a couple of reasons. First, Hoffman is owned by Snap On. You buy Snap On tire and alignment equipment, you are getting Hoffman. Secondly, I got a screaming deal on the changer as it was slightly damaged in shipment. I bought a matching balancer to go with it (which I got quite a good deal on as well). Both the changer and the balancer are not real elaborate, but given the nature of my shop (classic car and truck service) these should be more than enough to suit my needs. I have less than $7000 including the pin plates.

The pin plates, I bought from MT-RSR. They had a sale on these which brought it to $871 shipped including tax. There wont be much I cannot do as it covers about 99% of current applications.

The amount of space I have allocated to this is about 5'x9'

Hope that helps!
Tim

Outstanding!..Thank you.

Good to know.Thanks for the information.Bob

Good info and nice little set up!
I went through a similar scenario with 1981 Z28 steel wheels. I have an old Coats model 700 computer balancer at home with a lug-centric adapter that I used.
Lug-centric adapters are available for all major brands of balancing machines.

Ironically, I have a set off of an 80 Z28 to do next week