Tire Changer Experiences?

Good call, grabbing some lunch before the event. I did use the bubble leveler on the Tusk unit, I should check it with my framing level. The inbound bike is late so I synced and color tuned the 82 GPZ750.

The day didn't go as planned. (typical) I decided to mount the changer just on front of the bikes so I can park one on each side and not lose any room. Just back the bikes up and I'm in business.
Tire removal went as planned and just like the video. Install did too but I ran into trouble filling the tire. I had about a 9 inch section that wouldn't pop out of the center of the rim. Fussed with it for an hour. Took the pressure up to 65 lbs and just didn't want to fill it any more. The training videos say to lube the center of the wheel but I think they should say to lube the ridge between the center and the outside edge. Once I did that the beads popped into place while filling. I have no idea how I would have installed the new tire with a set of spoons. The ZRX tires are large. Ran out of time so I didn't balance it.

Even with lube and a high pressure source, some modern sport bike tires can be VERY difficult to seat. I can't even imagine getting one on with spoons.

There is always the starting spray and a lighter method to seat a bead .
Works great on construction equipment tires.
But probably not a great idea on the bike, especially indoors LOL
Dave

My friend Jeff did that and blew the sidewall out of a radial he was trying to seat on his trailer tire. Glad I stood back. What a show. BOOM :woohoo:
Steve

SWest wrote: My friend Jeff did that and blew the sidewall out of a radial he was trying to seat on his trailer tire. Glad I stood back. What a show. BOOM :woohoo:
Steve

You are suppose to spray the minimum needed !!!!

Not the WHOLE BLOODY CAN !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

LOL Dave

He used carb cleaner and it was a older tire. Wish I had a pic of the look on his face. :lol: He said "I've done this hundreds of times, first time for this." :woohoo: Yeah buddy,,,, sure. :whistle: A blast pig is the proper way to do it. I don't think I'd have the gonads to try it his way.
Steve

Yikes! Beware of blast. I do wear safety glasses when I fill them. Compressed air has a way flinging crap into the air. I pulled the rear wheel on the GPz today to change the sprockets and chain and mount the new tires.. Now I understand why I have slow rim leaks on occasion when I get new tires put on at the shop. The weasels don't clean the wheels. I'll grant you it is hard and unpleasant work to clean them up. I couldn't find anything that would cut it chemically. Red ScotchBrite was the answer and my paws are letting me know they don't like that crap anymore. If anyone has a better idea as to how to clean these I'd love to hear it.

bluej58 wrote: Make sure to plumb and balance your balancer before using it

I understand making sure it is level both directions. How do you balance your balancer Blue?

I bought a cheap one but it has adjustable feet so after I straightened out the twist in the base plate it leveled out nicely using a plumbers level across the top of the arms where the rod sits.
Then I plumbed up the arms and stuck shims where needed to line up both the arms, you can see one sticking out under the left arm.
I also marked the spot on my bench so I put it in the same place every time.
The picture also reminded me to say that baby powder on the tube helps to position it in the tire, but try not to spill it on the ground, very slippery.
With the 4 small roller bearings in the arms the wheel spins forever and is very sensitive .

I battled with the balancer today. I moved it to my main workbench, marked a spot so being level will be repeatable without fuss. The bubble level on the base of the unit wasn't close, plastic POS that is was. I got out the 6 foot framing level, set it front to rear, left to right and verified in an X pattern. As for the tire,that didn't seat the bead, it took 3 passes of pulling the valve stem, running it through the bead breaker and refilling it to over 60 lbs. It wasn't until I sprayed a bit of watered down installation lube and I finally got both beads to pop. I followed that with a close visual inspection, good to go. Once both of those things were complete, the balance cam in to line easily. I still have some runout in the balancer shaft. If I roll it across the workbench it makes a rhythmic tap tap tap. I believe the vendor is sending another although I have limited confidence it will be any better. Anyway, I'm in business now.

The bubble level on mine was a joke too,
I have had trouble with the metric tires in the past, the only tire that really works well for me is the Avon Roadriders 19/3.25 and 18/4.00
They fit like a glove, grab the road and give me 10,000+ miles
www.denniskirk.com/avon/am26-roadrider-tire.pfp543162.prdf

Are you using tubes in those tires?
I had trouble with using too much tire lube and had my valve stem rip a couple of times on the rear tire from it slipping on the rim :woohoo:
I put the rim locks back on and use a minimal amount of lube these days, problem solved.