Tire balance

I'm a mechanic and balance tires. Tires have an inner and outer plane. You need to balance both planes (2 weights) Some customers have fancy rims (Dubs) and don't want weights showing or some rims don't even have a lip for weights. My manual for the balancer tells you to run the stick on weights inside in the middle but that it's not the most accurate way to balance, but I've never had a customer come back. I've never balanced any of my motorcycle tires in 30 years and have had no problems. I'll clean it up (but put a small mark where the weights were) and try it out. Thanks guys.....

I know this thread is a little old but I found it through the search and wanted to ask some Q's.

What ever happened with this dynabead stuff? Did anyone test it at all.. sounds like crap to me... if you put them in a tire with a heavy spot - wouldnt they just settle to the heavy spot while you were trying to balance them-thus making it worse? As for a moving wheel - I am not a physicist but it just seems silly to think that free moving beads in a tire would "balance" it in real world conditions. Acceleration/braking/turning/etc... [edit-a youtube search showed some pretty compelling stuff - looks like it works well AT SPEED but I still dont like the idea because the low speed wobble is even worse with all the weight settled at the bottom... meh, to each his own]

Some of you were saying that you dont even bother balancing your motorcycles and have not noticed any harm in doing so... I'm going to put some new tires on soon and was just going to set up a level surface on both sides of the axle to find the heavy spot (ie. ghetto rig), but i may not even bother if a lot of people dont think its necessary... Thoughts?

If you can set up a homemade jobbie to balance them, then I don't see what harm it would do to go ahead & do it.

CycleGear installed a new tire & tube but said they couldn't balance it because of the rim stoppers (the deals that lock the rear tire to the rim).

The amount of "out-of-balance" on quality motorcycle tires is usually small. Therefore balancing is not critical. No major ill affects will be realized, but I just like that "velvety smooth" feel. I also believe that traction is slightly better in corners with a tire that is rock steady due to being well balanced.

I set up two cinder blocks on their ends - spread apart so that the wheel hub fits between them. I place a smooth piece of wood, such as a 1" x "2 on the top of each cinder block. I then place the wheel/tire assembly with the axle on top of the wooden pieces. The heavy part of the wheel/tire will settle to the bottom. But I then roll the axle slightly back and forth. This allows the wheel to more accurately find the heavy spot. Mark that spot and do the exercise several times. Then place enoutgh weight on the wheel until it will stay in position, regardless of where the wheel is stopped.

I use some 7 gram weights that have adhesive on the back sides. Got them from a tire shop. Smooth as Velvet.

I recently thought it would be "fun" to learn how to change my own tires. I bought dynabeads and never did manage to get them into the tire through the tube. They like to get all clumped up together and you're supposed to tap against the side of the tube to get them in - the FAQ on the website says an electric engraver held against the tube works great. Maybe an electric toothbrush would work too, but I gave up after getting maybe 1/4 oz into the tire. It would be easier if you went into the tire before mounting it.

I ended up taking it in to a local motorcycle shop that does a lot of racing bikes. I took it to them to have them get the tire mounted right for me since I could never get the bead to set. They say they take out dynabeads all the time but don't put them in. They said it won't hurt anything to have them in but I might feel an out of balance condition if I'm going over 65 mph. Apparently lots of commercial trucks and RVs use them, so maybe they work. The racing shop didn't even bother balancing the tire at all, so I'm guessing it's not really a big deal to worry about it.

By the way, it took me about 4 hours to remove and install one tire. Not as much fun as I had hoped. I'm going to try it again for the rear tire in the near future but bought longer tire irons - the ones I had were only about 8 inches long and were a real bitch to try to get the tire on and off with.

Phil