Tire balance

[kleake]

Completely wore out my PR3 and just had a new PR4 installed (front only). Only put on about 50 miles so far, but I think they didn't balance it right because I can feel a vibration start at around 65mph and gets worse as you get closer to 90mph. Not that I run fast like that often, but my old smooth tire was butter smooth up to infinity and beyond! They used those goofy stick on weights that I don't like, sooooo,, should I order me some of the clip on factory style weights and balance it myself (I do have a cheap but functional balancer) or shall I try dynabeads so I don't have to dismount and such? And IF I balance myself, where can I get the factory style weights cheap? I want to take it back and make them do it, but I just don't feel like dismounting it, driving all the way to their shop 20 miles away and then put it all back on. Grrrr

 

[Hammer Down Brown]

After my first experience with Dynabeads, I never looked back. Put two ounces of Dynabeads in each tire and you will be re-balancing your tires every time you move the bike. I feel like I get and extra couple thousand miles out of each tire.

Additionally, the little package of Dynabeads cost less than most dealers charge to balance a tire. You can get them in a little two ounce plastic packet. When you're mounting a new tire, put the plastic packet in there unopened. In the first mile or so the plastic packet breaks open and shreds leaving the beads free to do their thing.

 

[Bungie]

Have you ever looked inside of tire that's run it's life with dynabeads?

They are all embedded into the soft interior rubber. They do not free float rebalancing your tire with every turn. I've used them and been happy with them, but I think the theory also doesn't match the results either.

 

[lonerider]

I'd be curious enough to remove the wheel, put it on a balancer, and see just how far off the balance is. That would give me an indication as to whether I'd ever want that shop to work on my bike again. I've never used Dyna Beads, so can't advise you there. On some new tires that didn't have balance marks, it's taken me longer to achieve a satisfactory balance, and required more than the usual amount of weight but, once done, it should be smooth to past 120 mph, unless the tire is defective.

 

[kleake]

Yea, I'm tempted to pull it and see, but it's just a pain to have to do that, although I likely will. The shop was my local Cycle Gear and they have a different tech every time I need tires, so maybe it was just this tech. I mount my own tires most of the time, but with the FJR, I have just let them do it for the extra $20. So far they mounted my PR2's that ended up out of round, then they mounted my PR3's and they have been perfect. Now a PR4 on the front and it's this issue.

 

[Warpdrv]

There have been threads discussing that not EVERY tire coming off the line is good and balance-able....

I would take the wheel off and check the balance again....

If you can't get it to balance out - I would take it up with where you got the tire....

 

[escapefjrtist]

Only way to check balance is bite the bullet pull the rim off and check it. Since you have your own balancer, I wouldn't waste the gas to take it back to CG...balance it yourself and be done with it.

Best place to find weights is K&L, they're not OEM though. I use stick on weights I found at Harbor Freight, available in 1/4 and 1/2 oz weights.

Good luck!

--G

 

[900gc]

Yea, I'm tempted to pull it and see, but it's just a pain to have to do that, although I likely will. The shop was my local Cycle Gear and they have a different tech every time I need tires, so maybe it was just this tech. I mount my own tires most of the time, but with the FJR, I have just let them do it for the extra $20. So far they mounted my PR2's that ended up out of round, then they mounted my PR3's and they have been perfect. Now a PR4 on the front and it's this issue.

Not sure how much 'tech' is in a CycleGear tech to start. Nothing wrong with stick on weights, have used them on my race bike through about 30 sets of tires with no issues up to warp speed. Check the balance yourself, I wouldn't be surprised to find the CG guy settled for 'good enough' and it's off just a little. Also a very rare chance the tire is bad to start.

 

[art miller]

A comment on Hammer Down Brown's remarks. If you use Dyna beads you must be sure the tire is dry on the inside. Also you need more than 2 oz in the rear tire. Do not put the beads in the tire in the plastic bag as suggested. The beads come with proper installation items. The beads should be applied thru the valve stem. I have used Dyna beads on three front tires and they do not stick to the inside surface as stated in this thread. I too use PR2's therefore I cannot comment on other tire brand's inner surface having a sticky texture.

 

[Brodie]

I've had no problem with the peel & stick 1/4 oz square weights. Just wipe the rim where the weights go with disk brake spray cleaner before you adhere them. If you take the time to rotate the tire about the rim to align the tire light spot with the rim heavy spot you may get away with no weights at all. I've had several tires balance out this way. When you do get it balanced, take a digital picture of the weights (if used) showing the sidewall of the tire. If they fly off (unlikely if done right) then you can use the picture, relying on the tire sidewall landmarks to reapply replacement weights.

Good luck !

Brodie

 

[kenporider]

Cycle Gear doesn't have tech's, sales people do the mounting and balancing. The balancer they use will show 0.0 weight to be added if it needs less than 1/4 oz. If it's out of balance the three most likely causes are:

1) They forgot to balance it. This does happen sometimes since they are usually short handed on the sales floor and their sales people have pretty strict sales goals they have to meet. They have to walk away from the project to service customers and come back to it later. That's why I used to tell them in training to pull the weights before dismounting the old tire.

2) They never removed the old weights when balancing. Look for two sets of weights in different spots on the rim.

3) Weights fell off. There was an issue with the adhesive on the weights from K&L a while back where they weren't sticking properly and needed to be heated first. Those weights were supposed to have been discarded, but may have been kept around.

Personally, I would try the Dyna Beads. If that doesn't work, I would pull the wheel to check the bearing and make sure everything was torqued correctly upon installation.

 

[kleake]

I don't have a real issue with the function of the stick on weights, it's more the appearance and the gooey they leave behind once removed. The factory clip on just looks clean and neat so it's more a personal preference, however, I have had a couple of them come off the rear wheel.

After a little more ride time on my way home I think I am actually dealing with a defective tire. At 28-30mph there is a bounce in the front end. Not a major one, but enough that when looking for it, I was able to get it to do it almost every time. I probably wouldn't have noticed it except that I dealt with this on my first set of PR2's only they was much worse. I ran those tires for about 4k before I took them back in and got the PR3's. The PR2's I thought might be a balance issue so I blew it off seeing how I could only detect a problem at 25-30mph, and although it was enough bounce to be annoying, I don't spend much time at those speeds, and at highway speeds it was smooth. The tech/sales guy at CG at the time re-balanced and looked for them to be out of round and could not detect any issues. I insisted they were bad and they pro-rated a set of PR3's, and they turned out to be perfect, proving it was an issue with the tire. Now that the PR4 is experiencing a similar bounce, I'm betting that is more the issue. How likely is it that I would get a bad PR2 and then a couple of years later also get a bad PR4? Anyway, I didn't get to ride today, but I'm going to do some more testing to make sure it wasn't just the roads I was on but I'm betting I'm going to have them order me another PR4.

 

[timk]

RIDE-ON sealer/balancer would be another option.

 

[Mihalis fjr]

Has seat correctly the tire on the rim?Have a look..

I believe that the Tire hasn't seat correctly on the rim..Exactly the same happened to me...

 

[kleake]

Good point, I will check, however it looked ok as I did a quick spin when I put it on. I would think 42psi and about 90mph would have taken care of that though. lol

 

[Jer]

Completely wore out my PR3 and just had a new PR4 installed (front only). Only put on about 50 miles so far, but I think they didn't balance it right because I can feel a vibration start at around 65mph and gets worse as you get closer to 90mph. Not that I run fast like that often, but my old smooth tire was butter smooth up to infinity and beyond! They used those goofy stick on weights that I don't like, sooooo,, should I order me some of the clip on factory style weights and balance it myself (I do have a cheap but functional balancer) or shall I try dynabeads so I don't have to dismount and such? And IF I balance myself, where can I get the factory style weights cheap? I want to take it back and make them do it, but I just don't feel like dismounting it, driving all the way to their shop 20 miles away and then put it all back on. Grrrr

You apparently missed my June 03 post titled "Tire Balance." I had a similar problem and solved it by removing the front wheel and taking it to another dealer for a check. They found the weights to be several inches off from opposite the heavy point and also removed a quarter oz square. Ran the bike up to 80 afterwards and problem solved.

 

[kleake]

I did miss that, but I will look back at it. Did you have the bounce at 28-30mph as well or just the vibes at higher speeds? I'll have to look back at your posting.

 

[kleake]

I just read it. I do have my own static balancer, and I could have purchased the tire online for about $30 cheaper, I just didn't have the time to mess with it. Now that has bitten me and I'm messing with it anyway. I am going to look into a changer, in the past I did it with two LARGE screwdrivers and it worked, but I risk damaging a wheel and I didn't want to do that either.

 

[Auburn]

As others have said, I would pull the wheel and check / re-balance the wheel. If you still have an issue, then if could be a bad tire. Not too common, but not unheard of.

I would avoid Dyna beads at all cost. They make a mess out of the inside of the tire. If they were really that good, then every road racer in the world would be using them. If you look at the tire vendors at the track, every one of them are using balancer systems similar to the marc paynes and doing a static balance. IT doesn't have to stop rotation completely, but it should be barely moving. I have probably done about 200 sets of tire between racing, my own bikes and for others. I have had a couple that need to be rebalanced. It happens.