wheel balance

[silveryam]

I just had a set of Michelin Pilot Road 4 tires installed and I noticed the rear wheel has no weights. What are the odds it balanced with no lead? I hate to accuse the dealer of not doing something but it seems odd it didn't need any weight

 

[Ignacio]

Unlikely, but not rare. Does the motorcycle vibrate at freeway speeds? If not, no worries.

 

[DennisJ]

My current rear tire BT-023GT was mounted with no additional weight and there is no vibration . I've seen others that have required several weights t hough so I think if is buyer's luck. I remember hearing/reading that the wheels are balanced from the factory but can't verify the information.

 

[Road_Runner]

I used to mount auto tires when I was <ahem> much younger. Michelins seemed to, on average, require less weights to balance. Guess they be rounder.

 

[leedavis]

Just last week I mounted a Conti Road Attack 2 GT that was balanced - needed no weights. It happens.

 

[gumba]

I get so excited when I mount a tire and don't have to add weight that I soil my calsones.

 

[Justin]

Unlikely, but not rare. Does the motorcycle vibrate at freeway speeds? If not, no worries.

This. If it's not balanced, you'll know when you ride it.

 

[ionbeam]

Unlikely, but not rare. Does the motorcycle vibrate at freeway speeds? If not, no worries.

Just last week I mounted a Conti Road Attack 2 GT that was balanced - needed no weights. It happens.

As Ignacio notes, no vibes, no issue. That's the point of balancing.

Great that sometimes you can get a tire to be balanced without adding weights, but wait, there is more to it than the tires. Most people that have had tires changed in Fred W's garage have had the bare rims put on the balancer and the light spot of the rim marked. The rims are not completely balanced so you have two items that are not zeroed out. If a tire took no weight it means that you got the heavy part of the tire located at the light spot on the rim and both imbalances cancel each other out. If you have the time and it really bothers you, you can move the tire position around the rim until you find the best possible orientation. When you do this the tire/rim may take from little to no weight. In the pictures below you can see where this rim had the light spot. You could balance the rim, then only have the tire imbalance to deal with, however there is always the possibility to use the imbalance of the rim to counter the imbalance of the tire. It kinda depends on how many beers you want to spend on doing the job

 

[kballowe]

Have changed a lot of tires over the years.

Balanced some... others not.

Never really felt any difference. Not much unsprung weight in a motorycle wheel/tire.

Always figured that if vibration was a problem, then it was the fault of the tire. In a lot of cases, have taken these same vibrating tires and rebalanced them but they still had the vibration.

There's a bucket full of motorcycle wheel weights in my garage.... taken off of motorcycle wheels when installing a new tire and balancing. I remember one in particular that had three ounces of weights .... but balanced perfectly without ANY weights.

Things that make you go "hmmmmmmm"

 

[dcarver]

I dare you. Buy any non-Shinko brand tire, install, no balance.

You won't notice any vibes.

Report results for confirmation.

Sent from iPad

 

[John d]

Front wheels are much more susceptible to bouncing than rear driven wheels. So even if your rear wheel is not quite balanced, you would be hard pressed to notice it.

 

[builderwill]

Have changed a lot of tires over the years.
Balanced some... others not.

Never really felt any difference. Not much unsprung weight in a motorycle wheel/tire.

Always figured that if vibration was a problem, then it was the fault of the tire. In a lot of cases, have taken these same vibrating tires and rebalanced them but they still had the vibration.

There's a bucket full of motorcycle wheel weights in my garage.... taken off of motorcycle wheels when installing a new tire and balancing. I remember one in particular that had three ounces of weights .... but balanced perfectly without ANY weights.

Things that make you go "hmmmmmmm"

I'm starting to think that way too. The last tire I put on was a front BT-023. I got in a hurry and forgot to balance until I was cleaning up and didn't feel like taking the wheel off again. Took it out for a quick spin to 130 MPH and felt nothing. Might have gotten lucky but I heard from others who never balance a MC tire. Going to try it again on my next tire and see what happens.

 

[kballowe]

Right now... Dyna Beads seem to be all the rage.

I purposely left out the beads on three tire changes and made sure to get in touch with the customers, a month or two later.

All three of them told me that the bike runs sooooo much smoother and that the tires even run cooler.

No, I didn't balance those, either (and didn't charge them)

I'm just that I'm the luckiest SOB there is. Right ?

The only problem that I've had is the rare tire defect... or in the case of the el cheapo tires, a more common wobble or vibration, that no amount of balancing will solve.

Note that (nowadays) I change tires only for friends. I do seem to have a lot of friends. ;-)

 

[builderwill]

I tried the dynabeads as well before I bought a balancer stand. Not a believer. Tried them in two sets of PR2's. Smooth as glass until about 95 mph and then I would get a head shake, everytime at nearly the same speed. Could just be luck but stopped using them, never another problem.

Actually just finished building a plant that makes an identical ceramic product, slightly smaller diameter (.5 mm) used in oil and gas well fracking. We had to waste at least 50 dumpster loads during start up. Couldn’t help but to think about grabbing a couple 5 gallon buckets and sell it in 2 oz baggies for $8 a peice! Cost 30 cents/lb to make.

 

[flstffxe]

Add me into the list of stopped balancing MC tires. Obviously I balanced them when I was in shops for customers who paid for balancing. However my own or when doing for friends, family and others I stopped balancing about 10 years ago.

I would guess I do between 20 and 100 tires a year depending on the year. Last year I did about 30 in the 2-4 weeks before Sturgis but the year before that maybe 20 all year.

As for MC tires. I would say my experience is that there is almost never an issue with any of the major name brands unless the tire is physically defective like being out of round. When you get into the cheaper tires like Kenda, Cheng Shin, Shinko... I have noticed they are more prone to vibration issues when not balanced and have a higher rate of defects. For cheap tires, Duro has seemed to be the best in these regards.

Seems most that do the darkside thing go with dynabeads, can't say I recall mounting a CT without them.

The important thing is to do what you are comfortable with. If you are not comfortable with not balancing by all means have them balanced, it's not that big of a deal, but if you don't it will be something that sits in the back of your mind every time you swing a leg over the bike. Just don't be surprised when you get a wheel back that has no weights on it, it happens more than one would expect.

 

[RaYzerman19]

As far as I'm concerned you're darned lucky if an FJR tire and wheel don't take weights..... e.g., both my (bare) wheels are way off...... 20 grams or so front, 30+ on the rear. They had 20 & 30 gram clip-on weights from the factory. I balanced the wheels and moved those to the best spot, supplemented with stick-on if needed, then mounted tires and balanced. Some tires have no marking, so lotsa luck there. I usually get away with between 0 & 4 x7 gram weights. If I find an oddly out of balance tire (very rare), I'll spin it on the wheel 180 and try again.

 

[HotRodZilla]

After my last tire change, my bike was glass smooth. Then suddenly, it started vibrating pretty good at 80+. Turns out I threw the weights off the front wheel. I put new ones on, and it had been fine since.

I had to have a CycleGear installed front re-balanced also. That one was bad from the install. Both of those were front wheels, so maybe the rear thing is correct.

 

[900gc]

All this reminds me of the MotoGP race about 5-6 seasons ago (China GP I think?), where Rossi pulled in due to a tire vibration issue. He points to the rear, the techs change it and he goes back out. A lap or two later, comes back in. Turns out it was the front that had chunked, not the rear. Now one would think that the legendary "Doctor" would have known which tire was the culprit. Guess not in this case. And why the pit crew didn't visually check the front to make sure it at least looked OK was a costly error.

 

[gumba]

I like a wheel (bare) with some imbalance. I use that imbalance to counter the imbalance of the tire. Have a spare FJ wheel that is in perfect balance and it always takes more weight than most.