Rep Power: 452

My mom had new tires put on yesterday at discount tire and everything is fine but I was wondering I was changing her oil yesterday and noticed that on the right front tire there are 2 wheel weights on the inside of the rim, they arent next to each other but they are accross from each other. One is 1.00 weight and the one accorss from it is a 0.75 weight. there is only one on the outside rim, but is this ok? none of the other tires are that way, all the other tires have one weight on each side. The rim isnt bent or anything. I have tooken a class in school on tires and balancing but cant really remember the tire balancing stuff. I have been told as long as the tire balances it is ok, but also you dont want weights all over the tire. But 2 is ok. Just wondering if this is normal?

 
Rep Power: 0

yea its ok.. Some places use machine that balances the tire using the lugs instead of the centric ring, like the Hunter GSP9700. the machine tells specifically where on the tire it's not balanced. This cuts down on tire vibration. Some rims require more weights than others.

 
Rep Power: 452

cool, thanks just wanted to be sure, her other tires had only one weight on each side so I wasnt sure.

 
Rep Power: 0

I have a couple like that and had no problems.

 
Rep Power: 327

typically what it means is they put weights on, spun it again to zero balance it and it called for more weight in a different spot. This is sometimes caused from balance error, and or the tech that did the work fooked up

 
Rep Power: 0

... and was too lazy to try again from the beginning

 
Rep Power: 309

precisely, they probably just put the first weights a lil off and exposed a new problem, your tires will be fine dont worry,

 
Rep Power: 279

That's half *** work......essentially that tire is counter balanced. I'd make them re-do it. My guys would never get away with that kind of work....

 
Rep Power: 340

im getting Honda to install wheel wheights that are stuck inside the rim

 
Rep Power: 309

just some helpful info.
when mounting a tire you mount the yellow dot next to the valve stem, then try to match the red spot with the low-point of the rim. check if the yellow dot is near the valve stem and if it isnt than that would most likely be the reason why they added 1 extra weight, and its not half-assed it doesnt make a difference.

 
Rep Power: 279

It is half assed, lazy work. You have 1.00 and .75, 180 degrees across from one another.....when in relaity you may only need .25 on that side of the rim. Lining up the yellow dot with the valve stem has nothing to do with 1 extra weight, it has to do with people not knowing WTF they are doing. It is the kind of sh*t work I see from Sears, Wal-Mart, Americas Tire, Costco, and the other discount chains, and in my shop it is not acceptable, plain & simple. That type of work comes from the same shops that do crap alignments for some of you, as well as 'forget' to tighten wheels, and leave oil drain plugs loose.....

 
Rep Power: 286

umm.. I've actually come across tires where this was the situation. I was the tire installer, btw. I thought I messed up on the weights, or it was a balancer error. So I took the weights off, and re-did everything, and the situation was the same. I had 2 weights across from each other.

Sometimes this is the situation. It has nothing to do with lazy a$$ people. I noticed this happens more on trucks and vans rather than cars.

 
Rep Power: 279

I have been doing this for the better part of 16 years, and unless you have a balancer with a calibration issue, it should not happen.

 
Rep Power: 452

but Is it something to worry about? It is on my moms car, and she wants to know if it will be an issue down the road? Will she have tire wearing issues different from the other tires? She wants to know if the tire will wear out sooner or have tread issues?

 
Rep Power: 327

^^^^^^ is 100% correct . i wouldnt be WORRIED per say about it. But in the real world it does happen. Hell, im sorta surprised when i see a tire jockey actually zero balance a tire in the first place

 
Rep Power: 303

isn't it possible that there's more mass on one side of the tire?...

 
Rep Power: 309

yes^
i dont agree that it should never happen like this because if the top of the tire is perfect on both sides and has a 1g weight on inside and bottom of tire has .75g weight on outside it could be because the two sidewalls on the bottom are diff, now im not starting an argument, this is just how i see it and many people ive talked to said that it is possible and that theyve run into the problem that a machine will say put xx weights on this side then spin it again and it will say put xx weights here.
it is possible my fathers machine needs recalibration but ive done alot of tires (sometimes 15 a day) and ive run into this problem before. it can be considered half assed but it really doesnt matter. its just one of those situations where its a judgement call. if it kept telling me to put more weights without a question id restart it or if it said to put more than 1.5g on a side id try it again. for extremes like that id say its half-assed

 
Rep Power: 811

maybe you should take it to a real repair shop that specializes in balance/alignment and not some idiot place like sam's club or discount (crappy) tire. My balance was seriously messed up and the stupid place was not able to do it right at all. Took it to somewhere better and its perfect.

 
Rep Power: 279

We zero out all of our tires, and in extreme instances, can do a 'target' method, and go from increments of .25 ounce to .01 ounces. That is for your really sensitive stuff, but otherwise, always zeroed. After the weights are put on, we spin it again to check it. Just the way I expect it done, nothing else flies as long as I ruin the show.

 
Rep Power: 327

i personally zero out every tire i balance, but then again i balance maybe 4 tires a month anymore

 
Rep Power: 309

ive never let a tire go that wasnt zeroed out, i think its stupid if someone does and id flip out wanting my money back if i saw someone do it, or if they were doin it at my shop id hit them with a tire iron

 
Rep Power: 0

i smashed my finger putting a big as wheel on the balancer.. caught between the wheel and shaft.. this was yesterday.. i think i gotta bring it to the hospital.. my entire first digit of my fiber if full of blood

 
Rep Power: 309

^ damn sounds painful, one time i was mounting a tire and the bead wasnt sitting on the lip yet so i was pushing it down to loosen it and it finally popped up and caught the tip of my fingers between the bead and the rim, with so much psi in the tire i couldnt imagine how much pressure was on my finger tip but it hurt for a week

 
Rep Power: 0

I balance every tire to at least 0.15 ounces (usually better than zero on round off setting). When on the round off setting, a tire could be at 0.24 ounces but it will round off to zero. It's nothing you'd feel, i mean you could have a rock in your tread that is 0.25 ounces. I work at Costco and no we are not a bunch of hackers!!... at least not at the one i work at. Unless the rim or tire is sereously messed up, we never have 2 weights per side and never have more than 2 ounces per side, or a total of 3 ounces both sides added together. Anything more and we start to match mount, or used a different tire.

 
Rep Power: 309

if a rim is messed up to the point that extreme weights have to be added you might want to check the tire for lateral runout and then dismount and check the rim for laterla runout, they could be bent