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Road force balance

6K views 7 replies 4 participants last post by  IcarusLSC 
#1 ·
Man. I'm having a hard time here balancing my new 33" Duratracs on my pro comp 7069 wheels. I just brought my jeep to a place that does road force balancing, I'm paying about $150 to have all 5 tires road forced but now the guy's telling me that spinning the tires on the wheels or swapping wheels and tires is not included in the price. That that's diagnostic and can take all day. He's putting 10-14 oz on each wheel. Yikes. I'm sick of this headache. This is the 3rd time I've had them balanced. And I thought I was going to get a very thorough job here. This is just basic balancing with a big roller applied. Everything I've read about road force is that it includes all that swapping of wheels and tires if necessary. Is that right?
 
#2 ·
road forcing applies a roller to them to simulate the forces the tire and rim are seeing when on a vehicle and it measures the run out of the tire. the measurement then allows you to put the tires that would be quietest and tires with the least vibration in the proper locations for the best ride. essentially its expensive and it does take time. really dont believe you should need it on a 33in tire, unless you rims are out of round or something, there should not be more than 3oz of weight max usually at any given location on a wheel, inside or outside to get it balanced properly. if you tires are excessively worn unevenly and trying to get them roadforced i could see the reason for so much weight to try to get them spinning try and even and without giving you a poor ride.
 
#3 ·
Okay so here's an update. I have been having a steering wheel shimmy between about 42-55mph, hence the multiple balances. What ended up happening today was he found that the right front passenger side tire had too much run out to be fixed. It was a bad tire. And it couldn't be fixed by match mounting either, according to the machine, and I saw the screen. So I called tire rack and they are replacing it under warranty. And somehow I got out of the shop only paying $70 (with a $20 off coupon) less than half what I thought it would be. I didnt ask, just smiled and handed over my card.

Now, I still have about 6-14oz. of weights on these wheels. Which is a lot, but if the shimmy is cured, whatever. They are cheap wheels, pro comp 7069's, so maybe that's why. I haven't taken the jeep on the freeway yet to see if the shimmy is gone, I'm really hoping it is. I'll post up again once I do get up to speed.
 
#4 ·
check out Dynabeads. Been running them in my 33's and no problems
 
#5 ·
Sounds like he is wanting to ForceMatch (MatchMaker) them above just the RoadForce balancing. That matches tires to the rims runout for best balance. It is time consuming though so a lot of shops don't do it unless asked or have issues.

I'm surprised it still took that much weight, sounds like some funky tires or rims. (Probably tires.)
 
#6 ·
They're brand new 33" goodyear Duratracs, just like lots of people on here run With pro comp 7069's, also like lots of people on here run. It's funny that people are saying its a lot of weight, but the last two places I took the tires said they usually see 10-12 oz. per wheel with these bigger tires on small wheels. I'm not saying there's 14 oz. in one spot, but spread over a couple different places on the wheel.

As far as the match mounting, yes I was under the impression that it was a standard part of the road force balance. The guy today said it wasn't. Unless there was a problem. When he found the tire with excess runout, he (and the computer) said match mounting wouldn't fix it. So I assume if match mounting would've fixed it then he would've done it to that tire. I'm hoping anyway! Because he didn't spin any of the tires on the rims.
 
#8 ·
Shimmy can be a lot things in Jeep (very minor DW due to loose/worn steering/susp items etc...)

MatchMaking is not usually included unless asked for or agreed on that I've usually seen. Usually not needed either though. $150 for 5 tires is a bit high for basic RoadForce balance even up here. I'd think it would include spinning them on the rim as that is very easy at least (more so with the bigger tires! If they find a funny one, they let the air out, break the bead, spin it 180* and try again. Takes all of 2-3 min. tops on a GSP machine) Then they would move on to MatchMaking if need be if still an issue, which will probably cost more then.

What kind of weights are they using? They should not be place all around. That means they are fighting each other for balance if you think about it, unless they are doing an option on the Hunter machines which hides the stick-on weights behind the spokes (doubtful on a Jeep.) The split-weight feature will split a heavy amount but they usually are closer to each other.

Now all this above is at a shop that really cares, which honestly, many don't much. Most will try to make as much as they can in as little time as possible. The other thing is these Hunter machines can be temperamental if not taken care of and calibrated on a regular basis (the newer ones are better at least it seems.) Measuring rim-runout is also done wrong at many places too. How they are setup with weight blinds etc is also important as it can say balanced/OK but with the hidden blinds still need weight. RoadForce limits can be altered too. These are a per shop decisions too set too so all aren't the same! The machines can be very complicated when using MatchMaking and StraightTrak etc. They can be great machines but lots of techs have love/hate relation with them ;)
 
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