Morris Minor Owners Club

The way I read it - it says £2.68 each -supplied in bags of 25.............. But happy to be proved wrong - seems a bargain price if it's 25 valves for £2.68.........

Certainly if you can get it done 'on the quiet' for £10 cash - that's a good deal. Many places want to charge very much more than that - as a 'punishment' for not buying the tyres from them! It's very easy to balance your wheels on the car.....which takes account of the very out-of-balance brake drum - which off car balancing does not.

so how do we balence tyres or drums on the car

thanks

bmcecosse wrote:The way I read it - it says £2.68 each -supplied in bags of 25.............. But happy to be proved wrong - seems a bargain price if it's 25 valves for £2.68.........

I could post a piccy of the 23 I have left over... The postage from this place is expensive though, in the end worked out at nearly 40p per valve.

I've explained that before Dennis! Back off the adjuster on the front drum (or remove pads if you have daft discs fitted ) - check the wheel swings freely and allow it to settle. Mark the lowest postion with chalk - and repeat a couple of times to see if you get same result. Then turn the wheel so the chalk mark is at 3 o'clock - and add weights at 9 o'clock until the chalk mark doesn't want to swing down. Check it a couple of times to make sure it now settles 'anywhere' - and fix the weights in postion. Of course - you need to be sure you put the wheel back on the same studs in future - so make a mark with paint or marker pen on one stud tip - and on the wheel adjacent. Yes -it's only a 'static' balance - works fine with my car - right round into the fuel gauge ( off road, of course ). And yes - it's only the front wheels. Never found a need to do the rears - but I suppose possible if you pull out the half shaft first.

aupickup wrote:so how do we balence tyres or drums on the car

thanks

My thoughts could be:

Jack the wheel up.
Spin it slowly until it rests, you may see the wheel rock to and throw before it stops.
You then need to put a weight on the very top of the wheel, start with a 5. (logic is the heavy point sits at the bottom)
Spin the wheel again and repeat until the wheel loses that to and throw before it stops and spins evenly.


That's how we balanced grinding wheels anyway, except the weights where adjustable.

Ive got a great little gizmo i bought years and years ago. You remove the wheel plonk it on top if this little thing with a bubble in the centre and distribute balance weights until the bubble is centred - works great No idea where I bought it, when or who made it.

thanks roy and dean

catswhisker wrote:
I may be mising something here, but I dont see the point in struggling to change tyres / valves
yourself when you are probably going to have to go to get the wheels balanced anyway.

1) you get the chance to clean and paint the wheel, including the critical bead seat area.
2) you don't get the wheel nuts tightened up by a gorilla with rattle gun (not that they all are, and some use torque wrenches, and some even realise that 7/16 studes don't need 85 lbft)
3) there's certain satisfaction in knowing there's another task you can do for yourself
4) they may not need balancing, and if they do, you can do it yourself plenty well enough for normal use of a Moggy. And there's a strong argument for letting a tyre settle in for a few hundred miles before balancing.

It's an interesting comment on how well wheels are balanced commercially if you look at the typical wheel, with balance weights scattered round the rim. Nice, original, narrow rims are far less likely to need dynamic balancing.

catswhisker wrote: I took 4 wheels and new Toyo tyres to my local tyre place,had a quiet word,flashed a tenner,
twenty minutes later,job done. Fitted and balanced, old casings disposed of and the bloke
even loaded them into my car.
Money well spent I reckon .

Well, yes, but that's about like saying you got four new tyres for 20 quid by slipping it to the tyre fitter to steal them for you. It may have been a one-man operation, with a very generous "one man", but more likely that it should have gone through the firm's (and the taxman's) books.

billlobban wrote:Ive got a great little gizmo i bought years and years ago. You remove the wheel plonk it on top if this little thing with a bubble in the centre and distribute balance weights until the bubble is centred - works great No idea where I bought it, when or who made it.

Known as a "bubble balancer" or "static wheel balancer", they're one of the few bits of kit that Frost sell cheaper than most places, at around 60 quid. Or it shouldn't be too difficult to make one - anyone here a teacher who could set it as a design and build project?

Kevin