Balancing
 

Left my old Compomotive wheels at a garage this morning to have new tires put on. The mechanic calls me and tells me the center piece is "frozen" and they cannot get the wheels on the machine to balance them.
I am not a wheel or tire expert, but is there a different way of balancing them? And/or a trick to prevent the centers from "freezing."
They are my old 16 inch rims, and I am waiting for new 17 inch rims from Vintagewheels, but had hoped to keep my old ones for spares.
Anyone with similar experience or solutions?
Thanks.

Are you talking about the spinners.

If so, make sure they are hitting them in the right dirction to pull them off.

Yes. The threaded unit in the center of the wheel.

If you are sure you are hitting them in the right direction, you may want to continue to hit the spinner .... it will come off.

Also, do a search for this, someone had the same problem and believed they used a heat gun.

They are hitting them in the wrong direction!

There are a few tire shops which can do it while the tire is on the car. Old school machine spins the tire while one end of the car is jacked in the air and the tech puts his hand on the body to feel vibration while guessing and checking with weights. It's an art. Cost is around $30.00/tire but when I had it done the guy wouldn't do the rears. Not really sure why not.

You still need a way to get your tires loose though and I can't speak from experience but the spinners turn to the rear of the car. Passenger side counterclockwise, drivers side clockwise. Somebody correct me if I'm wrong. Then to install use some antiseize on them so they don't get stuck again.

John

Tops to the front to take them off.

Use a lead hammer, hit an ear, turn the wheel 120 degrees, hit the ear, rotate 120 degrees, etc..

Bob

I've never thought much of this technique - it's always smacked of a quickie, Sears Auto Repair method. I'm sure the right setup in a skilled operator's hands can turn out acceptable results, but really... all that's gained is the time to pull the wheels off, and there is no way the precision can be a high as with a good spin balancer.

That used to be my thinking as well.

HOWEVER, when my new SPF had a front end vibration that couldn't be balanced out by three different machines, I went the "on the car" method.
It balances all the rotating mass, not just the tire and wheel. In thirty minutes, my front end was as smooth as glass. The only way I'll balance my fronts from now on!

I don't doubt it solved your problem and that the process has its place in the big toolbox of car solutions. It's usually boosted for two reasons: It's quicker because the wheels don't have to be demounted (translation: lazy shop wants to shove cars through faster) and it "balances the whole rotating assembly." Well... if your hub and rotor or drum aren't balanced the way a machinist would consider them balanced, you've got other problems and wheel weights aren't likely to be a long-term solution.

The rotating mass that ISN'T tire and wheel is negligible at road rotation speeds. You'd have to have a disc rotor that was visibly misshapen, or a bad hub or bearings, for them to have much effect on road vibration. Few such cases would be curable by tire balancing. That, taken with the lower precision of the technique overall, makes it at best a special case option. Glad it worked for you, but I'd never have a daily driver balanced this way, much less something lightweight and intended to be driven fast.

BTW, the OP said he "left his old wheels at the shop" - I'm not sure any of the comments about frozen spinners or whacking them the wrong way applies. I don't know what he means, to be honest...

That used to be the way to balance tires on motorcycles. That was the step above bubble balancers and at the time there were few spin balancers that could take a bike wheel. The only thing I had concerns about were some of the items you don't seem to feel are an issue. Maybe on a car, but on a bike, bearings( they are predominantly ball and not tapered roller) can create vibration issues. So I was never thrilled with them because I felt that unless you had a new tire installed and could check the bearings, you could be masking a potentially serious problem. That may be one reason that the rears wouldn't be done by the balancer. He knew that all the CVs as well as differential components could trigger a vibration. These used a strobe light though, I'm not sure about the "feeling" the vibrations....probably take a better feel than I've got...and it's pretty good.:)

The spinner center of the Compomotive wheels, five bolts, are held in place by a couple of Allen screws on the sides. Loosening these should allow the spinner unit to be moved out. Except for the first one the shop tried, it did not. They managed to scratch the end as well and bend the plate that covers the lugnuts. This weekend I will try as well.
I have had these wheels for some 13 to 14 years and I happen to like them and kept putting off buying new rims, until I finally have to admit that finding 16 inch tires to fit in the rear seens to be next to impossible (275/50/16 range).
The wheels have been off before (obviously), but I have had no reason to move the spinners before. Now, it sounds like a good idea to loosen them every so often.
So, I have ordered new wheels from Vintage wheels for the sake of finding tires, but would like to keep my old ones as well. The Vintage wheel sales peson was very helpful so I am hopeful that these wheels will will work out nicely.
Right now the car is on jack stands, while we hit +90 degrees in NY today, a 100-year record, according the news. And to make things worse, today I got an invitation in the mail to test drive a new Ferrari (California?) at Monticello (guess they have to "sell" cars too in this economy). Don't know how I got on that list, but I am itching to drive my ERA.

Balancing - more
 

I have still not been able to get out the center pieces of my wheels. I am attaching two photos - outside and inside - if someone has a bright idea. The shop managed to get this one lose and scratched. I can turn it both ways but it does not come out. So far I have resisted using much force in case I damage the threads. But I am not even sure the threads hold it in place - or whether the threads are just for looks and to hold wingnut. Any ideas, before I have to find another shop? Thanks.

http://img504.imageshack.us/img504/9890/wheel2n.jpg

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http://img405.imageshack.us/img405/763/wheel1g.jpg

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Most Dynamic Ballancers have adapters to fit the five lugs. So you center the wheel with tapered lugs.

couple of ideas
 

Omathisen First off, It looks like someone has some black stuff between the rim and the center cap?? RTV?? Some RTV eat Aluminum and corriode it. To get the center caps off I would try a large press with wood blocks to remove them. Antiseize needs to be coated on both parts. If that doesn't work easy, then adding a little heat around the rim and again try tapping out the center. The last thing would be to airgun or drill and grind out the centers and buy new center caps. Cheaper to replace centers than rims. If hitting the center use ONLY a BRASS, LEAD or DEADBLOW PLASTIC HAMMER.
If these things fail, call a rim repair man that can come to your house or place of work. Rick L.

Pull the set screws completly out and see if there is another one in the hole.
Some times they double up the set screws, using another set screw like a jamnut to lock the first set screw in.

Just a thought.

Not wanting to do any further damage, I took the wheels to race car engineer my son knows this Saturday. He took one look at the wheels, put them upside down, and tapped out the center. Took all of five seconds.
I got sidetracked by the original mechanic and the threads and did not help that Compomotive did not answer my inquiries.
The engineer told me that he could tell that the threads were "outside" and did not go into the center of the wheel, and the "lip" inside was an optical illusion.
So that was all of 20 seconds, plus 15 more minutes to file away the scratches on the center that the first shop damaged and redoing the threads so the wingnut fits again (better than before). It sure helps when you find somebody who knows what he is doing.
So now I have two sets of good wheels.