Balanced tires...

not on your A-Body but your trailers. Had a blow out on the trailer last time I used it. Noticed there are no weights on the wheel, figured they might have gotten tossed off. Checked the remaining 3, no weights on any of them. Checked the small trailer, ditto....hmmm....so my question is does anyone else have unbalanced trailer tires????

Not even balanced on my camper....i was there the last time one was replaced at inspection, didn't even throw it on the machine...i didn't bother asking as hes an old family friend and new he wasn't trying to pull something over on me...so it must be common practice for trailer tires to go unbalanced...

None of my trailers' tires are balanced. 12 tires total at my house. Never had a problem.

all the wheels on my trailers have weights, even my boat trailer. it only takes a minute to balance them. if they are way outta whack it can cause un even wear.

The problem I have, and this includes the "popular" so called tire stores, it that you pay good money to have them balanced, and ..........they aren't.

I'm done with Les Schwab

I'm done with Perfection Tire, and it only took ONE TRIP

Went into Perfection after getting PO'd at Schwab. Told the guy "Here's your chance to get a new customer" and told him WHY

Bought a set of 4 tires for the old Ranger, had them mounted, and .....uh......"balanced"

Made one trip to PF and back about 15 miles. Immediately had to take them back to get at least one of the fronts re-balanced.

I just don't get it.............

when I worked at the dealer, we would occasionally have a tire that we balanced
need to be re-balanced after a few miles. I don't know if its from sitting in stacks for months in a warehouse or a temperature thing. I personally had it happen to some general tires I put on my own car. all the weights were still there and the tire was an ounce off.

Some tire brands are a pain in the *** to balance, Mastercraft being one of them. It also depends on the type of machine being used, the ones that simulate road force would be the most accurate, some shops might only have a dynamic balancer. Tires need a load on them to find their happy spot on the rim so after driving on them for a few miles the balance might be off a little.

Balancing trailer tires is a waste of time, you wont be able to feel any vibration from an out of balance trailer tire unless your riding in or on the trailer.

I'm normally a stickler for detail. I had a trailer tire repaired once and a new one mounted once at this particular local tire place. Both times they casually said that they normally don't do it, you don't feel it and they don't need it! I insisted, and they did.

Well, of course you don't feel it because it's on the trailer. But you would normally feel it in the vehicle you are sitting in. If anything can be felt, it means that it's not rolling as smoothly as it should. Any "imbalance" WILL cause some degree of irregular wear and undesirable harmonics, vibrations & loads on the wheel bearings & suspension. You can get by with it, just like with a factory engine balance job. It's "close enough". But if you want it, in my opinion, "done properly", balance them.

Over time, even balanced tires may wear unevenly enough to change the balance - regular tires or slicks, even if you don't feel anything. I've seriously considered it, but just never got around to rebalancing them part way through their life.

Locomotion said:

Any "imbalance" WILL cause some degree of irregular wear and undesirable harmonics, vibrations & loads on the wheel bearings & suspension. You can get by with it, just like with a factory engine balance job. It's "close enough". But if you want it, in my opinion, "done properly", balance them.Over time, even balanced tires may wear unevenly enough to change the balance - regular tires or slicks, even if you don't feel anything...

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^^Absolutely RIGHT! ^^ If a tire/wheel is out of balance just 2oz. it can cause 15lbs of additional force against the road surface on every revolution. That's quite a bit of force causing unnecessary wear & tear on tires, bearings & shocks etc.:shaking2: You should always have them dynamic balanced also. It makes a difference.

Heres the deal. I work at a co-op and work in the car care center. Now on all car tires its a no brainer balance new ones everytime. Now on the otherhand on your typical trailer the wheels probably arent balanced, its kind of personal preference and type of trailer that permits weather or not to balance them. From what ive seen if you have bias ply trailer tires. Balance or no balance chances are they are going to wear uneven, radial trailer tires on the other hand usually wear a lot better than bias ply trailer tires. That being said if i install trailer tires i wont balance unless there are weights already on them or the customer specifically requests it. Let me explain. If someone comes in with a nice double axle horse trailer with aluminum wheels than you bet i would balance them. If you get someone come in with a old wore out double axle horse trailer with rusty steel wheels and all the marker lights are busted and it looks like its been abused and mistreated than chances are they could care less if their tires are balanced. It just depends. Now if someone doesnt request they be balanced then i base it on trailer. We have a lot of flat bed trailers come in with 235/85r16 and we put 10-16 ply trailer tires on, 99 percent of the time they will not get balanced, no sense in it, in a 16ply tire the tire and wheel probably weigh about 50-75 lbs combined, no use in balancing them unless requested by the customer. Same on a single axle yard trailer and double axle yard trailer. If its a decent trailer and if it is requested they will get balanced. But if its not mentioned they probably wont get balanced. Thats the way i look at it. But im honest too if you ask me to balance them than they will get balanced no doubt about. Even though we dont charge extra if we balance them or not. I guess it just depends on where you have your tires installed. But also consider its hard to get trailer tires to wear perfect, varrying load weights and various roads/turns and driving habits have just as much to do with affecting tire wear as balance does.

Locomotion said:

I'm normally a stickler for detail. I had a trailer tire repaired once and a new one mounted once at this particular local tire place. Both times they casually said that they normally don't do it, you don't feel it and they don't need it! I insisted, and they did.

Well, of course you don't feel it because it's on the trailer. But you would normally feel it in the vehicle you are sitting in. If anything can be felt, it means that it's not rolling as smoothly as it should. Any "imbalance" WILL cause some degree of irregular wear and undesirable harmonics, vibrations & loads on the wheel bearings & suspension. You can get by with it, just like with a factory engine balance job. It's "close enough". But if you want it, in my opinion, "done properly", balance them.

Over time, even balanced tires may wear unevenly enough to change the balance - regular tires or slicks, even if you don't feel anything. I've seriously considered it, but just never got around to rebalancing them part way through their life.

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For optimim tire life and even wear. Rotate every 3,000 or 6,000 and rebalance every 6,000 in cars anyway. Probably wouldnt be a bad idea to rotate trailer tires as well

A trailer with balanced wheels; stops/brakes better, handles better & uses less fuel to tow it than a trailer with unbalanced wheels. In addition to the wear & tear on components.

Lonewolf3165 said:

A trailer with balanced wheels; stops/brakes better, handles better & uses less fuel to tow it than a trailer with unbalanced wheels. In addition to the wear & tear on components.

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1. Balanced/unbalanced trailer tires will have no effect on stopping. On a trailer without trailer brakes the tow vehicle provides the stopping power, and on trailers with trailer brakes the tow vehicle/trailer work simultaneously to provide braking power unbalanced trailer tires will not affect either situation. Load weight and load placement/weight distribution will affect braking on the trailer/tow vehicle.

2. Trailers do not handle reguardless of balanced/unbalanced tires. Their intent is to haul loads not to be able to go around mountain curves and menuver through traffic above the speed limit or carelessly. Load weight and load placement/weight distribution will affect handling characteristics of both the trailer/ tow vehicle

3. If your towing a trailer your probably not concerned that much about fuel efficiency. Load weight and stop and go traffic or highway driving will determine fuel effeciency more than anything.

Although the main thing i agree with is that unbalanced trailer tires can in some cases affect tire wear and ride in the trailer and the tow rig, and also cause more wear and tear on the bearings.

JMO not looking to argue

When I was in the mattress manufacturing business I ran three cargo trailers that hauled a minimum of 700,000 miles between them during the time I owned them. Not one balanced tire in the bunch and never had any uneven wear or premature blow outs. Never had bearing issues either. When hauling raw supplies in to the plant we were at the legal maximum load limits for the rig.

I suspect a lot of the problem with tires today is the word "Rated" because we no longer get the plys we used to. Years ago I wouldn't think about using 10+ year old tires if they looked good. Today I wouldn't do that after having one go to crap on my CRV and seeing many other like new tires that have blown out.

"Today's load range/ply ratings do not count the actual number of body ply layers used to make up the tire’s internal structure, but indicate an equivalent strength compared to early bias ply tires. Most radial passenger tires have one or two body plies, and light truck tires, even those with heavy-duty ratings (10-, 12- or 14-ply rated), actually have only two or three fabric plies, or one steel body ply."

http://www.tirerack.com/tires/tirete....jsp?techid=55

To this day I still don't run balanced tires on any of my trailers and I even have my own equipment to balance them. I do replace them a lot more often because I don't trust the ply "Rated" crap.