Weight less Wheel Balancing - More Snake Oil

[Mighty Mike]

Ok I heard about this a good 7 to 8 years ago and then just faded from memory and recently again came to my attention, The concept seems found and seems like a very cheap, easy and solid solution to a problem that sometimes just wont go away, specially people who have large chunky off road wheels. 

So the theory is these plastic beads by centrifugal forces are shoved to the right spot in the tyre due the wobble of the wheel, And its suppose to be a fit and forget type of solution because as the tyre wears they automatically adjust themselves with in the tyre, Initially they were introduced by a company called Dynabeads but they are nothing but plastic pellets so basically anyt plastic pellets can be used, BB pellets seem to be the popular alternative.

Here is a tiny video demo'ing the theory

 Also a two part long term review of someone who used this method for balancing his tires. I'm always more interested in long term terms as to see how something holds out over long term useage

 

Six months down the road
 

 

Also another interesting way to a DIY tyre balance job at home, Bubble balancing, not really weightless but I thought I would include it here, didn't know about this until recently, but I dunno how well this would work. A little more looking into it show these were how tyres were balanced before the days of digital wheel balacing machines and suppose to work very well when done right, what are your thoughts on this?

 

[Barry]

For small car tyres, its easiest just to use hammer on or stick on weights.

I can't comment too much on the beads. I've never used them personally but I have seen people using them and they seem to work fine. 

When I was driving articulated trucks, we used small sandbags inside the tyre to balance them and it worked perfectly. A truck tyre is so big and will be naturally unbalanced and the amount of weights you would have to stick on the rim would make it dangerous if they decided to fly off.

Ive also used the bubble type balancers in a shop I worked in before. They are ok if it's all you have, but it has to be set up on proper level ground and the wheel has to be properly centered. It's easy to make a mistake with them if you don't know what you're doing and set a wheel badly off balance. I much prefer the electronic machines, especially the modern ones that will check for runout and flat spots. Less margin for error but then again, it's all down to the operator.

[Gaurav]

I have never heard or seen this but using my common sense if this has to work then why after pop-out in sand our perfectly balanced tires goes off-balance due to some grams or a kg of sand

[Barry]

When the tyre pops off the rim, it's going to spin around a bit. Even a few degrees from what it was, it's going to be out of balance anyway, sand or no sand inside because the weights on the rim don't correspond to the original position on the tyre any more.

I have never put loose sand inside a tyre so I don't know, I used sand bags. But I think the above explanation works.

[Mighty Mike]

Interesting, never heard of sandbags in HGVs

[Mighty Mike]

1 hour ago, Gaurav said:

I have never heard or seen this but using my common sense if this has to work then why after pop-out in sand our perfectly balanced tires goes off-balance due to some grams or a kg of sand

The concept is of counter weight balancing and there are charts available online that tells you the amount/weight of beads you should use for the size of your tyres, when you have a pop out, you get a good amount of sand in tyre which acts in a negative way, instead of acting as counter balance weights. 

From what I remember its just a few ounces or around 100 grams for a regular 4x4 tire.

Although if it works, I think it would be a great DIY hack, just fill and forget it until the life of the tyre

[desertdude]

I've always wanted to try this, but by the time its time to change tyres I've forgotten about this! Note to self remember to use balancing beads the next time you change tyres!

[Gaurav]

49 minutes ago, desertdude said:

I've always wanted to try this, but by the time its time to change tyres I've forgotten about this! Note to self remember to use balancing beads the next time you change tyres!

Good luck and do share your experience if you remember on-time to use it.

[desertdude]

You know I will, IF I can remember to that is, as you know I just need to a certain amount of research before I'm satifised and will just go ahead and do it, and not listen to the naysayers, be it diesel oil, water injestation, fender trimming, sawing off bumpers etc etc And till now none of my DIY hacks or ghettos mods, even if they didn't add anything, did not have any negative effects. At least they killed my curiosity on a certain subject.  

[treks]

43 minutes ago, desertdude said:

You know I will, IF I can remember to that is, as you know I just need to a certain amount of research before I'm satifised and will just go ahead and do it, and not listen to the naysayers, be it diesel oil, water injestation, fender trimming, sawing off bumpers etc etc And till now none of my DIY hacks or ghettos mods, even if they didn't add anything, did not have any negative effects. At least they killed my curiosity on a certain subject.  

You can rest easy- the beads do actually work, although the trick to making them work is to know how many to put in if your rims are slightly less than perfectly round. Try and try again, but I've seen beads balance tires on damaged rims that could not be balanced in any other way.