RkFast

So I had my tires Road Force balanced at a local shop. One with a great reputation. Got the car back and it rides smooth as glass. Great.

One of the little habits I always have after tire work is to take note of how much weight went on and where, mostly so that I know in case I throw a weight. Well, I peer at the tires and I have multiple weights on the same side, which is like a a pretty hack job of balancing a tire/wheel assembly.

So Im kinda pissed for the lazy work they did.

But....the car rides great.

So leave it or have them re-do the balancing so that there is only one weight on each side of the wheel? I keep reading how "wrong" it is to have more than one weight on one side of a wheel. And I get that. But Im thinking no harm no foul here. Even if its technically the wrong way to do it, the results were good...that is, a smooth riding car.

Thoughts?

Simba91102

This is a good question. Back in the "old" days, what you say about having weights on both sides was the way to do it correctly (though I've never heard of the "no more than one weight on each side" rule). With the more sensitive (and advanced) balance machines in use now, it wouldn't surprise me at all if they can pinpoint just where, and how much, the weight should be applied. And that may well be on just one side. Perhaps you should ask the shop who performed the service about the process, and share your concerns with them (before you express any anger or disrespect).

mrgold35

Do you have OEM or Aftermarket rims? OEM rims seem to be well balance. My thinking is maybe they really didn't fully road force balanced and adjusted the tire(s) on the rim to limit the amount of weights. They might have just compensated with extra weights instead. I don't know if adjusting the tires(s) or just using extra weights are exactly the same thing in the long run since the smooth ride is the end results in both cases?

Side note: I purchased a TQ wrench and always re-TQ to 80 lb-ft all the lugs when I get home. There have been times the lugs felt well over 120 lb-ft when I was trying to loosen to re-TQ. I had to get a 2-foot breaker bar for some of lugs that were way to tight. They (Discount Tire) once broke a stud putting on a lug nut once.

RkFast

Car has stock rims and I have had a BEAR of a time trying to get a smooth ride out of it. Always a mystery. There is actually a record of it on this forum, if youre interested in reading it...lol. Ive had such a bad time with it, Ive more or less come to the conclusion that the whole "road force" thing is a scam. I have not been able to get a smooth ride in over 15 times with 10 different shops trying to RFB four different sets of tires. Unreal.

In fact, the ONLY people who have been able to get my car to run smooth are two shops that did it "wrong." One rim repair guy who had a second hand "generic" balancer who also didnt put weights on by the book and put multiple weights in different spots on one side of the wheel and the other shop mentioned above.