I have two Wheel Vintique 15x8 Buick style chrome rims I bought off the board a few years back and the shop I was going to buy tires from checked the rims and said they weren't true. I brought them back home, mounted them on a spindle I clamped down in a vise and checked them myself. They don't appear to be out left to right but the rim shell, where the tire bead seats varies by about .080" up and down as the wheel rotates. Basically, a wheel with a built in .080" bump from the lowest point. Basically, they told me they'd be OK on a car that didn't get driven very much but they might not balance out too well. Thoughts? Are all Wheel Vintiques this bad and can they be "fixed" in any way?
Just my opinion, but it doesn't seem like the end of the world to me. My vote is to mount a tire on it and see how it balances out.
When I worked as a mechanic, we considered 1/16" (.0625") to be out of true for alignment (you rotated the wheel and averaged it out). I don't recall that this amount out of true was an issue with balancing, although I did have to refund a board member when he got a wheel from me that was messed up. In this case, it was axial (side to side), not radial runout. I personally suspect that the tire shop bent the wheels when demounting the tires when putting them on my new wheels, but it ended up on me. C'est la vie. What the heck, it has been awhile since I've done a physics mechanics problem. I'll go do some math on what that amount of out of round does in terms of imbalance, and get back. Might take a few hours. Note that the big deal is, even if the tire is balanced, once it is on the road, it is "hopping up and down" by the amount out of round.
You cant balance those wheels through the center hole like a stock wheel. You have to balance them through the lug nut holes
I bolted the wheel to the hub and rotated it by hand to measure the runout. They told me they mounted it to the stud hole rig they use for the fancy wheels. Charged me $25 for the honor. I suspect a good bubble balance would do the trick mostly.
Not to bust your nuggets, but if a wheel isn't round, and a tire isn't round, just how good is moving the tire around the wheel until the imbalance is gone, since the result may still be something that still thumps up and down on the ground? This isn't racing, where a tire can be shaved for balance so that the car can make it some portion of 500 or 600 miles before they get tossed, but I think that the question is still legitimate.
Bubble balance means squat (sorry) in this case. We used to bubble balance tires all the time in the '70s and '80s, but the weights only got put on one side of the wheel. Guaranteed to be approximate.
match mounting can orient the wheels high spot with the tire's low spot. It might help mitigate the issue
The only real good way to measure would be total runout with the tire and rim combined. Match mounting will correct some issues- to a point, and a load balancer is the only real good way to do this. All that being said, I think Wheel Vintique's specs are supposed to be within .030 both lateral and radial on the rim alone. You might try contacting them to see what they say before doing anything else.
I didn't buy them from Wheel Vintique and I've not heard good things about their customer support. The wheel has a label that says, "You mount it, you own it!" They are within that spec laterally, just not radially round. I guess if you consider a mid point .000, they are only .040" out that way from a mid point.
I've mounted tires on wheels worse than that which rode like you were on a magic carpet. I've also mounted tires which appear to be perfect on rims which were much better and had vibrations. I bet you'll never notice (as long as it's balanced well). -Bob C.
I would suggest to find a balance shop with a road force balancer. (Basically match mounting balancing). This sounds like the perfect application for an issue like yours
Here is where you go to find the Hunter Road Force balancer in your area... http://www.gsp9700.com/search/findgsp9700.cfm Hunter Engineering GSP9700.com Check out this site for a complete understanding of "match mounting". Make sure the shop you go to actually knows how to use the machine. The tire and wheel should be marked up with chalk marks and sometimes numbers when they are done.
Tire stores are spoiled by machined alloy wheels with no visible run out so they freak out easily. The bare rim shell allows for .040". If you are looking at the inner (chassis side) tire bead area you will notice the rim shell is not round but has 10 flat spots where the rim is clamped into the polishing equipment when chroming. There's no way to measure that accurately. If you measure in the drop center opposite where the weld is that should be less than .040" out of round. Measure the front side tire bead face for run out, NOT the lip the weights clamp on to. Again .040" is allowed for the shell. The lip is a non controlled surface. I always use clamp on weights on the inner lip only because I don't like to see weights on the face of the wheel. If you try to use stick on weights you will need to add more weight due to them being moved to a smaller diameter where they have less effect. If you don't have to align the tire lettering to the valve stem for show purposes then move the tire around on the wheel to use the least amount of weight.
Sounds like a plan. Are you the guy that makes new wheels out of old centers? If so, I'd say that's good enough for me. I think I'll run them. Heck, we didn't even bother with this stuff in the old days when I was mounting/balancing tires unless it took excessive weight and the wheel noticeably wobbled on the machine.
Yeah I'm that guy. Give them a try they might turn out to be fine. FYI I have an old bubble balancer and have not paid for mounting or balancing in years.
Not to sideline this thread, but any idea on someone who could straighten a bent rim? I'm pretty sure I have one that needs some help. I really should just mount it up to a spindle to see how much the runout is, but I don't have anything to put it on at the moment. Ran it on a balancer without the tire and it had noticeable wobble.
I have two wheel repair shops right near me, both within about 20 miles. Based on that, I would suppose they are also pretty common in other parts of the country. http://www.rimpro.com/ http://www.wheel-repair-specialist.com/ If you can't find someone locally, send your wheels to me and I can bring them to one of the shops. You might also be able to ship directly, but I'd be happy to "manage" the work for you in order to ensure everything comes out the way you would like. -Bob C.
