Hunter Road Force

[cp3]

Is it worth the extra cost to have this balancing machine used?

Looking at ordering tires online so I looked up local shops that use Road Force and called a couple. One place is &7.50 for a regular balance or $25 for Road Force, per tire. The second place was $8.50/$30. It's not a huge cost but $45 vs $150 for the 6 tires I need is a big difference and slightly more than the cost of a tire.

 

[sasilverbullet]

Yes, worth it when buying new tires. They'll know right away if any of them are bad from the factory. Every time I buy four tires, at least one of them comes up bad. Saved me a lot of time and heartache to have it fixed before I hit the road for the first time.

Disclaimer - I do know a shop that has such experienced guys that they can tell the same thing with the old style machine. Trouble is, finding those experienced folks!

 

[Kira]

Hello, Man, I never thought of the "quality control" response. I was going to say that I've found 3 tradesmen who do a perfect job balancing tires with a common spin balancer. I had my snows road force balanced and could feel no difference. It's an unmatched comparison, I know. I think I'll stick with my regular guys until I buy a set of 4 as sasilverbullet says. Kira

 

[ctrcbob]

Originally Posted By: cp3
Is it worth the extra cost to have this balancing machine used?

Looking at ordering tires online so I looked up local shops that use Road Force and called a couple. One place is &7.50 for a regular balance or $25 for Road Force, per tire. The second place was $8.50/$30. It's not a huge cost but $45 vs $150 for the 6 tires I need is a big difference and slightly more than the cost of a tire.


Road Force is great, if done correctly. Not everyone does it correctly. Your costs seem high but that is CDN. Get the regular balance done, then if you are not happy, take a short trip from your Canadian home, cross the border and check out the various Dunn Tire locations in Buffalo. I got a GREAT Road Force Balance done at the Dunn Tire location in Henrietta (Rochester) NY. This location is/was the only Rochester location that had the Hunter Road Force machine, and they did a GREAT job. Cost me less than $70 USD and from the time I walked in, to the time I left, was just over an hour.

 

[stephen9666]

Originally Posted By: sasilverbullet
Every time I buy four tires, at least one of them comes up bad.


Are you serious?

I worked in a tire shop and I've bought quite a few sets of tires in my day. I've never bought a set of tires with a bad tire, and probably only had a handful that I installed ever turn out to be bad. No where near one out of four tires is bad, from my experience.

It's much more likely that you're getting installers who don't properly balance the tires.

To the OP-
I don't think the extra money is worth it for the road force balance, unless you have a balance problem that it can help correct.

 

[SteveSRT8]

We've only had one bad tire in as long as I remember.

And we buy 12-16 PER YEAR!

Time to start buying better tires.

 

[cchase]

Originally Posted By: sasilverbullet
Yes, worth it when buying new tires. They'll know right away if any of them are bad from the factory. Every time I buy four tires, at least one of them comes up bad. Saved me a lot of time and heartache to have it fixed before I hit the road for the first time.

Disclaimer - I do know a shop that has such experienced guys that they can tell the same thing with the old style machine. Trouble is, finding those experienced folks!


What brand of tire (so I don't ever buy them)? I've never even seen a bad tire.

 

[sasilverbullet]

Originally Posted By: stephen9666
Originally Posted By: sasilverbullet
Every time I buy four tires, at least one of them comes up bad.


Are you serious?

I worked in a tire shop and I've bought quite a few sets of tires in my day. I've never bought a set of tires with a bad tire, and probably only had a handful that I installed ever turn out to be bad. No where near one out of four tires is bad, from my experience.

It's much more likely that you're getting installers who don't properly balance the tires.

To the OP-
I don't think the extra money is worth it for the road force balance, unless you have a balance problem that it can help correct.


Yes, for real! For about 12 years I bought my tires from Discount Tire here in the San Antonio area. The old adage "you get what you pay for" is born out by those guys. They're the cheapest, and it shows in the quality. Before road force was an option it would take a few times of coming back in with "unbalanced" tires, or ones that "pulled" before they'd replace one and fix the problem. Now with road force, I knew I was leaving the store with four good tires.

About 1 yr ago I found a local tire shop that is amazing! They don't have the road force machine, and don't need it because of their experience level. I've already bought two sets of tires from them (I have a lot of vehicles) and I've not had any problems.

Bottom line - in the average shop, get the road force when you buy new tires. If you're just getting a good set of tires re-balanaced, go with the old machine.

 

[rjundi]

The catch is the monkeys need to know what they are doing with the machine. Not always the case.

 

[SteveSRT8]

^^^This is HU*GE IMO.

I have had a whole bunch of vehicles for a looooong time, and the skill level of the tire guy is crucial to happiness and long life!

 

[hattaresguy]

The Hunter is the only machine that can properly balance the tires on a Mercedes, and luckily my local dealer only charges $10 a tire.

OTOH I'm pretty sure I could balance the tires on my Silverado static and get it close enough. Not sensitive to balance at all that one.

 

[cp3]

Well, I ordered the tires tonight so they should be in next week. I'm probably going to go with static and see if there are any issues. Right now my Son can mount and balance them at work for no charge, better than $25/tire for 6 tires. They have a Hunter but it is a Smart Weight and he tells me it is a pretty good machine too.

Thanx for the input guys.

 

[edwardh1]

dont buy tires online. if you bring in 4 tires and one is bad I bet it will get balanced anyway.
get the tires and the balancing at the same place, what u want is a finished product.

 

[yonyon]

Except when using the Road Force or an aftermarket wheel that requires placement of wheel weights in very close planes or has a very conical rim, the SmartWeight software feature can only give a worse balance, not better. It will often allow putting less weight on the tire which can be good for aesthetics. If you want a good balance on fairly normal wheels and aren't using the Road Force, turn the SmartWeight off.

 

[CapriRacer]

Just an FYI:

"SmartWeight" is Hunter's way of dealing with the difference in vehicle sensitivty to static vs dynamic balance. This has to do with tolerance.

Vehicles are most senstive to static balance - and with a tolerance of plus 1/4 oz (5 grams). Put another way, unless you have a senstive vehicle (or butt), you won't be able to tell the difference between a perfectly balance tire/wheel assembly and one that is off 1/4 oz.

Vehicles are not as sensitive to dynamic balance differences and a difference of 1/2 oz (10 grams) will also not be noticeable. SmartWeight takes that difference into account when it specifies the weights. Turning off the SmartWeight feature does produce a better balanced tire, but the difference is not needed.

 

[meep]

Originally Posted By: stephen9666
Originally Posted By: sasilverbullet
Every time I buy four tires, at least one of them comes up bad.


Are you serious?

I worked in a tire shop and I've bought quite a few sets of tires in my day. I've never bought a set of tires with a bad tire, and probably only had a handful that I installed ever turn out to be bad. No where near one out of four tires is bad, from my experience.

It's much more likely that you're getting installers who don't properly balance the tires.

To the OP-
I don't think the extra money is worth it for the road force balance, unless you have a balance problem that it can help correct.


i bought 4 Destination LEs last year. came back twice in a week to fix vibration. told me 2 of them had tread that was "walking" side to side. they replaced ALL 4 for my trouble. much, much better, but at 80 (rare) the mdx still exhibits tire shake. i've never had problems with bridgestone or firestone rubber before.

 

[benjamming]

Originally Posted By: edwardh1
dont buy tires online. if you bring in 4 tires and one is bad I bet it will get balanced anyway.
get the tires and the balancing at the same place, what u want is a finished product.


It appears that you need to find a better tire installer...

 

[stephen9666]

Originally Posted By: cp3
Well, I ordered the tires tonight so they should be in next week. I'm probably going to go with static and see if there are any issues.


I believe there is some confusion in this thread on static/dynamic balancing.

Many modern tire balancers perform a dynamic balance, not static. A dynamic balance is not unique to the Road Force balancers.

When I worked in a tire shop (about 8 years ago) our regular spin balancers checked for dynamic balance.

This link has more info:
http://www.discounttire.com/dtcs/infoTireBalancing.dos

 

[Ken2]

When I hung out in a buddy's dad's shop 50 years ago he was doing dynamic wheel balancing. Little new here. Road Force is not balancing. It is matching various forces of the tire and the wheel for the smoothest ride (tire stiffness variation, wheel eccentricity, etc.) .

 

[CapriRacer]

Originally Posted By: Ken2
When I hung out in a buddy's dad's shop 50 years ago he was doing dynamic wheel balancing. Little new here. Road Force is not balancing. It is matching various forces of the tire and the wheel for the smoothest ride (tire stiffness variation, wheel eccentricity, etc.) .


Ken,

I can't begin to tell you how many times I've explained what tire uniformity is and how the Hunter GSP9700 works - and some folks will still talk about "balancing" - and they mean it just like the words say. I suppose the concept of "balancing" is so ingrained in people's minds that something else causing a vibration just doesn't compute.