[hduff]

Tire Balancing Beads

The commercial version is at
http://www.innovativebalancing.com/

The budget version is at
http://aircooledtech.com/tools-on-th...lancing_beads/
which uses high density air-soft BBs

3.5oz of beads per tire, no external weights and the tire is balanced at speed?

This seems Too Good To Be True (tm). Is it?

[forestrytodd]

My father sold tire mounters and balancer's a few years back. I asked his opinion on them and his response was "What" the he laughed quite hard

Simply put - don't even waist your time looking at it.

[302 Z28]

Utter nonsense.

Vince

[bentwings]

The truck guys swear by these things. I surely don't know the theory behind them. I've ridden in a 1 ton dually with them and it was a lot smoother than mine is with out a load.

I still use lead however. haha Too old the change now.

[38mike]

I quote from one of those links in the OP:
"Whenever your wheel tries to move up, the beads counter that movement by moving down momentarily."

I've been thinking about this scheme since I read it here yesterday. With my knowledge of physics, I'd have to say there is NO WAY those beads could react fast enough to compensate for all the 'other' forces on the tire besides just its centrifugal pull at the 'high spot.' Every time one hits a pothole or any substantial bump, the tire will "try to move up" and the beads will be trying to keep up. No way they could keep up with that much continual adjustment. The centrifugal force (plastering them against the outside of the tire space) would NOT allow them to roll freely enough to readjust quickly enough. Let's face it..that heavy spot is only "trying to move up" for half a rotation...mere micro-seconds for each rotation of the tire.

How would one test these things? Anecdotal evidence like bentwings' isn't really scientific enough, but how about this simple test:
Take a wheel/tire known to be out of balance, put in the beads and test it on a dynamic spin balancer. If it would work on the road, shouldn't it show up as a balanced tire on the spin balancer?

I have stated my unscientific skepticism, but I'd be willing to listen to someone that could perform such a test!!

[cobalt327]

I notice passenger cars and light trucks are (mostly) omitted from the recommended vehicles. They say:

If you have low-profile tires, that being any tire with an aspect ratio 65 or below, you may have balancing issues that precludes using Dyna Beads as the sole balancing method.
Our official policy is that we do not advise using Dyna Beads in any car, truck or SUV tire with an aspect ratio 65 or below unless used in conjunction with weights.
The reason for this is that this type of tire has a higher incidence of lateral imbalance, which is basically that one side of the tire is heavier than the other side, creating a ?wobbling? effect, or ?shaking? of the steering wheel. This type of imbalance can only be corrected by careful placement of traditional weights on the wheel rim.
That being said, the physics principle is still the same, and the addition of a Maintenance amount will usually* smooth out the ride and reduce, if not eliminate, any future rebalancing issues.

An easy test would be to take a wheel/tire down to the tire shop, remove the wheel weights, check the balance.

Break one bead of the wheel/tire, throw in the recommended amount of beads, recheck the balance.

Unless the wheel HAS to be bounced to distribute the beads, this should show a balanced tire; the tire machine comes up to speed gradually (relatively speaking) and that should be enough, I'd think. But they do say the tires have to be independently sprung, so maybe the tire machine test wouldn't be valid?

EDIT- While I had the window open to write a post, I got sidetracked and now see now that 38Mike had suggested the tire balancer test already.

[sbchevfreak]

Don't knock these beads untill you have hands on with them. I have used them from Counter Balance, and they work very well. I have yet to use them on a passenger tire, but large knobby 4x4 tires react extremely well. I have been using them in LT265 tires and up. Anything 31" up gets them. Have you ever tried to balance a 37x12.50 on a spin machine? Nearly impossible. the CBB beads are VERY effective.

[bentwings]

38 mike
"Anecdotal evidence ...." haha I love that. I generally get 70-80k miles on a set of 6 tires on the dually. They come with free rotation and balancing. Someone would be pretty hard pressed to convince me to throw another 30-40 bucks a tire on top of $900 bucks for a set of tires.

Speaking of funny, what would happen if you stuck a pile of them in the rear tires of the funnycar. The car usually gets around 3-4 g's for a couple hundred yards so I could just see all those little round spheres piled up at the back sides of the tires. Think you had tire shake before, the tires would probably be egg shaped with the big part at the rear shaking like a bowl of jelly. Well I usually have my TIG welder and a handfull of 4130 tubing with me so I guess I could rebuild the chassis between rounds. haha

I tried to do some dynamic analysis on them a few years ago but the problem has too many unknows for an easy solution. Viscosity?, mass, frequency. Just to name a few.

[timothale]

Years ago my brother-in-law bought the old balancer from the Buick dealereship, the tech said he hated to see it go. it did a better job than the new ones but took about 15 minutes per tire and they lost money using it. He said they would use it when they had a problem getting a smoth ride with the new one.. I now have it . you first do a static balance in the on car position then unlock the spindle and rotate it 90 ' and spin it with a drive motor. It has a spring loaded disc that you lift the handle to contact the disc to make it run true while the tire wobbles. then unlock the spindle and rotate it back to the on car position, flip the indicatator into position and rotate the wheel by hand and the indicator shows how much weight to add and to the inside or outside of the rim. take enough time and it does a good job.

[cboy]

Originally Posted by cobalt327

An easy test would be to take a wheel/tire down to the tire shop, remove the wheel weights, check the balance.

Such an easy, inexpensive and convincing test one wonders why it isn't plastered all over the Innovative Balancing web site...unless it does not produce the results they want to show.

But as others have suggested, perhaps the tire has to encounter rebounds AND be in a vertical position for the beads to find "home".

Put me down as skeptical but interested in hearing more.

[xxllmm4]

I have actually used these beads on a bunch of my cars and trucks and have always been happy with them. I have used the stainless steel ones at http://callieskustoms.com/CalliesKus...g%20Beads.html I have them in my WRX Tires and at 120 MPH have not a had any shakes or shimmy.

I have a Harbor Freight tire changer and do all my own tires but don't have a balancing machine, no need to have one with the beads. These are really common with 4x4 guys, motorcycles and Truckers.

[bentwings]

Last spring the new set of tires I have on the dually had about 15k on them so since I had free tire balance and rotation I took the truck in for the service. There was no issue at all with the tires. I just had time and thought it would be a good thing to do. haha read on

I got it back and it had a severe high frequency vibration that would leave your hand numb after an hour on the road.

Short story.... After the 6th return for complete removal, sanding and cleaning of the rims and rotors, lubing the lugs ( they are like heavy truck lugs) I still have the vibration. Even pulling the 12k GN.

I had a 2500 pound block of concrete inthe bed over the winter and even then after driving for an hour the vibration is still there.

It's even worse now.

It's a lot of work doing 6 truck tires. I spent the better part of 6 mornings at the tire store so that's enough.

So the first thing is that I will never buy that brand again. Second I'm going back to no rotation no balancing after the initial set up like I've done in the past. My tires have always worn nice and even with the rear wearing the center a little more as I don't tow all the time. It doesn't really matter however if the tires last 60k the cost per mile is so low that it is no really significant.


As for the beads and the plates....too much $$$ for me and not a sure fire fix. There are too many who have noted no difference. Some say they are ok, but I'm not going to test.

[xxllmm4]

The thing is when it comes to balancing tires nothing is 100% after looking around you can find hundreds of people on message boards not happy with conventional lead weight balance jobs. Personally I have been much more satisfied with the beads.

[milo]

Once you understand how they work they will...
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eq263AYgyYg

[Hemi-Meadowbrook]

They work on the same principle of fluid harmonic dampers. However, with driving an SEMI as experience, putting them inside the tire adds wear to the tires from the inside out. They ARE NOT recommended. I've seen the evidence of lead shot and golf balls that have penetrated the rear of the cab when a tire had blown. Not fun! P-car tires are manufactured to different specs and due to their smaller size have less variables in manufacturing. Big (30" and up) tires have different harmonic issues that can be stabilized by a ring that contains fluid and lead shot. HOWEVER, they balance not only the tire, but the entire wheel hub! Extends the life of the tires on big trucks significantly! Especially when tires can be $300-600 per tire. Check this out if ya want to know how they work...http://centramatic.com/Page.aspx?page=Demo