I have heard for years about wheel balance beads and wanted to try them on the Durango. My motivation was simple curiosity, I didn't have an imbalance problem to solve. I also have access to a lift, tire mounting machine, and tire balance machine at Bill's shop and Bill was curious to, so we figured we'd give it a try. All my cost would be is time to install the beads and a few bucks for the beads, so what could go wrong?
I bought some beads from https://www.magnumbalance.com after reading the material on their website. They have a bead application phone app, which works very well, which will tell you how many beads to use by tire size or tire weight. On their website in the FAQ https://www.magnumbalance.com/en-us/faq/ they state you do not need to balance your tires. Seeing this, I decided to remove all the balance weights when I put the beads into the tires.
The first trip to Bill's shop was to remove the tire weights, break one bead down on the tire machine and use a small funnel to get the beads inside the tires. The app calls for two scoops or 6.5oz in 265x60R18 tires. So I added three scoops or 9.75oz, because more is better, right? We finished the job in about 45 minutes and went for a test drive. The freeway is about three blocks away so we jumped on and drove about three miles, turned around and drove back to the shop. The beads do work, there was zero shaking, which meant the tires were perfectly balanced. This is going to be cool!
The next day I drove back to my hometown, which is 300 miles. I jumped on I-80 and started the drive at my normal 73 MPH. All was in balance, life is good. The interstate has nice long sweeping curves, this is where the trouble began. Every time I went around a curve, the shaking would begin and would last for a couple miles, then it would be all smooth again. There are a lot of curves on the interstate in a 600 mile drive
. Why was this happening? Did I put too many beads in? Maybe three scoops was too much weight in beads?
Bill and I talked about the shakes in the curves and decided we would take some amount of the beads out. We had to break both beads down to get the beads out. We sucked them out with a vacuum and put one scoop (3.25oz) back in each tire. We were pretty sure less beads would be better and smooth everything out.
A couple days later I left on a 2,000 mile trip. The shaking was slightly less, but it was still there around every corner and then for a couple miles. If you exit the interstate and get right back on, there was zero shaking, but enter the first curve and the shakes begin. There are a LOT of curves in a 2000 mile drive
. You also have a lot of time to think about why curves cause shaking, about 28 hours of time.
Objects in motion tend to continue in a straight line, unless acted on by an outside force. Tire beads, not being fixed to the inside of the tire, are free to attempt to travel in a straight line, until they contact the sidewall of the tire. The beads inside the tire, pile up on the outside of the curve because they want to go straight. This causes the temporary imbalance until the beads have enough time to slowly migrate back to an equilibrium distribution and the shaking stops.
Ugh, this experiment was failing, but why does it work so well in semi and motorcycle tires? Because they are much higher profile, meaning the ratio of height to width is greater. The shape of the inside of motorcycle tires also helps keep the beads in the center of the tread. The wider the tire, the worse the imbalance caused by bead migration to the outside of the turn.
We broke the tires down again, removed all of the beads, balanced the tires with wheel weights, and had a good laugh at how much time we had wasted on this experiment. However, we both agreed that it was worth the effort because we learned about tire beads!
The next weekend, I made another 2,000 miles round trip and enjoyed the shake-less drive. Bill's tire balance machine had just been re-calibrated and that thing is right on the money.
My verdict on tire balance beads is, they aren't for tires with wide footprints. Motorcycles and semis, great, but not for cars.
As an aside, I do have Centramatics on my truck and they work wonderfully, because the steel balls are captured in a tube and can't migrate.
My $.02
I bought some beads from https://www.magnumbalance.com after reading the material on their website. They have a bead application phone app, which works very well, which will tell you how many beads to use by tire size or tire weight. On their website in the FAQ https://www.magnumbalance.com/en-us/faq/ they state you do not need to balance your tires. Seeing this, I decided to remove all the balance weights when I put the beads into the tires.
The first trip to Bill's shop was to remove the tire weights, break one bead down on the tire machine and use a small funnel to get the beads inside the tires. The app calls for two scoops or 6.5oz in 265x60R18 tires. So I added three scoops or 9.75oz, because more is better, right? We finished the job in about 45 minutes and went for a test drive. The freeway is about three blocks away so we jumped on and drove about three miles, turned around and drove back to the shop. The beads do work, there was zero shaking, which meant the tires were perfectly balanced. This is going to be cool!
The next day I drove back to my hometown, which is 300 miles. I jumped on I-80 and started the drive at my normal 73 MPH. All was in balance, life is good. The interstate has nice long sweeping curves, this is where the trouble began. Every time I went around a curve, the shaking would begin and would last for a couple miles, then it would be all smooth again. There are a lot of curves on the interstate in a 600 mile drive
. Why was this happening? Did I put too many beads in? Maybe three scoops was too much weight in beads?Bill and I talked about the shakes in the curves and decided we would take some amount of the beads out. We had to break both beads down to get the beads out. We sucked them out with a vacuum and put one scoop (3.25oz) back in each tire. We were pretty sure less beads would be better and smooth everything out.
A couple days later I left on a 2,000 mile trip. The shaking was slightly less, but it was still there around every corner and then for a couple miles. If you exit the interstate and get right back on, there was zero shaking, but enter the first curve and the shakes begin. There are a LOT of curves in a 2000 mile drive
. You also have a lot of time to think about why curves cause shaking, about 28 hours of time.Objects in motion tend to continue in a straight line, unless acted on by an outside force. Tire beads, not being fixed to the inside of the tire, are free to attempt to travel in a straight line, until they contact the sidewall of the tire. The beads inside the tire, pile up on the outside of the curve because they want to go straight. This causes the temporary imbalance until the beads have enough time to slowly migrate back to an equilibrium distribution and the shaking stops.
Ugh, this experiment was failing, but why does it work so well in semi and motorcycle tires? Because they are much higher profile, meaning the ratio of height to width is greater. The shape of the inside of motorcycle tires also helps keep the beads in the center of the tread. The wider the tire, the worse the imbalance caused by bead migration to the outside of the turn.
We broke the tires down again, removed all of the beads, balanced the tires with wheel weights, and had a good laugh at how much time we had wasted on this experiment. However, we both agreed that it was worth the effort because we learned about tire beads!
The next weekend, I made another 2,000 miles round trip and enjoyed the shake-less drive. Bill's tire balance machine had just been re-calibrated and that thing is right on the money.
My verdict on tire balance beads is, they aren't for tires with wide footprints. Motorcycles and semis, great, but not for cars.
As an aside, I do have Centramatics on my truck and they work wonderfully, because the steel balls are captured in a tube and can't migrate.
My $.02
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but I think I might just pay for conventional balancing going forward--it's not bank breaking, but for a bit I was taking delight in doing most of the work on my car.
