harbor freight portable wheel balancer

Quote :

you cant use too much soap and water. the force of the bead against the rim along with inflation forces all the h20 with soap out of the bead seating. whats left is a watery residue that just evaporates.its just dishwashing liquid.

I don't doubt that some shops still use soapy water, but good shops won't use it on aluminum alloy rims (or at all). Ever notice that ring of corrosion along the edge inside the rims? It's the reason our wheels are notorious for having slow leaks around the bead, and I think it's caused by soapy water to mount the rims. Some soaps have an alkali that corrodes aluminum, causing the pitting that makes the bead hard or impossible to seal. If your tire shop uses dish soap, use someone else!

My guy at Firestone showed me the corrosion on the interior of the rim, and explained it was causing a leak of 10 PSI/week. He then used a grinder to remove the pitting and then a special lube to ensure it didn't happen again. My wheels, which leaked for 2 years straight, have been holding air ever since.

To my knowledge, the tires have not slipped on the rims, but I will mark them and check after a couple 90-20 hard stops. Maybe those of you who are having vibration issues should check as well. A slipping rim/tire would most likely through off the balance of the wheels enough to be felt.

knowlegeable shops use Murphys oil soap or ivory liquid. some places use dawn liquid soap. corrosion along the rim? thats nuts. thats more a "acid rain" thing. to my view,the acid rain deposits dry over time along the tire bead ,along with salts and other contaminants like tailpipe emmisions and any other crap along the road your tires pick up. acid will eat through alu like nothing. one could change to new tires 15 times a year or ten time more, and the tiny little deposits of drying soap would not affect the rim one iota! the mixture of soap in the water is like less than a 1/4 cup for every five gallons or so. as for any other lube,you can use just about anything thats slippery. sheeet, i could even bust a nut all over my new tires and that would be lube enough!lol there are tons of "special" tire lubes on the market,and guess what? they cost more! LOL .watch out for those Firestone guys AA,they are the biggest crooks around.

Interesting perspective on the Firestone guys. They always give me unbelievable deals year after year (like buy one, get one free), and they do things other shops wouldn't, like removing directional tires from the rims and remounting to opposite side of car (better rotation) for free. I even challenged them to beat a price from Tirerack with free shipping + 20% off using a friend's employee discount. They offered to match the price on any Bridgestone/Firestone tire (even special order) qualifying for that deal. I'd still pay the $12/wheel mount/balance fee, but I'd do that anyway buying mail order tires.

Lol, please don't nut on my rims, robo! Acid rain? Maybe, but I always clean the chrome really good before getting tires mounted, so I don't know how that stuff would get to the inside of the rim. I do know one way to corrode the inside of a rim is to use dish soap, because one of the ingredients on many brands is sodium chloride, aka salt. I checked out Dawn and it seems do be salt free, but if you use Ivory, Palmolive, or Ajax dish soap, you are lubing the rims with a weak salt water solution.

Murphy Oil Soap, again I wouldn't trust it, especially when the manufacturer states in their materials data sheet the avoid contact with aluminum! There are tire mount lubes out there, with corrosion inhibitors added, costing $20 for an 8 lb bucket. I imagine that would go a long way. Why in hell would anyone use a liquid containing salt? Or a soap that reacts with aluminum? (!!!)

Those are a couple of nice toys you've got, Deek. Have fun with them!

A Firestone shop once torqued my lug nuts on so railroad tight I couldn't get them off when it came time to rotate.
I was so pissed I drove the car back down there and made them do it!

Shops I worked in years ago used a lubricant specifically made for mounting tires. Not dish washing liquid. That seems pretty lame and cheap to me.

When tires are freshly mounted, it is a good idea to drive gently the first 50 miles or so. No hard stops, or jack rabbit starts.
Newly mounted tires will move some from the point they are mounted.
My auto shop teacher demonstrated this for us by having us unmount, and then remount 2 tires on his '69 Riviera.
one on a front wheel, and one on a rear drive wheel. Then marked the orientation of the rims to the tires.
The next day, we saw that the front tire had moved very slightly, maybe an 1/8th of an inch.
The tire on the drive wheel on the other hand moved over an inch because he got on it from a stop.

Since seeing this with my own eyes I have always taken it easy after getting tires mounted.


(This teacher was a man after my own heart. He lived and breathed Buicks. If it wasn't a Buick, it was crap in his eyes. And God help the student that drove something other than a GM. He was sure to catch shit from him.
The extra credit question on the final exam was to spell the name of his daily driver.
Riviera.
That was an easy one for me.)

Good info, Dale. That makes a lot of sense to me, as the bead sealer would still be soft for a while after drying. A little shift between the tire and rim seems within reason while the tires are braking in.

AA wrote: "Murphy Oil Soap, again I wouldn't trust it, especially when the manufacturer states in their materials data sheet the avoid contact with aluminum! There are tire "

no silly. not moms Murphy oil soap that is used on furniture,but Murphy's tire mounting lubricants.
jtmproducts.net
thats the stuff.

sweepspear wrote: Not dish washing liquid. That seems pretty lame and cheap to me.

that's the world we live in buddy. and mechanics are the cheapest as your wallet will attest after paying for repairs.

Quote :

no silly. not moms Murphy oil soap that is used on furniture,but Murphy's tire mounting lubricants.

You said it, not me...

robotennis61 wrote: "knowlegeable shops use Murphys oil soap or ivory liquid." (page 2)


And Ivory liquid has salt in it. Not on my rims.

AA corrected: "You said it, not me..."

so sorry,error of language.

AA also noted: "And Ivory liquid has salt in it. Not on my rims."
good grief AA. the amount of salt deposited on your rim from tire mounting is minimal. i can gurantee that at any given time of the year when the shop runs out of "the good stuff" the mgnr will send 1 of his boys to the supermarket to stock up on good ol fashioned dish soap. for any damage to occur on your rim,you would have to subject your rims to 10 times the amount of tire changes a typical tire testing day at Car & Driver magazine or Consumer Reports goes through! and then multiply that by 20! blame it on the winters of C-bus,Ohio for cryin out loud!

I won't blame the OH winters, because the road salt stays on the outside of my wheels. The bead seal keeps air in, so it logically woud keep water & salt out. The only water inside the tire is from humidity, and that dish soap water used to mount it (it doesn't dry up, all the water stays inside the tire).

Here's an interesting read: http://www.randakks.com/TechTip62.htm

The author, Howard Halasz, claims to have some experience mounting tires on bike rims. What I found interesting is the description of the slow leak, exactly like what many of us have seen on our OEM alloys. The cause of the leak is also exactly the same as what I've seen on mine: "pitted right where the bead contacts the inside of the rim". The article is about a bike from Houston, TX, so I think we can rule out salty roads and acid rain.

It's only one guy's perspective, but it's funny how his story matches my experience to a "t".

Dale, awesome that your shop teacher was a buick nut and had a '69 Riv.

re: tires shifting after mounting, for sure, a little bit. After that you shouldn't be able to shift a tire on a rim without a serious panic stop. My bro (tire pro) recommends to his 'serious' customers to come back in a week for re-balancing.

AA wrote:

I won't blame the OH winters, because the road salt stays on the outside of my wheels. The bead seal keeps air in, so it logically woud keep water & salt out. The only water inside the tire is from humidity, and that dish soap water used to mount it (it doesn't dry up, all the water stays inside the tire).

Here's an interesting read: http://www.randakks.com/TechTip62.htm

The author, Howard Halasz, claims to have some experience mounting tires on bike rims. What I found interesting is the description of the slow leak, exactly like what many of us have seen on our OEM alloys. The cause of the leak is also exactly the same as what I've seen on mine: "pitted right where the bead contacts the inside of the rim". The article is about a bike from Houston, TX, so I think we can rule out salty roads and acid rain.

It's only one guy's perspective, but it's funny how his story matches my experience to a "t".

Of course the chemical reaction between the two at that concentration will cause corrosion. but we are talking about a quick swipe of highly diluted soapy solution(preferably murphys or dawn) along the inside of a tire. it is not enough to cause a problem.they don't dunk the tire in the stuff. like i said ,you would have to mount daily many tires with soapy solution to see any damage. if you change your tires That much then you might want to look into a sealing/tire lube for the install,but if your swapping tires once every 30 to 50 thousand miles,come on! worrying about the chem reaction between 1 part soapy to 10 thousand parts h20 is the least of your concerns. and acid rain and road salt,even if not visible,can work their magic and cause damage.think about it,how many times can you clean your wheels in the winter? as many days as you work and play right? if your lucky enough to have access to a hose after arriving at work to spray your wheels down before starting your day behind the desk or whatever. the wheel sits 8 or 12 hours having fun with all those nice road products the city just loves to shovel out along the streets and highways for your protection. Now whats going to hurt more,the every third year new tire event with soapy water(preferably murphys or dawn) or the every year winter miracle?

deekster_caddy wrote:

Dale, awesome that your shop teacher was a buick nut and had a '69 Riv.

Off topic, but this was in '78-'79, so a '69 Riv was just a used car. Still though....
Shortly before I moved on from High School, he trailered in a Saturn Yellow '70 GSX that was in a flood at some point and was full of mud.
I wonder where it is now.

Now back to slipping wheels.