Balancing wire wheels

[TR3-2001SE]

What is the best way to balance wire wheels. They can be bubble balanced, spin balanced on the car, or balanced on a machine that spins the tire.
Which of the three methods have you wire wheel users had the best success with?

 

[clint]

On the car would be best, the whole rotating mass is balanced. Disadvantage-finding a place that can do it, the cost, and the wheels have to be kept on the same corner, marked when removed and put back on exactly the same to stay balanced.
A good spin balancer can do an excellent job, but the shop may not have the right adapters or a tech that feels like spending the time to figure out what will work to get the wheel secured on the machine. Our old balancer didn't have the right hubs, the new one(2yrs old) can be set up on wires. Another nice thing, you can rotate and remove your wheels and not worry about balance.
Bubble balancer? I think I know a guy who still has one burried in the back of his storage area. On a more serious note, When he digs that thing out, he can do just as good a job as any spin balancer. And depending on what hubs the locals have on the spin balancers, you might need to go the low tech route.

 

[tlthorne]

You will want to check to see how the mandrel that
fits the spindle on the the dynamic balancer fits
wire wheel are chucked up on the outer surface of
the outside of the wheel(lost you yet?)most spin balancers will chuck up to the inner part of the
wire wheel inner hub, look at the knockoff and see
what i mean, some where on the web is some good info from Brown and Gammons on this( maybe SOL
the Scions of Lucas? i think the website is
www.team.net, doing this from memory and havent thought about it for a couple of years, may have changed by now.
hope this is of some help!
take care!

tt
clueless near st.louis

 

[Dave Russell]

As a point of interest, Dayton Wire Wheel says that since 1990 their wheel hubs have been fully machined & an inside cone rather than the previous outside (inverted) cone can be used on the outer hub when balancing. Another good reason to use Dayton wheels?
D

 

[TR3-2001SE]

Yes I saw the diagram of this on the Dayton web site and I'll be looking for this if I go the spin balanced route.