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Bubble balancer thoughts

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What do you guys think of the old time style bubble tire balancers? Do they work as good or better? I know nascar uses them but it's been my experience that race tires don't stay balanced long.

I know they take longer per tire, but are they as good?
 
When I was in college in the early ā€˜70ā€™s in an automotive suspension class we were taught how to balance tire / wheels using a bubble balancer. At that time the only other wheel balancing technique was spinning the wheel on the car. Stand-alone spin balancers and electronic wheel balancers did not exist at that time. To use a bubble balancer correctly, imagine dividing the wheel into three equal sections. With the heavy spot as the starting point take four same size wheel weights and put two of the wheel weights at the other two points dividing the wheel into thirds. With selecting the required weights so that bubble is in the center attach two of the weights on each side of the wheel at the two positions opposite the heavy spot. After installing the four weights check the wheel again making sure the bubble remains in the center of the circles. At one time Snap-on made a bubble balancer that came with a tool to place over the wheel to indicate the three wheel points where to place the wheel weights.

While working as the service manager at Harley Davidson of Cincinnati spin balancers were trying to enter the motorcycle market. The Snap-on dealer brought a new motorcycle spin balancer into the shop to demonstrate. Two motorcycle wheels with new tires installed were selected and the Snap-on representative used the spin balancer on one wheel and I used the bubble balancer on the other wheel. After both wheels were balanced, the balance was tested by putting the bubble balanced wheel on the spin balancer and the spin balanced wheel on the bubble balancer. The tire / wheel bubble balanced was proved to be better balanced than the spin balanced tire /wheel. By better balanced meaning spinning the bubble balanced wheel at a higher speed without requiring additional wheel weights or shaking of any type observed. The new spin wheel balancer was not purchased. The other motorcycle shops that purchased the spin balancer used it as a sales promotion tool to sell tires assuring the tire buyer a smoother ride. A good sales guy can spin any new technology as better than the ā€œold schoolā€ techniques. Just as a note, if the wheel weights are placed on a wheel exactly opposite the ā€œheavy spotā€ using a bubble balancer will cause the wheel to bounce at high speed having a feeling of being out of balance.

The newer electronic wheel balancers will remove the skill out of tire / wheel balancing. I would be very surprised if the average tire shop worker installing tires on your car understands or even cares about the theory behind tire / wheel balancing.
 
Funny, as I never gave it a thought but, in helicopters, the mechanical movement of a blade control happens approximately 90 degrees before the result, is this also the theory behind wheel balancing? PJ
 
They work just fine. Go ahead, buy one. Any significant error is operator error. :cheers:
 
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