Thanks for the tips - good info.

When you have the chance a picture of your tire changer would be interesting.

So it's the air pressure that seats the bead on an installation? Good thing I've got a compressor, because I assume you'd need a good flow of air to get started.

For getting the old tire off, do you think something like tin snips and bolt cutters to cut the tire off would work? If you can get the new tire on without tools, and the old one can be cut off, it looks like there is very little chance of scratching the rims - except maybe with a bead-breaking tool mistake.

I have some bare rims and might try putting on some new tires myself if no tools are required. That would be pretty impressive to be able to do.

Ken300D

Ken,

Cutting the old tire off would be a seriously difficult job. Cutting through the reinforced rubber of the sidewall would be difficult enough, but the bead is made of several strands of some seriously strong wire. To get at the wire to cut it would be difficult without risking significant damage to the rim.

To put a new tire on by hand, you need to lubricate the bead. There is special lubricant that the tire stores use, but I have water and dishwashing liquid mixed up in a spray bottle. I'm careful not to let very much into the tire interior. If you get very much water inside the tire it will drive you crazy trying to balance it.

I am working on pouring a small slab outside my shop door with lag bolts to bolt down the tire changer. Once it is bolted down I expect that it will work MUCH easier. Once it is on the slab, I will try to remember to take a picture. It's not much to look at, I probably should give it a coat of paint, but it sure works well.

BTW, I found a dip switch on the circuit board of my balancer that converted the balancer from ounces to grams. It now gives me the weight in grams, very handy. I was previously getting the readout in tenths of an ounce and mathematically converting to ounces. The added bonus is that the resolution is now one gram, when set for ounces the best resolution was a tenth of an ounce, which is about 2 1/2 grams. I can use "fine mode" and get a resolution down to the individual gram. My balancer also has a MAG mode that indicates the tape weight size for inside the rim. The MAG mode is amazingly accurate.

I am basking in the joy of being tire store independent.

Have a great day,

PS. I think the machine in your picture might be assembled incorrectly for the picture. I believe the piece that goes down to the lower left in the picture should be put on the top side of the member that extends to the left in the picture, then you would use a long bar and pull up on the bottom of the bead. You could use a jack on it if need be. I am just guessing at this, I have never seen one in action. LB

Do you think I can do anything at all with this type of tire changer? This is available at www.harborfreight.com and sometimes they have free shipping sales. I presume some part of this is a bead breaker, but I don't know what its set up to do in the picture....

Ken300D

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Ken,

To begin with, I apologize for not yet posting a picture of my wheel balancer and tire changer. I'm taking next week off for vacation, so I hope to do that then.

Second of all, I totally understand your willingness to consider the machine shown. The biggest challenge that I expect you will have with such a machine is breaking the bead. It could be, however, that you could make a cheater bar of some sort for the bead breaker that could ease the work.

My machine works like the one shown, except it has an air powered clam shell type bead breaker. This drastically decreases the sweat necessary to manually change a tire. Even with that, it is a workout to do a set of tires.

Also, with the machine you show and with my machine it is mandatory that you lag the machine to concrete with enough room to get all around it. This will be about 3 to 4 feet clear, all around. I poured a small pad behind my shop, with lag bolts in place when I poured the concrete. The machine shown would not be harmed by the weather, that's good news. Mine, with the air cylinder should not be in the weather. I took an old trash gondola and use it inverted over the top of the machine when not in use to keep water out of the air cylinder. When I set it aside to use the machine, it is a handy place to put valve stems, valve cores, pressure guage and the other paraphenalia that you are constantly reaching for while changing tires.

Another consideration is the scratching of wheels if you plan on using it with alloy wheels. What I did was cut a piece of antifreeze bottle and made a protector to go between the cone and the wheel hole and also used a piece of agricultural plastic tubing over the end of the "stick" to protect the outer wheel lip. On my new car, there was very mild scratching near the center hole, but polish took it away completely.

Again, I understand your desire to buy one of these machines. The good news is that you will not be out much money if it does not work out for you. Also if you were to pour a slab for the machine with a center post machine in mind, you could remove it and put a center post machine in its place at some point in the future.

The advantage of an old center post machine is that there are plastic kits that you put over the pieces that contact the wheel to prevent scratching. I would really like to have a center post machine for this reason, but after finding my $50 treasure that I use only occasionally, it's impossible for me to justify one.

One idea is that most every tire store around is moving away from their center post machine(s) and replacing them with rim clamp machines. This means there are many of the center post types around. I started asking around at the tire stores if they wanted to sell their machines. A few of them said to come back in a month or two, but then I found my old antique machine.

Good luck,

Another thing to ask you is if you are doing anything in terms of valve stems. These probably get changed by tire shops more often than necessary - but sooner or later you have to put in new valve stems and valves.

Have you located a tool to pull them into the wheel, and do you know of a supply for new valve stems?

Ken300D

If you lube the stem with rubber lubricant, the same stuff you should be using when mounting the tire, you can pull them through with a fish wire. You also can get a heavy tool to pull them through for about $8.

I bought a big box of valve stems at Pep Boys for $8 or $10. I don't replace them unless they are cracking. Age gets them, not mileage, so since I drive high miles, I usually wear out the car before it needs stems.

I apologize for not getting my tire machine and wheel balancer pictures posted while on vacation. I still hope to do it soon.

Have a great day,

I might be slow, but I've finally gotten some pictures I will try to post here.

First my balancer. The picture is a wheel I was balancing for a spare for my 300E. I spun it, and you can see the left display indicating the weight needed. Once the wheel is turned until the LED's are flashing under that display, you put that amount of weight on the inside lip at the top position of the wheel as you see in the picture.

I found a DIP switch on the machine that changes the display to indicate the weight in grams. When I do a wheel requiring weights marked in ounces, I simply divide the number by seven to determine the number of 1/4 oz. required.

The right side display indicates weight for the outside lip. If you hold the button down while spinning it gives a resolution to the gram, rather than within 1/4 oz. The book calls this "fine" mode.

Here's the machine:

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Okay, here's my $50 tire machine. I poured a 6' by 6' slab behind my shop and lagged it down. Excuse the pine needles, it's that time of year. I have an old plastic trash bin that I place upside down over it when it's not in use.

Notice the air cylinder and the "clamshell" that is powered by the air cylinder to break the bead. It works pretty well.

I used a piece of plastic tubing over the piece that fits the rim on the bead breaker to prevent scratching the rim. It tore up, so I just put duct tape over it. The duct tape is good for a few wheels before it must be replaced, but it does a pretty good job if you keep it fresh. I can't see on any of the wheels any scratches at that point.

On the center of the wheel, I cut a piece of antifreeze jug, made a circle, and cut radially to allow it to form a cone. I put that between the cone that holds the wheel center and the wheel. It keeps from scratching the center hole at the edge that goes against the wheel center.

I tried to take the picture with the bar in the background, but it didn't make it into the picture. One end of the bar has a shape that I can't describe, but is used to force a stubborn bead into place. I haven't needed to use that end. I simply use bead lubricant on wheel and tire and push the tire onto the wheel by hand.

The other end of the bar is tapered down to about 1/2 inch before an end that looks much like the knob on a baseball bat. This is used by simply putting it between bid and rim, then levering it over and pulling it against the center post that sticks up above the cone. You then just lever around the wheel until the bead is off all the way around. I use a piece of cloudy looking plastic tubing over the end to prevent scratching the wheel lip.

This machine is from the sixties or early seventies, so it was designed for narrow wheels. I thought it wouldn't work on wider wheels. I welded some knots on the top of the post so the cone could thread on at a higher position. For the upper part of the clamshell, I cut the vertical pipe and welded a piece of pipe in place that was just small enough for the original pipe to fit over. I then drilled a hole in the original pipe and several in the new pipe at varying locations. You see the pin through the hole. If I remove the pin and raise the upper clam shell, I can replace the pin in one of the other hole sets to extend the range.

As it turns out, I have not had to extend the range except for the 255/50's on my Vette.

Here's my $50 wonder:

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hello dose anyone know where i can find parts for a snap-on wb200 hand spin balancer?i believe i need the main computer board?and snap-on no longer makes it.also need parts and manuals for a branick model 3000 balancer serial # 719. when you plug the branick in there is just dashes on the display on the left side?and the right side is dark.and sometimes the fan comes on?and sometimes it dont?i just got both units and am doing my best to work the cobwebs out of them.any help at all would be greatly appreciated.


thanks much.

I have a wb200 that I am trying to calibrate. I get to the point where I put on the 4oz weight on the outside of the rim, and have to adjust the screws to a reading of 3.75-4, but the most I can get is 3.5 any suggestions?

I too just picked up a Snap on balancer. It's a WB250 hand spun type.

Does anyone have pdf of the manual for this or similar model?

The question I have surrounds the "Modes' for applying weights. The machine appears to allow placement of clamp on weights on the rims and/or a combination of adhesive weights to various points on the inside or outside of the rim. Are these modes rim specific or simply a matter of weight type and location preference?

TIA.

CB

Check that, just called Snap-on and they e-mailed me a pdf, no charge!

CB

How's this for a long term machine review?

I started this thread in 2002 shortly after which I bought the Coats 1001 shown in an earlier post. I have used the heck out of it for 11 years and it finally laid down on me a few weeks ago. I hit the button, it spun up to speed and kept on spinning without resolving the balance.

I am going tomorrow to pick up another Coats 1001, that I bought filthy cheap. The fellow said that he saw it work before buying it, but has never used it, since he has no power for it. I figure it's worth the pittance price to see if I can get enough parts off of it to fix mine. If I'm lucky I'll end up with two working machines and make another home mechanic somewhere very happy.

In the course of looking for service people that know how to fix the machine, I was told that if it is the main circuit board it will cost $1,500 to fix it. When I choked on that price, the fellow said that there are many people who like this particular machine so much that they happily pay the bill.

It has indeed been a great machine and I understand why they do that. Hopefully I can fix mine up. I need to put two tires on the front of my SLK and two on my wifes pickup.

__________________
2001 SLK 320 six speed manual
2014 Porsche Cayenne six speed manual

Annoy a Liberal, Read the Constitution

Follow up on Coats 1001.

I picked up the other machine and got it home. I took the position sensor off the one I drug up and put it on my original machine. Voila! It worked perfectly.

It is 100% impossible to justify your own wheel balancer from an economic standpoint. From a practical standpoint, however, if you want PROPERLY balanced wheels that run smooth at any speed and/or you don't want the tire store kids trashing the face of your fancy wheels, it's the only way to go.

My Coats 1001 lives! Woo-hoo!

__________________
2001 SLK 320 six speed manual
2014 Porsche Cayenne six speed manual

Annoy a Liberal, Read the Constitution

I keep having trouble in my area with weights falling off.Can I buy my own weights that will work with German rims? Or should I clean the inside of rims and use the stick on wheel weights.

__________________
1999 w140, quit voting to old, and to old to fight, a god damned veteran