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balance or shake

Yahoo Message Number: 65952
Are there any comments or opinions (that happens on certain rare occasions, here on CCO ) on the Centramatic wheel balancers ? web site for those who might not heard of this product.
www. Centramatic.com
AL

00 Affinity

Re: balance or shake

Reply #1 –
Yahoo Message Number: 65953
I have had mine for 1.5 years approximately with no issues what so ever. I noticed a change immediately once I got on the freeway after having them installed. Smoother ride immediately. I think money well spent. Big truckers use them a lot for the extended tire life, but we will never have to use that feature

Ron Baran 09 Magna 7025

Re: balance or shake

Reply #2 –
Yahoo Message Number: 65955
Bought my 04 inspire used 4 years ago and it had the original toyos on and a bad wheel bounce problem. Had two different shops try to balance them out in different ways but still the problem persisted. Since I wasn't ready to get new tires at that point, which really was the problem, I made a trip to a trusted friend in the truck tire business and he found that two of the six toyos were pretty bad and moved them to the back and installed the centramatic all around. What a difference. It was not 100% cured but was great. He wanted me to change to Michelin but at that time I wanted to put a year or two more on the toyos before changing. Last year I did the Michelin's and now with the centramatics, not one vibration. I would not be without.

Regards,
Steve

04 Inspire #51075

Re: balance or shake

Reply #3 –
Yahoo Message Number: 65956
I'll share two items on the Centramatics:

1) A gent I work with, has had his on two diffrent RV's for over 75K miles combined. He has never had a problem, and was the main reason I decided to get them.

2) I bought Front/Drive/Tag rings. When I had them mounted along with the new tires. The tire shop Manager and a gent behind the desk, had different opinions on them. Especially on the value of the drive wheels. So we balanced the front and tag tires, put on the rings, and went for a drive. I placed a pot of water on the bathroom floor over the drive wheel. Came back to the shop, added drive rings, and out again for a drive. Same roads, same speeds. The jiggle of the water in the pan, was calm in compairson to what I would call medium jiggle without the rings.

As I commented on another thread, I also tiped the tire installer to take a bit extra care on centering the tires on the rim. The 'egg' of a slighty off centered tire to rim, will not be helped by balance or rings or powders.
The shop suggested I not balance the Front or Tag, but I figured these are going to be on the coach for 5-7 years - so a minor cost.
I now wish I had added the rings to our old rig when I first set it up, so that tells you that I do like these rings.
I looked at powders, and almost went with the Liquid Balancers, as the also have a sealing capability for nails and such smaller punctures. If I was going to get a 'in tire' balancer, I'd do the Liquid with seal, as you get two for one with this.

Best to all on your choices,
Smitty

04 Allure 31017
04 Allure Sold to a nice new owner! Now enjoying a 07 Magna Rembrandt 45' ISX600 #6775
"We're ONDROAD for THEJRNY!" (Toad and Coach license plates, say Hi if you see us!)

Re: balance or shake

Reply #4 –
Yahoo Message Number: 65959
It would be interesting to drive the coach set distance on the highway then measure the tire temp, put on the balancers and repeat. If it is truly dropping tire temps I would sure be willing to push the life of the tires out a little provided there was no weather cracking or oxidization happening. It would pay for the balancers.
Kevin Burns

00 Affinity 5865

Re: balance or shake

Reply #5 –
Yahoo Message Number: 65960
Kevin - Why am I not surprised that you would have thought of a good way to validate the value. I have a heat sensor, and I bet I could have talked the Manager of the shop in doing a full before after heat reading. As he was the one that was a Centramatics user himself.
If anyone else does this, it would be neat if they could talk their tire shop into helping in this test. As most people do not balance the tires along with the rings, that would have probably been a better test.
In 5-7 years, when a replace my current shoes - I'll see if I can't run this test myself.

Smitty
04 Allure Sold to a nice new owner! Now enjoying a 07 Magna Rembrandt 45' ISX600 #6775
"We're ONDROAD for THEJRNY!" (Toad and Coach license plates, say Hi if you see us!)

Re: centramatic balancing/genset shutdown

Reply #6 –
Yahoo Message Number: 65962
Testimonials are nice but to be really impartial a so called "double blind" study would be necessary. A study where the tester would give an opinion without knowing what type (or no) balancing was used on an otherwise identical coach while driving the same road stretch. For most of us this is impractical although the "water jiggle in the container in the bath" sounds pretty good. If this method is so great why hasn't it totally replaced balancing in specialty tire shops? It seems to me that basically you're adding non sprung weight to the tire/suspension system and getting essentially a flywheel effect. I'm no expert and have no quarrel with anyone who promotes or uses them but I take their claims with a grain of salt - just like Amsoil claims.
Incidentally, has anybody ever had their genset shut down while driving a slushy road at /below freezing? This occurred to us recently while running the genset/inverter charger to keep the voltage up because of alternator/regulator failure. When we got back on dry roads - restarted the genset and had no further problems. Is the genset air inlet/filter system vulnerable to icing up?

Jim Monnahan, '02 Intrigue #11410, ILS 400.

Re: centramatic balancing/genset shutdown

Reply #7 –
Yahoo Message Number: 65963
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ullnFQD4F1I
A little research helps.

And believe Amsoil. Have used it since the late 70's. Love it, it does what it says it will do. Why do you think so many oil companies are now offer some kind of synthetic? It started with Amsoil.

As for the genset, suspect it may have been due to slush plugging the cooling system and causing overheating.

Leonard Kerns
97' Magna

Re: centramatic balancing/genset shutdown

Reply #8 –
Yahoo Message Number: 65964
No disagreement relative to synthetics - just the multilevel marketing concept and claims sometimes made by Amsoil reps. I've used it myself.
Thanks for the suggestion about the radiator being blocked by slush.

Jim Monnahan

Re: balance or shake

Reply #9 –
Yahoo Message Number: 65967

Al: Best investment I ever made. 25,000 miles no shimmy no shake no cabinet squeeks and new tires wearing true. Barrie Boas 94 Concept 5111

Re: balance or shake

Reply #10 –
Yahoo Message Number: 65969
Al, I installed centramatics front and rear this past spring. I got them at the same time I had new Toyos installed. The Centramatics work as claimed. My coach has never ridden this smoothly and I bought the coach new and have 100K miles in 7 years. I am now a believer in Centramatics.

George in Birmingham
'04 Allure 31038
George in Birmingham
2003 Magna 6298

Re: balance or shake

Reply #11 –
Yahoo Message Number: 65975

Next time you are in a rest area or truck stop, take a stroll and check out how many professional rigs have balanced their tires. Most have not, if they have they do the fronts only.
With 22.5" wheels we are hard pressed to drive fast enough to really spin them up. In 35 years of class A RVing any time I have brought a tire back for shaking (balanced or not) they took off the wheel and rotated the tire 180 degrees on the wheel and tried again. Made it go away every time.
Balancing is a high profit margin service (after they pay off the machine of course).

Bob (rthandren@...)
'05 Inspire 51178

Re: balance or shake

Reply #12 –
Yahoo Message Number: 65985
I have seen a brochure on the Balance Masters. Are they similar to the Centramitic wheel balancers?
John

06 Inspire 360 #51942

Robert Handren wrote:

Re: balance or shake

Reply #13 –
Yahoo Message Number: 65987
If I recall right, same basic method of balancing. Except they use a fluid in the ring, where Centramatics uses balls. They also have more products, like for drive shafts. Suspect they both work well. I went with the Centrmatics, due to the one-on-one positive feedback from people I talked to that had them. One for many years and miles. I did not know anyone that has the Balance Masters. Not knocking them at all, I just don't know about them from real world users.

Best,
Smitty

04 Allure 31017
04 Allure Sold to a nice new owner! Now enjoying a 07 Magna Rembrandt 45' ISX600 #6775
"We're ONDROAD for THEJRNY!" (Toad and Coach license plates, say Hi if you see us!)