Derf, et al -
Another approach.
I mount my own, manually, using spoon-type tire (tyre?) irons such as used
to come with the tool kit. I lay the wheel face down on an old quilt and
put the tires on from the rear. This keeps from getting rim scratches on
the $75 each paint job. I can slip the tire on the rim as needed to
reduce the weight required to balance them. The little green mark on the
bead that is supposed to go next to the valve stem may not be exact. I
balance them on a static bubble balancer to better than 1/8 ounce (wheels
were balanced at truing after painting.) and put the weights on the inside
rim. They work great on the highway and in Solo II events. Regarding
valve stems, my Classico inner tubes have threaded metal stems with rim
lock nuts.
Clay L.
'67 Sprite
8:45 AM 7/16/01 +0000, Charles Christ wrote:
>the type of tire machine you are looking for is referred to as a rim clamp
>machine. the machine has 2 types of pads for gripping the back side of the
>rim . bevery carefull thatthey have the "SOFT" type of pads! the other
>type of pads have a raised set of teeth that do a wonderfull job of gripping
>steel rims but chew the living daylights out of chrome and alloy rims. now!
>most customers could care less what the rear side of their rims look like.
>but with the price of alloy wheels and high visibility through wire wheels
>you had better inspect the tire machine and ask to see the surface of the
>pads that grip the rear side of the rim! the machine we use for the
>morgan'schrome wire wheels has the soft pads on it. no marks at all!
>another thing to consider! some wire wheels have a larger than needed hole
>for the valve stem to protrude through. this requires a small plastic
>bushing to take upthe space and protect the valve stem from shearing where
>it passes through the hole in the rim. and do not forget to check the
>condition of the rim strip! the rubber band that covers the spoke end
>nipples to protect the inner tube from chaffing! also 1 last wire wheel
>item! make shure there are no stickers on the inner tubes or inside the new
>tires! we have had a few flat tires on the race car last year and after it
>was all said and done we found tiny stickers under 1/2" square that must be
>date code stickers or something similar adhered to the inside of the tires.
>the stickers must be buffed out to be removed.(they will not peel out due to
>the nature of their adhesive they need to be "buffed" with an angle die
>grinder with a scotch brite disc attached.) we found that the stickers
>while staying mostly adhered to the inside of the tire still had a few edges
>that through flexing started to lift and chaffed the tubes to the point of
>failure. upon breaking down the tires a perfect negative imprint of the
>sticker was found where the hole was made inthe tube.
>
>just some wire wheel ramblings that may save others some problems or damage
>down the road.....
>
>chuck.
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