Wheel balancing - Centre (hub) or stud

So I know that the Jimny has wheels with a 108mm hub centre and the general advice is to balance the wheels using a stud adapter, sometimes called centreless or hubless wheel balancing (after Citroen) but it seems hard to find places which do this.

So do you take your Jimny to somewhere that does stud balancing and if so is it a national chain or local garage? Or do they just do hub centre balancing and use a large cone or collet?

I have had Jimny wheels balanced twice before, I suspect they did cone balancing, but one doesn’t seem to have a cone which fits and the other appears to have gone and the nearest branch is a fair way to go.

what do you think?

Robin

Some of my thoughts.

Make sure you clean the mounting face of the wheels and hubs, I didn't on my 5 spokes and couldn't get them right, no repeatability. And don't expect the shop to notice and do anything about it, they will get a balance and send you on your way. I was lucky as I couldn't cope with the motorway vibration when in Scotland and ended up in Inverness suzuki dealer on a Saturday morning with a technician who wasn't supposed to be there but he took pity on me and sorted me out. This is extremely rare in the motor industry.


Find someone who does pickups and commercial vehicles as evidently there's different size machines and car ones can be marginal. I would also suggest a smaller independent rather than a nationwide and I'd probably start looking in Hexham for someone who caterers to farms rather than Newcastle and someone dealing with builders but that's just me being discriminatory for no good reason.

Use hammer weights, they are more effective and will need less. Function before aesthetics.

I also am keeping half an eye open for a second hand set of machines but I don't really have space and would hardly be using them twice a year, but they would be cool. My name is Lambert and I have an addiction to tools.

I'm trying to understand the issue of Jimny JB74 wheel balancing, so that when I need new tyres I can have them balanced correctly. I have the standard SZ4 steel wheels.
Is the problem with hub centre balancing that the Jimny wheel centre hole is not accurately placed at the centre of the wheel. or that the diameter of the hole is too large for a standard wheel balancing machine?
If the hole is simply too large then adapter cones are readily available, inexpensive and I would imagine reputable tyre dealers would have them and know how to use them. If the Jimny wheels are genuinely stud centric then there is a greater chance of problems at some tyre dealers.

Having had balancing issues I am under the impression that the light weight alloys and a heavy tyre make this "small" problem bigger.
There is most likely no issue with standard tyres and/or steel wheels but with stupid heavy BFG muds the problem is much larger. I think.

Also on my car doing offroad, driving around with a very low pressure can make the tyre spin on the rim making the balancing completely off the chart. I have seen an old video of my SJ spinning the rim inside my BFG Muds. (0.4 bar pressure is close to nothing)

Did a check once with a mate that has the right tools. With rims only in the balancer we found the two original alloys we looked at to be completely straight center and all. However we saw that with the wrong cone angle on the balancer the rim could ride on a cast edge in the center hole.

I am with Lambert here, use the local tyre shop. Dunno how it is in UK but here there is winter and summer season and around the date for it not being allowed with summer or winter tyres in Spring and Autumn, the tyre shops get insanely busy. I would avoid those dates and use the shop in a calm period when they have time to do the job properly.

Take it to a Protyre franchise.  It's where etyres send "difficult" cases.

Doctorchris wrote:

I'm trying to understand the issue of Jimny JB74 wheel balancing, so that when I need new tyres I can have them balanced correctly. I have the standard SZ4 steel wheels.
Is the problem with hub centre balancing that the Jimny wheel centre hole is not accurately placed at the centre of the wheel. or that the diameter of the hole is too large for a standard wheel balancing machine?
If the hole is simply too large then adapter cones are readily available, inexpensive and I would imagine reputable tyre dealers would have them and know how to use them. If the Jimny wheels are genuinely stud centric then there is a greater chance of problems at some tyre dealers.
 

Yes, there is no guarantee that the centre hole is perfectly central to the stud holes.
When wheels were made by Rubery Owen you were lucky if they were properly round!
When I had an MGB the tyre place tried to use the cone, and you could see the run-out in the tyre.


I don't know whether the J74 uses stud centric or hub centric mounts, I suppose the test is whether the wheel seizes onto the hub ring or not!
 

Just use balance beads 
Tyres will never go out of balance 
It's that easy 

jackonlyjack wrote:

Just use balance beads 
Tyres will never go out of balance 
It's that easy 

Did you get your beads from Dynabeads.co.uk?  Do you go for through the valve (compatible with TPMS) or inserted past the rim?

I must admit there are a lot of options, any hints on which (and how many) I would need for Maxxis 215/70 on Gen4 alloys with TPMS would be gratefully received.

Robin
 

Are the factory alloys not hub centric? normally wheels supplied on a new vehicle have the correct centre bore in them? I've never investigated Jimny alloys as I'm a steelies guy.
It's when you go aftermarket things get tricky, as rim manufacturers often make the centre bore larger to fit a wider range of vehicles. (some rim manufacturers make rims specifically for vehicles - ROH for example make a rim specifically for the Jimny).
We regularly machine spacers for a local tyre shop (the one I personally use) to take up the gap between the hub spigot and the aftermarket alloy rim centre bore, mostly because its better safe than sorry and easier than getting info out of OEM's about whether or not they're actually required for that vehicle.
From my experience steel wheels tend not to be hub centric, (at least the cheaper ones) and alloys nearly always are (or can be), mainly because alloys are machined in one setup, and as a consequence the centre bore is true to the bead.
All this to say balancing a stock alloy rim that is hub centric should be fine either way, through the centre bore, or with a stud adaptor. Its just a question of whether or not the stock Jimny rims are in fact hub centric. Would be very strange if they're not.

I've had my new Showa Garage alloys fitted with Yokohamas and it's spot on.

No weights visible, they're all on the inner surface,  balanced via centre bore.



 

Hughes wrote:

Are the factory alloys not hub centric? normally wheels supplied on a new vehicle have the correct centre bore in them? I've never investigated Jimny alloys as I'm a steelies guy.
It's when you go aftermarket things get tricky, as rim manufacturers often make the centre bore larger to fit a wider range of vehicles. (some rim manufacturers make rims specifically for vehicles - ROH for example make a rim specifically for the Jimny).
We regularly machine spacers for a local tyre shop (the one I personally use) to take up the gap between the hub spigot and the aftermarket alloy rim centre bore, mostly because its better safe than sorry and easier than getting info out of OEM's about whether or not they're actually required for that vehicle.
From my experience steel wheels tend not to be hub centric, (at least the cheaper ones) and alloys nearly always are (or can be), mainly because alloys are machined in one setup, and as a consequence the centre bore is true to the bead.
All this to say balancing a stock alloy rim that is hub centric should be fine either way, through the centre bore, or with a stud adaptor. Its just a question of whether or not the stock Jimny rims are in fact hub centric. Would be very strange if they're not.
 

You'd think the alloys are hub centric- it is less trouble to machine the rim true to the centre hole than eccentric!

The trouble with "Hub centric" is not only does the wheel centre have to be accurate but the hub itself has to be machined to a high standard, Take a look at the hubs on a Jimny