Had 4 new tires put on my truck a couple weeks ago. Yesterday while washing the truck, I noticed that the idiots had installed the balance weights on the damned wheel covers!!!

Now I have to go back and raise some hell.

Oh, not to mention that it took them nearly 2 hours to actually install the tires!

They skipped balance weights day.

quote:

Originally posted by Elk Hunter:


Oh, not to mention that it took them nearly 2 hours to actually install the tires!

Probably very time consuming balancing those wheel covers, putting them back on at a slightly different rotation point, rechecking the balance and then taking them off again to do another rebalancing all over again!

I must say that in my 50 plus years on this earth, I have NEVER heard of or seen that!!

Incredible to say the least.

Sorry to hear about that. One of my jobs in college was a tire buster for Montgomery Wards. Never ever saw anyone put the weights on the wheel cover. Problem I see a lot is not relearning the TPMS after rotating or installing new tires.

That's a new one for me and I thought over all the years, 47 in total that I worked in car dealerships I had probably seen it all.

One of the best ones. 1968 a friend's father had a loaded El Camino circa 1967. It had those hokey Chevrolet option simulated mag wheel covers on it. His dad dropped it off at a local gas station for a set of tires. Yep, you guessed it, tire buster took an impact to not one but two of the fake lug nuts.

That left such nice holes in the wheel cover....

quote:

Originally posted by shovelhead:
One of the best ones. 1968 a friend's father had a loaded El Camino circa 1967. It had those hokey Chevrolet option simulated mag wheel covers on it. His dad dropped it off at a local gas station for a set of tires. Yep, you guessed it, tire buster took an impact to not one but two of the fake lug nuts.

That left such nice holes in the wheel cover....

That made me laugh. Years ago I watched a guy do that same thing.

You won’t find a lot of Phi Beta Kappas working fixing flats at tire shops.

I worked at a tire store for almost four years, and have been around cars and shops quite a bit.

NEVER have I heard of someone putting the weights on the wheel covers.

Holy smokes, Elk, I'd be sure and take pictures of that before going back to the shop. That's just stinking fascinating!

Holy smokes! Kinda makes you wonder about all their other work. Don't have him do your brakes.

Once on my semi truck I had a tire guy mount a 11R22.5 beside a 12R22.5 in a dually config. Maybe it's the same guy.

I have worked with, and seen worked with, tires for almost 40 years and cannot conceive of this.

Buy a set of tires here in our only tire shop and what do they set the air pressure at? Whatever is the maximum pressure molded on the sidewall. Picked up my 3/4 Ton Suburban the other day and all four had 85psi in them. Made for a pretty rough ride.

quote:

Originally posted by arfmel:
Buy a set of tires here in our only tire shop and what do they set the air pressure at? Whatever is the maximum pressure molded on the sidewall. Picked up my 3/4 Ton Suburban the other day and all four had 85psi in them. Made for a pretty rough ride.

And the lug nuts are tightened to 500 foot pounds.

Pics or it didn't happen.

Seriously, you didn't take pics of that? This is comic gold!

There has GOT to be a good update to this thread....

I started out as a tire buster as well then worked my way up the ladder for over 12 years in the field.
I too have NEVER seen or even heard of anyone doing anything as boneheaded as that and I have seen some SHIT!
You should go back and check to make sure they really meant it or if someone was playing a joke and forgot to tell you.

Way back in the day when I worked on cars for a living, some Chrysler products had left hand thread wheel studs on the right side of the vehicles.

I had at least one car towed in where the owner broke every wheel stud because someone had made them too tight.

Also have seen inexperienced tire jockeys snap one or two with the impact gun before realizing something was not right.

In all my 30+ years in the tire business I've never heard that before. Gotta wonder how they did that?

This is so unbelievably stupid that it MUST be documented with pictures and shared here and all over the net. I have never ever ever ever heard of such stupidity. It's mind boggling.

I've seen weights made for steel wheels, aluminum wheels, big truck wheels, and weights with adhesive for dynamic balancing. I can't imagine any of them staying on wheel covers. How does one mount the wheel and cover on a balancing machine?