Centramatic's or balancing beads?

Beads are about the same cost as having your wheel computer spun balanced with lead, give or take a little. Shop the internet for dynamic balance beads. I have them in my drives and they're wearing nice and even but I still think they're too pricey. I would like to be able to buy beads for cheap in bulk then weigh them out as needed. You have to be careful with the tire lube when installing beads. Getting tire lube all inside the rim can get them clumping and you don't want that.

 

$600 +/- for three axles using Centramatics that will last at least 1MM, guaranteed or beads that must be replaced as lost when repairing a tire. As mentioned earlier, beads right now are not cheap and they do exactly the same thing the Centramatics do but for a lower up front cost. Me, I like the idea of not putting something inside the tires (although beads are OK, I have seen too many mutilated golf balls I guess) and after 2MM, Centramatics have proven themselves to me. Good luck...

 

Centramatics are completely useless on drives or tandems. Having used them for years I tossed the centramatics aside and went with beads. Also installed tru-balance sleeves, now that is an A#1 product. I'm putting beads in my steers when the current steers which are unbalanced wear out. Not wasting my time, money, effort balancing trailer tires anymore. My whole idea is to recycle the beads and use them forever to keep the cost down. Really see no reason at all why I can't. Might have to buy a small bag of beads every couple or 3 years to make up for any spillage. They're ceramic they don't just go bad. But it would be nice to just buy a large bulk amount cheaply. Of course I understand they don't make money like that.

 

On ebay there is a guy from AZ. advertising ceramic beads for $1.70/oz. I don't know if that is a good deal or not. Just letting people know about it.

 

Loves Truck Stop sells the balancing beads for about $20 (bag) per tire, it seems cheap too me.

 

What weight, size and brand of beads are you using in the drives? I have had excellent performance with Centramatics on my drives but will look into beads a little more in-depth.

 

The same ones Love's carries only I bought them off the internet. $20 a bag + labor (don't forget that) is on par with or even more expensive than what it costs to have wheels computer spun balanced with lead. That is really expensive if you're talking about 10 wheels or even 18. Also consider not every tire shop does beads. If you run into tire issues out there on the road that could become an issue. I wouldn't even bother with beads if I was paying someone else to do the tire work. For me the whole idea was to have balanced wheels/tires and not having to pay someone else to do it - or pay as little as possible. If you could buy beads in bulk like a 5 gallon bucket at a time and it only costs (estimating here) about $2 a tire to dump some beads in it you'd have enough beads to last probably 10 years and balanced tires would be really cheap.

 

Cheap trick- Wal-Fart has heavyweight plastic BBs in a two pound container for a decent price. Split a container between a pair of tires, and it'll work just the same. Plastic, so they don't rust or dust, and anything not needed will just roll around in there without affecting anything. You might even be able to get away with splitting a container four ways if you're using good tires. I ran these in 31" mud tires on a Wagoneer with excellent results, they should actually be more effective on a taller truck tire.
IIRC, Equal packets are only about 4oz, so that would be the minimum I would use in a tire.

 

At one time I used the plastic BB's you are talking about. But I read an article that stated any balancing method needs to put a sufficient amount of weight in a small area to be effective. That statement makes sense to me. So I quit using the plastic BB's. I now use copper BB's. I have never seen any damage to the inside of the tire. They will only roll around in the tire until you get up to speed. After that they should stay where they are needed. I use the same amount of weight as recommended by the bead companies.