Changed my tires with cheap tools

[Gollum]

So yesterday I got the pleasure of changing my first tire! I'd done lots of reading and watching youtube videos and was honestly quite scared of how much work it would be. I was expecting a minimum of an hour per tire from what I'd seen, if I was lucky.

 

But I knew that this guy I know now would help me out. He's one of those very typical old guys that knows all those stupid little tricks that make life easier. The type I highly respect, which this forum seems to be full of. He offered me to let him use his tools, and I just asked he'd tell me what to do to help me along. Luckily, it was WAY EASIER than I'd ever thought, and even for my first time went very smoothly. I had to pull tires off other rims to put on the rims I wanted the tires on, so we had two tire removals and one tire install for each wheel, and it only took about 30 minutes per wheel at most and then they were ready for balancing.

 

So here's the tools used (for the most part)

 

Basic tire changer platform

http://www.northerntool.com/shop/tools/product_18863_18863

 

Bead Breaker (the one on the cheap tire changer above was crap according to the guy helping me)

http://www.harborfreight.com/bead-breaker-92961.html

(the one we used was a vintage american made variant. Similar design, not sure how the actually perform from one another.

 

Bubble Balancer

http://www.harborfreight.com/portable-wheel-balancer-39741.html

(the one we use looked like it was about 100 years older than this, but same exact principle)

 

Basic Tire Iron

http://www.harborfreight.com/24-inch-general-purpose-tire-iron-93230.html

 

 

We also had some other basic tools, like a wrench for pulling off wheel weights that also clamps them back down and acts as a hammer for weights. Another nifty tool was used for pulling the core out of the valve stem. It's about the size and shape of an audio coupler, but metal and has a little fork on the inside of one side that grabs the core.

 

So here's the steps we followed, that hopefully helps someone out there.

 

Step 1. Remove air.

Just removing the core from the valve stem is way easier than bleeding the tire, though the guy helping me said the tool used is getting harder and harder to come by and used to be a dime a dozen growing up. It's just a little tool that grabs the core. A slim needle nose plier would do the trick I'd imagine. Just twist the core and it'll come right out, just be careful of those threads when putting it back in. Doesn't need to be wrenched down like crazy, just enough not to leak.

 

Step 2. Break the bead.

Put the tire onto the bead breaker tool above, one the ground. This will be the first time you use some tire lube, which is extremely important in making this an easy job. Just use some water with dish soap (generous proportion). Putting it into a spray bottle of sorts makes it easy to apply. So put some lube all around the bead and then stand on the rim so it doesn't move on you. Put the bead breaker's arm onto the tire and put your weight on the upper arm. The trick to make this easy is to keep putting lube on as you push the bead down with the breaker. Having someone else apply the lube will make it much easier. At my 170 pounds I had to bounce pretty hard on the upper arm to get the bead off quickly.

 

One you've gotten the bead off in the first section, push down the rest of the tire bead into the drop section of the rim (where it goes inward to give you space). You can now flip the rim and do the same thing on the opposite side. Remember, you can't over-lube. A wet tire is much easier to work with. If it's a hot day I'd recommend finding shade as the lube will evaporate quickly.

 

Step 3. Remove the tire.

 

This is one of the most complex parts, but it doesn't need to take long at all. Take your rim with loose tire and mount it onto the tire changer. You'll have to unscrew the top of the tire changer, and then put the wheel on, and put the top back on which clamps the rim down. If you're worried about scratching your pretty wheels put something down to protect the rim. Good piece of rubber would be nice, but you can use anything, like wood shims. Now that the wheel is clamped nice and tight (right??? go check) you can use your tool you used to tighten the clamp to get under the bead and pry it over the lip. If you're worried about your rim, they make plastic protectors to go over the lip, but I didn't bother and didn't seem to hurt my rims. Now that you've got the bead over the lip at a point, you have to work your way around the wheel. Using the center post as a leverage point you can rotate your bar around, but the bead will just move with you, and you won't make any progress. So what you have to do is put that basic tire iron above side the gap you've made and then work in the opposite direction. This can be a bit difficult with two hands, but it doesn't have to be hard. Lots of lube. Once you see the bead sit onto of the lip between the iron and your main pry tool, you're set. The bead will now apply enough pressure on the rim lip that you don't need the basic tire iron, you can pull it out. The key in getting all the way around without struggle at this point is just lots of lube, and MAKING SURE that the tire bead bellow the lip is still in the drop center of the rim. If the bead isn't in the drop center then there won't be the slack to get the bead over the lip. So just keep watch on everything and add lube and this whole process should only take 5 minutes at most. Once you get the bead completely over you can start working on the other bead going over the same lip.

 

Get the other side started can be a little tricky because the tire is in your way slightly, but it's all the same methods and doesn't need to be too difficult. Just take your time and don't force anything. Once you get it started it does take some serious force, and I was banging the pry bar tool against the center post pretty hard, but I made VERY short work of it with that kind of energetic effort.

 

Step 3.5. Clean Rim

Apparently many slow leaks are cause by poor bead seal from dirt and grim between the rim and bead. You should take this moment to clean the bead area of the rim with a wire brush. This doesn't take much work or time and is probably just good practice. My rims look like they hadn't been cleaned in several tire changes.

 

Step 4. Install tire.

 

This is probably the most difficult part, but I think with practice it doesn't have to be extremely hard. First make sure you're putting the tire on the right direction you want. Most tires now days have directional tread so make sure you know which way is which, and which side of the car you want the rim in question to go on. Once you've figured that out you can put the tire over the rim and start getting the first bead over partially. You'll be using the other end of the pry bar here which you'll notice isn't symmetrical. One side has a hook, and one side has a buldge on it, that's thinner on one side than the other. You can only work this tool one direction around the center post, thin edge leading. So to use this side, you have to get the bead in the valley of the outside end, and force the inside of the end over the outer lip of the rim. To do this I had to keep the opposite end of the bead relatively close to the rim lip, not way down in the drop center. Once you get the tool in place to start working the bead over, you might find it easy to make progress to now put the bead over the lip into the drop center to give you some slack. Don't forget to keep adding lube! Once you're most of the way around you can just lift the bar you're using to roll the bead over the edge and tada! It'll pop over. The second side is pretty much the same story. Just getting the tool into place will be the hard part. After that just make sure to add lube and keep the bead in the drop center and it should work it's way over with some elbow grease.

 

Now that you have a tire back on the rim, you need to add air. But you need your bead onto it's home on the rim before it'll seal and hold air. This is where it's handy that you've removed the core from the valve stem. Fire up your compressor and just leave the quick release by itself on the end of your air hose. The quick release will grab the valve stem just fine. This allows a very free flow of air from compressor to tire to set the bead nice a fast. Just make sure to release the air as soon as you hear both beads seat. No reason to over inflate the tire and blow it up in your face. Pulling the air hose off the valve stem will be leaking though, so put your finger over it and grab your core to put back in and then thread it back in. It doesn't matter if you loose a ton of air, because the beads are set now. You can can attach a tire filler with gauge onto your air hose and fill the tire up to desired pressure.

 

 

Step 5. Balance

 

The bubble balancer works, but the guy helping me went on and on about how you just can't beat the newer fancy digital balancers shops use now days, and that they're idiot proof. But learning to use a bubble balancer is an art worth learning as it doesn't take much, just time and patience. All you have to do really is set the wheel onto the balancer and make sure it's set down nice and square onto the balancer. Try to do this in an alcove if there's any wind, as the wind will make it very hard to get a stead reading on the bubble. The principle is no different than using a carpenter's level. Note where the bubble is going, then set some weight on the lip towards the bubble and watch where the bubble goes. Was it enough? Too much? Did it not go in a straight line towards the center? Try move it side to side to find the true high spot. If you're adding more than .5 of an ounce you can put half on one side of the rim, and the other half on the other side give more equal balance.

 

You could also run into a situation like I did. The tires I had where fairly decent quality tires, and one only needed .25 of an ounce, and the other was as good as it was going to get without any weight added at all. We'll see how it is once I drive it though.

 

And that's it. It might be a lot of reading, but it isn't nearly as much work as it can be made out to be. Just have to take your time and really understand what's happening and you'll figure out how to make it easy on yourself. Once you've made it easy you can then work on doing it quickly.

 

I only did two tires, and have 6 more to do. One of the times I make it out there I'm going to drag a camera with me and take some pics and maybe do a little better of a write up. I know I haven't used all the correct terminology here, but hopefully I've gotten the points across.

 

So hopefully this helps someone out there. I know that before I was one the fence on buying all this stuff to do it myself, but I'm not POSITIVE I never want to pay to have a tire mounted again. Shops are charging as much as $65 here locally PER TIRE to mount and balance the new tire, and recycle the other tire. Even the cheaper places still end up charging almost $200 total in installation fees for a full set of a 4. I now know what I need to buy, and that all those tools will be paid off in just a few new tire sets.

[padam07]

I always like to see people trying new things on there own but man I think changing tires is one thing I will never do on my own. I can't believe how much more expensive it is in Cali than Mass. Here a local shop will mount and balance a tire for $12. New stem is $2 and waste fee is another $2. So for $65 for a set of 4 is what I will do forever.

[JMortensen]

Bubble balancers do a static balance. A dynamic balance is much better. That's not to say that you shouldn't do it yourself, but you may find that your car is sensitive to wheel balance issues and the bubble balance is just not sufficient.

[19762802+2]

I do these things everyday at work (I work at Discount tire). I'm thinking it would be pretty difficult to do these things yourself, but those prices are pretty ridiculous. We dismount old tires of rims for anyone for free I'm pretty sure. It also helps to know the guy's there or make friends with someone who works at a tire shop. I just got 4 new tires for my Dodge Colt vista for $243 but like I said I work at a tire shop. Also like Jon said, a static balance isn't as good as a dynamic balance and we usually only do a static balance on very heavy wheels or very large wheels such as offroad tires/wheels where it won't matter as much. Also if you wanted to save money, I don't know about your shops but we have Unit's (which is where we sell tires and make money blah blah blah) and Labor which is stuff like rotations, balancing, flat tires etc. We do flat tires and RBA's (rotate balance air) for free at discount tire (don't know if you have one where you live.) but if you wanted too you could just install the tires yourself and have them balanced for free as I'm not sure at the moment if we charge to put tires on rims if you already have tires. but I think it would be considered a bolt on or a snow change for us. Also you should put new valve stems in the rims as well because they get old and crack and can cause leaks as well.

Edited March 22, 2011 by 19762802+2

[thehelix112]

Gollum, nice writeup dude! Some pictures for some of the more intricate steps would be awesome if someone else wants to use this writeup at some point soon? I'm assuming you're not going to and change the tyres again just to get pictures.

 

Dave

[Gollum]

Honestly I'm quite concerned that the balance won't be sufficient. But getting tires balanced locally still saves me quite a bit of dough, and the static balance should get me safely around for the time being.

 

Regarding local prices, I know those seem high but that's really what they've gotten to be in the bay area. I need to check some local shops and see what it looks like. I had a pretty good local hookup for a while at a wheel works and they'd do a full tire job for me at around $120 total iirc. That would include dismount, mount, recycle, new stems, balance, etc. And that was a good 50% or more discount. I recently had my wife's Accord in to replace all 4 tires at the local costco and that still came out to at least $130 total cost over the tire prices alone. I was quite happy with that, as that's the best I'd found for her car yet!

 

I will be doing some more tires in a few weeks once the weather clears up again. I'm going to take some quality pics and revisit this thread and rewrite it. Maybe I'll get rewarded my first sticky.