Modern Vespa

I had new tires mounted recently.

Pirelli Angels.

The shop once told me that they balanced front tires, so I assumed they were good.

But it turns out that they didn't.

I went on the first long ride with the new front tire today.

We ran over an indicated 70 mph for a bit of the ride, and I felt a slight vibration coming from the front.

When I got home, I busted out the Marc Parnes static balancer and balance the wheel, it only needed 7 grams, then took it out for a smooth ride.

Much better.

Some say that there is no need to balance scooter tires.

I agree for 50cc it those that don't ride faster than 50 mph, but faster rides need balanced tires.

Bill

For sure, for sure!

Have been doing own bike/scooter tire work since 1955, over 400 tires---am well aware that most shops in US cannot or do not balance small wheels and tires. Changing tire, I put on my balance stand to check out run out, but for at least the past 10 years "Ride On" has worked well for me, as balance medium---not cheap, but really works!!

There are thousands of trailers in South Africa running on Prowhite 10" rims.
The tyre places can and do balance them.
I see no reason why they can't balance Vespa ones.

Fancy setup, Bill!

The rims of the tires must all be balanced, in Italy also the rear rim and on all those that exceed 50 cc.

The problem is that some dealers & tyre fitters simply don't have the correct tyre balance equipment. These days they rely on dynamic digital balance machines that cannot cope with 10 or 12" wheels. Therefore a static balance machine must be used. In the trade these are now regarded as 'old fashioned'. Many don't have them so dealers will often tell you the wheel doesn't need balancing. As said here, not true. They must be balanced.

I tried having the local tire shop balance the wheels on wife's GTV but the shaft on the electronic balancer was a little too fat to go through the hole in the center of the GTV's rims.

I have one of the Marc Parnes static balancers and use that for the GTV and other two-wheelers in the garage!

Years ago, Boris Loose, who had a local scooter store for a while, then did repairs and oversaw the scooter community, would do all of the servicing for my scooters.

Including tire changes.

He never balanced them and they, mostly, were fine.

But one ride stands out that changed that.

I rode up to North Carolina for a MP3 Gathering.

The entire way up and back, I had to deal with a shaking front end.

When the wheel shakes, the windshield shakes.

When the windshield shakes, the air around it shakes and that shakes the helmet and my head.

Not what you want on a 9 hour ride.

So I started balancing them myself.

Bill

I have the Marc Parnes balancer and am surprised sometimes at the amount weights needed to balance the tire when I get it back from the motorcycle shop. I have a shop do the tire mounting.

Barry,

I was careful and took my time.

I even cut a 7g weight in half so I could get them as close as possible to perfectly balanced.

The front of Rocket only needed one 7g weight.

The new front tire on Vanessa still had old weights on them and it was quite out-of-balance.

I took them off, ran it through the Marc Parnes and found that it needed three of the 7g weights.

Haven't tested that one yet but I think it will be good.

Bill

been preaching this for years.

On the car it is standard to balance the wheels in first and second order inbalance.

When a static balance stand is used I guess you can only do first order balancing.

Is that enough for a 16" Beverly front wheel and a 14" BV rear wheel?

What I see on my BV is balance weights both on the rignt and on the left side of the rim, not on the same position. I think that means the wheels have been balanced first and second order.
I bought it like that, so far I did nothing on the tires but my rear tire should be replaced next spring. The scooter does not have any vibration in it from the wheels between standing still and top speed. So the wheels have been balanced perfectly.

Do I need to make sure the wheels are first and second order balanced?

While getting tires changed on a Suzuki, I refused balance beads. The package weighed very little compared to the tape weights added with my Parnes setup. Although possibly wrong not to try them, I suspect the beads are bullshit.

The static balance is normally good enough for our Vespas - but my Fuoco needed a total of 120g on one front wheel distributed between both sides after dynamically balancing. Dynamic balancing is best - but the shop has to have a machine with a small enough spindle to take the scooter wheels.

The 'rule of thumb' used to be that if a bike went over 50mph (80kph) then it needed its wheels balanced.

Check the balance of a bare rim with the valve stem
Many times adding a tire doesn't require further correction

not true at all. the tire themselves have overlapping belts in them thus creating a out of balance tire.

I have balanced many a bare rim and then mounted tires and checked and each and every time I had to rebalance the complete assy.

Quote: "exceptio probat regulam," The exception that proves the rule;

Most tyre suppliers/fitters in Auckland will not /can not balance Vespa/MP3 wheels.
Except AJ. He has modified a Vespa hub to fit his dynamic balancer . My road bikes, racing bike and scooters have all been treated to his tyre supply and fitting expertise . A well balanced front wheel is a must for the best ride and kindness to the rest of the bike. Many thousands of miles of riding have proved this.

PS Tyre(eng.)= Tire(US)

I have the same Marc Parnes balancer for the GTS. I also have one for my BV which I have not used yet because I'm on the original factory tires. The BV has quite a bit of wobble during deceleration. I'm wondering if the factory could have done a poor balancing job.

No you don't on a Vespa. The spoke offset allows weights to be fitted near centrally on the rim alleviating the need for any other balancing.

Even with the right size spindle Jim, the software often won't cope with 12 or even 13" wheels for a dynamic balance. My dealer just spent £4,000 on a state of the art dynamic balancer. It can't cope with Vespa 12" or MP3 13" wheels. He's sick as a parrot about it, yet it does the 14" Burgman wheels and above fine.

https://butler.brbunited.com/it/products/equilibratrici-it/equilibratrice-di-ruote-da-motocicli-librak328bike/

Librak328BIKE motorcycle wheel balancer

Balancing machine, for rims with a diameter between 10 and 26 inches.

CATEGORY: Wheel balancers TAG: Motorcycles, Quads, Scooters

The super simple Marc Parnes static balance works just fine for me.

Bill

The BV350 wheels can be spin balanced at Cycle Gear. As well as the rear wheel of my Honda's. The front Honda wheel has to be balanced on my $20 Harbor Freight static balancer.

My BV definitely goes faster than 50mph.

I will check at the local tyre shop if they also do motorcycle tyres and what they do for balancing. I would prefer dynamic balancing.

Replacing a rear tyre on a BV is a bit more complex than on a car. You need to disassemble the exhaust and part of the right side wheel suspension.

I got my wheel balancer today from http://www.marcparnes.com/

Balanced my front wheel* and it needed between 5g and 10g so I went 5g (testing showed near than the 10g). unsurprisingly it was opposite the valve which is a heavier non stock tpms

I watched stickyfrog's video first and was interested to see that used 21g. it was a classic gts/gt wheel with a citygrip ... were the old rims not balanced at the factory or are citygrips very unbalanced or ...?



* the modern/new GTS wheel design (made in china) / pirelli diablo with a couple of thousand kms / internal TPMS (cheap from aliexpress)

It helps if you put the wheel on the balancer first, no tire and find the heaviest spot. Don't assume it will be the valve stem. It often isn't. If your new tire has a red dot on it, match that up with the heaviest spot on the wheel. Now you've matched the lightest point of the tire with the heaviest point of the wheel.

I expect your balancer is only first order balancing (or static balancing)?

Yes.

Not an option. I was not replacing the tire and don't have the tools or skills to do so.

I didn't assume the valve but did predict it as the TPMS is heavier than a standard stem.

This tire didn't have the red dot but some previous diablos did.


The point of my post was not about my wheel it was my being curious why some others have needed such a large amount of weights

Then you are only balancing up - down imbalances, not left - right.
If you do not balance left - right you will still experience vibrations at higher speeds.

For both up - down and left - right balancing you need a dynamic balancer. Depends on the max speed your scooter is able to go. If that is above 50mph your tyres need to be dynamically balanced.

Yes but my local tire shop can't do wheel balancing of 12" vespa wheel. (Think this is discussed earlier in the thread).

static is better than none

This is what those of us who live in the US have to deal with.

Luckily, every wheel I have balanced with the Marc Parnes has run smoothly at all speeds, right up to the top speed.

Bill

The Parnes fits in my tool chest and has served me through 6 bikes. Sure beats the axle on blocks method.

Never have I ever dynamically balanced a scooter wheel, and never have I ever experienced vibrations.
Marc Parnes does it for me, too.

I felt no vibes on my static-balanced Ducatis at over 130mph or at 120mph on my K75S. It should suffice at 65 on my ET4.

It was discussed earlier, indeed. Tyre shops need the specific tooling.
And fore sure static is better than none.

wow that is soooooo interesting. wonder why all those tires mounted and static balanced at road race tracks are not tossing riders all over the tracks because they are not DYNAMICALLY balanced?

oh those guys must be keeping thier speeds under 50 mph gong around the high banks of Daytona.

Now "old", you can't be commenting on your on comments or people will think you "are" old.