Wheel balancing is a process of adjusting the weight of your wheels and tyre combination to ensure even distribution of weight. This is important to ensure a smooth, vibration-free ride. Wheel/tyre balancing can also improve tyre wear, resulting in longer tyre life and improved fuel economy. While Goodyear tyres are designed for smoother journeys and fuel saving low rolling resistance technologies on some tyres, having an unbalanced tyre can impact these. The process of wheel balancing involves mounting the wheel and tyre combination on a balancing machine and spinning it to determine the amount of weight and where it needs to be placed for even distribution. Once the correct weight is determined and applied, technicians can then adjust the tyre pressure to complete the wheel balancing process.
Most tyre dealers will offer a tyre balancing service when purchasing new tyres and this is because it’s strongly recommended as something you need to do before fitting new tyres to your vehicle. Tyre balancing involves ensuring the wheel rim, tyres and valve combination spin without causing potentially uncomfortable vibrations when driving. As well as being potentially uncomfortable for drivers and passengers, an unbalanced tyre can also be prone to excessive or uneven tyre wear that can reduce the lifespan and efficiency of your tyres.
Although there is no guidance on intervals of balancing your tyres in terms of mileage, over time tyres can become unbalanced so it’s worth knowing signs of when you should consider visiting a local garage to have tyres rebalanced:
Tyres need to be balanced to ensure a smooth and comfortable ride. When the tyres are unbalanced, they can cause the car to vibrate and make it difficult to handle. Unbalanced tyres can also lead to premature tyre wear, increased fuel consumption and increased braking distances. By balancing your tyres, you can help to reduce vibrations, improve handling, fuel economy and potentially reduce uneven wear on the tyre tread.
An unbalanced tyre can vibrate and spin imperfectly which can cause a slight judder effect rather than spinning smoothly, it’s due to this imbalance that tyres can wear unevenly impacting the life of your tyre tread. By ensuring your tyres are balanced correctly you can extend the life span of your tyre tread – but by choosing a tyre with Mileage Plus Technology™ you can extend the life of your tyre even further.
The Goodyear EfficientGrip Performance 2 provides up to 20% more mileage than the next best competitor and 50% more mileage than the predecessor.
A tyre balancing service involves putting the inflated tyre and rim onto a balancing machine that will spin the tyre and wheel to recognise any areas where the weight is uneven which can cause an imperfect spin. Weights can then be added by the tyre mechanic to the rim to create a uniform weight across the spin of the wheel and tyre. This process is repeated until the machine is unable to recognise any unbalanced areas on the tyre and creates an evenly weighted spin.
This is how you can tell if your car wheels are unbalanced, you can experience a significant impact on the performance, handling and safety of your vehicle. Unbalanced wheels can cause your car to vibrate or shake, especially at higher speeds, potentially leading to increased tyre wear and decreased fuel efficiency.
Tyre balancing focuses on the weight around the wheel and tyre combination to generate a smooth and comfortable ride and wheel alignment covers the angles of contact between the tyre and the road.
