Supercorsa Wheel Balance

I did my first tire change on my 1299S last night.

During the balance process I confirmed that the valve stem is the heaviest par of the wheel. I then lined the two little dots on the tire with the stem. When I put on the balancer, the valve part went right to the top. It took 60 grams of weights at the stem to get it to balance .

Is this ok? I guess I could pull the wheel off, and spin the tire so the dots are opposite the valve..but this isn't making any sense unless Pirelli marks their dots differently?

I believe red dots are heavy points on a tire and yellow dots are the light points.

That's way too many weights

Motorcycle Tire/Tyre Tech 101

TYRE MOUNTING - IMPORTANT INFORMATION

WARNING
These tyres are only to be used on vehicles for which motorcycle tyres were originally stipulated by the manufacturer. Any other use can be dangerous. Check if the tyre has directional arrows. If it does, you must mount the tyre so that the arrow points in the direction of rotation. Some PIRELLI tyres have a red dot on the sidewall. This indicates the lightest point, and should be positioned next to the valve. To clean or lubricate the bead, use tyre mounting lubricant or soapy water. To seat the bead: remove the valve stem core and inflate the tyre. For safety reasons do not inflate motorcycle tyres to more than 50 psi (3,5 bar); for scooters tyres do not exceed 150 % of the indicated maximum pressure. Be sure to reinstall the valve stem core and inflate the tyre/tube to the recommended riding pres-sure. Check the bead control lines for proper seating. If the beads are not properly seated, you will have to deflate the tyres/tubes and repeat the above procedure.

I just had Pirellis installed on my wheels. Red dots line up with stem on rear wheel. Zero weight required.

RRnold said:

That's way too many weights

[Some PIRELLI tyres have a red dot on the sidewall. This indicates the lightest point, and should be positioned next to the valve.

Click to expand...

I did put the dots near the valve stem. Is this a defective tire? The only way I know to use less weights is to put the dots opposite the valve stem.

How did you balance it? Do you have center adaptor?

Pirelli's and Micheln's hardly ever require more than about 3/4oz of weight.
Dunlop's are usually the most out of balance, although the Q3's show a significant improvement in this area.

There's way too much balance weight on that rim...

If that were mine, I'd break the bead and rotate the tire and see if that balances it a little better.

zexz1000 said:

I just had Pirellis installed on my wheels. Red dots line up with stem on rear wheel. Zero weight required.

Click to expand...

I second that

Hmmmmm,
had a talk with a Pirelli guy (Germany) in January this year and asked him explicitly about the dots. His response was pretty simple: "forget about them"....

ChrisE said:

How did you balance it? Do you have center adaptor?

Pirelli's and Micheln's hardly ever require more than about 3/4oz of weight.
Dunlop's are usually the most out of balance, although the Q3's show a significant improvement in this area.

There's way too much balance weight on that rim...

If that were mine, I'd break the bead and rotate the tire and see if that balances it a little better.

Click to expand...

Parnes axle & cones on a Nomar base.

I'd break the bead an rotate it, but logically that doesn't make sense. Here's the problem.

When I put the wheel on w/ no tire, the valve stem is at the bottom (6 o'clock). When I put the wheel on the balancer with the tire on on the stem is at the top (12 o'clock). That means the heavy part of the tire is exactly opposite the heavy part of the wheel. So every other combination of wheel / tire orientation will be worse. The fact that I had to put the weight at the valve stem location means I can't optimize it any further...right? If my logic holds, every other position will require more weight.

Although I find the Pirelli dots to be fairly accurate, and they do indicate the light spot own the tire, if I get a badly out of balance after mounting a new tire, I will break the bead and try rotating it to see if it helps sort out the imbalance.

If you rotate it, and it puts it more out of balance, you'll see it real fast.

That's still a lot of weight on your wheel though.....

UPDATE:

I pulled the whole thing apart and started over. I got it down to 50g, but that's it. It's 100% the tire. The wheel alone is almost perfect. Rotated the tire to 3 different positions all around the wheel and every time it took over 10 x 5g weights to balance.

I just got a crappy tire.

I'd return the tire for a new one.

Well that sucks....On a positive note, they wear out quick, so you'll soon be able to replace it...