in case anyone was in need of this service, Hunter has a national / international search for locations last reported to have the required equipment

Hunter GSP9700 Wheel vibration Control System solves wheel vibration and tire pull problems that balancers and aligners can't fix

Hope this could help someone out

 

Thanks!

 

When I was in auto shop in high school (Probably 12 years ago) we got a demo and some lessons from the Hunter People.

The guy that came out was super knowledgeable and talked about things that were above the heads of alot of the guys in that class. He talked about how some times you have to take the tire off the rim and match up the "high" imbalance in the tire to the "low" imbalance in teh wheel to so they cancel out.

I taking my car to shops that have a hunter machine for balancing.

 

Thats one of the ways you can get a very accurate balance with the hunter machine.

Be advised, most shops expect to get the tires right the first time. otherwise, they can and do charge more for each additional attempt to 'spin the tire' on the rim.

If you are mounting brand new tires, they usually have a yellow wax stamp indicating how they should be mounted on the rim; you line up the yellow mark with the valve stem, from there it should be able to balance out easily,

i'm sure if they're doing it for a flat rate and customer doesn't want an outrageous bill for a simple wheel balancing, they will let some go that maybe/coulda used a tweak in the tire, but general shop practise is to just get it done, and in most cases its more than good enough.

But if you're being really meticulous about getting a balance issue out of your big wheels, and going through the added cost of road force balance, talk to the service person and explain how you're familiar with how the machine works, you're particular about getting an issue addressed, so put the top guy on the job and make sure its perfect, so maybe they will take your balance a bit more seriously,

My tires were slightly worn when i decided to get them rebalanced (was removing them to refinish the wheels anyways) and had them rebalanced on a local hunter rf machine,

they managed to get them on the first try,

if you have 16 or even 17" wheels, i don't think this is absolutely necessary, but on the 18" and up wheels, it certainly does help.

My local jag dealer did not have a road force balance machine, so i called the local bmw dealer (who i think is listed on the hunter site). BMW service desk guy picks up,

"what? sir? road force balanced? never heard of it"
"ask you tech"
"sorry sir, tech says no idea wtf youre talking about"
"you sure?"
"yes we dont have that sort of machine"

talk for 2 more min, and he suddenly informs me "oh uh... actually, after closer inspection we do in fact have a hunter road force balance machine"

they had it, but wanted $275 to mount tires and balance... yea...

found some local indie who was listed on the hunter site, dropped in, coincidentally had a whole vintage jag theme in the office... i brought them unmounted and he charged me $40 a wheel to rf balance, best price i seen yet.


Does your local jag dealer have a road force balancer?
Who has had their tires road force balanced, and how much did it run?