Packard Forum Index » Post-War (1946-54)

I am about to have new diamondback radials mounted for my '54 Clipper. I've been reading that steel wheels have the centers stamped, and that they are often not perfectly centered - causing cone balancing to not be accurate. Is it worth my trouble to track down a shop that can do lug-centric balancing? In other words, are the centers on Packard wheels generally true?

I never heard of this problem, or ever saw a lug centric balancing machine before. If that is your biggest problem, then I wish I had a packard that ran as well as yours! ha. Surprised nobody commented on this, but I think any normal balancing machine would be fine.

The tires I have had done were spin balanced. They just load the mounted tire and wheel on the machine and the computer tells them where to add weights. That's about all I have seen for years. Aside from the old bubble level thing which I don't know if many use out here, what other methods are there?

EDIT: I do remember one place that had a motor on a floor jack thing which spun the tire, wheel and drum together. Is that the lug centric you are asking about?

I had a very positive experience years ago with the type of balancing mostly used nowadays on highway trucks where they balance the wheel/tire assembly with the brake drum. Of course the obvious advantage is that entire rotating assembly is balanced, not just the wheel/tire. The disadvantage is that rotating tires may destroy the balance, and when dismounted, wheel/tire assemblies must be returned to the same orientation on the drum. But it sure solved a bit of a shimmy problem I had with a beam-axle Packard.

I had my 75 Ford van balanced like Dave's Packard. They also bent the axles a bit for alignment. It cured a vibration/shimmy I had since I bought the van. Most truck shops can do this. I painted one stud on each wheel so I could mount them exactly the same if there was a need to remove them. Worked great.

I was surprised that no-one had weighed in either...

I found that my local Goodyear is one of the only places around that has a lug centric attachment for their modern balancing machine. - So I'll take them there.

Here is a nice web piece I found that shows lug-centric balancing.

http://www.dbraun99.com/mgtd15470/On%20Going%20Maintenance/Lug-Centric%20Tire%20Balance/Index.html