Correct Tyre Fitting

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It’s incredible when you find out that the majority of tyre fitters don’t know how to correctly fit a tyre. It’s not rocket surgery but I guess these people aren’t the brightest of people.

Give Them A Head Start

Clean your wheels up as much as you possibly can. You might even have to remove them. I find that iron cleanse spray and a stiff plastic bristle brush helps get most stuff off. As you clean the wheels, remove the balancing weights and clean off the old sticky pads.

I have seen tyre fitters not notice old wheel weights and then balance the alloy and new tyre with additional weights that counteract what’s already there.

Take a close look at your tyre side wall. Anything better than rubbish should have 1 or 2 coloured marks. These are usually a red dot and/or a yellow dot. On the smart, we are only interested in the yellow spot.

Ideally, this yellow spot should be mounted onto the wheel right next to the valve stem.

Alloy wheels for normal cars like the smart aren’t balanced from the factory. It’s only done once the tyre has been fitted. The wheel is obviously not perfectly balanced as it has a valve stem hanging out of it. The valve stem is slightly heavier and affects the rotational balancing of the wheel.

The yellow mark on the tyre side wall shows the lightest part of the tyre.

So, if you have the lightest part of the tyre lined up with the heaviest part of the wheel, you are far less likely to have as many wheel weights as there is more chance that the weights will even themselves out.

What About The Red Dot?

The red dot indicates the radial force variation. This is the high point of the tyre. Smarts don’t use this mark but some higher powered cars do. In which case there is a physical mark or dot on the alloy wheel that the red dot should be lined up with.

Added Bonus With The Dot Lining Up

If you get all of the dots lined up in the 1st place, you then have a reference point should the tyres slip.

Tyres moving slightly, independently of the rim can cause the balancing to go out of spec. It can also be a sign of contamination between the tyre bead and the wheel. Movement and contamination can be a big cause for pressure loss that might be mistaken as a slow puncture. Excessive movement could also cause a blow out of the tyre carcass which can be very dangerous.

Look at your tyres every few months just to check they haven’t moved.