i spend $40 for front and rear to be mounted/balance, and thats bringing the tires in. thats the cheapest im finding in my area.

 

Yeah, mine was $20 on the bike with their tires. I didn't have a problem with that.

 

i ride the bike in and pay about $30 to do it while i wait but that's cuz the time to do it myself is not worth the $30 + equip. investment.
but if you can be self sufficient and do it yourself; props.

dude you can't break down rates like that ... electrician charged me $75 to put up my chandelier and it took him 15 minutes (that's the going rate) THAT'S $300 per hour to put it up. damn T and his azn maf [sm=smiley36.gif]

 

I, well my brother, bought an automatic tire changer and computer balancer after checking the prices to have the tires on his gold wing changed. So, I have at my hands the same tools/machines used in tire shops and will so any tire for anyone... come on over to southern ohio and I'll hook you up. A couple of members here, 05RR and Jared are using me. It takes me a lot longer than 5 minutes, but I end up being the one that takes the wheels off the bike too. I enjoy working on bikes even when they're not mine. The total set up cost my brother $2500. But in this area, the dealerships WILL NOT mount a tire they didn't sell. They say it's a liabilty issue because they do not know where the tire came from and if it's safe. And the ohter shops do not balance. Still charge $30 a tire too. So, keep me in mind if you're near by.

You can buy tools to do this a lot cheaper, but we wanted to do it right. We static balance and 9 times out of ten 0 out the balance which is perfect. We had a guy that works in a tire shop train us on what and how to do things and he said they consider 5 out of balace close enough. I've mounted all of the tires in my local bike club.

 

20 bucks is cheap if done right and balanced properly.

 

Try this...Purchase tire irons($10-20), some plastic rim protectors($10), and a set of tires. Remove the wheel/tire assemblies from your bike, if you have already bought stands($200-250 for front and rear)to support your bike with no wheels on it. Now the fun part...have fun trying to break the beads in your garage. Wrestle with the old wheels/tires for an hour, wrestle the new tires back on the wheels. Hopefully you have an air compressor to air up these new tires enought to seat the beads correct. Do some half *** balance job, hopefully it is accurate. Mount wheels back on your bike, road test to find a vibration.....get pissed because you wasted an afternoon getting your butt whooped by some tires instead of riding. Now $40 to CORRECTLY mount and CORRECTLY balance two tires doesnt seem so bad does it? Or you can buy your own equipment for $2500 dollars and teach yourself how.

 

$2500 may sound like a lot to pay, but Gold Wings cost a lot more to mount and balance and it take about a day at the shop to have it done. So you have to drop it off and wait for them to have the time to do it.

I've changed about ten bikes so far myslef, not counting what my brother has done for his friends. So 10 bikes at an average of $50 a bike is $500 saved for my friends. I say $50 because most of the tires I've changed were owned by riders that didn't trust themselves to remove the wheels.

 

That's not too bad of a price really. I pay $25 per tire at the stealership - if I bring in the rims -balancing is included, and it's about the same everywhere else. I think it doubles if you bring the whole bike in.
Sucky thing is, most places around here don't even want to touch your tires if you order them elsewhere. They handle them like the plague. After lots of bitching and moaning, they finally do it though.
Starbucks needs to make good on it's contingency!!

 

Not to thread jack, but do they usually double-stick tape the weights onto the inside of the rim? I had a Yamaha place mount my rear tire (when it got a screw and needed replacement), and they used clamp-like weights on the inside of the rim on that beaded edge in the middle.

I took it to the dealer I HATE, but only went there because it was an emergency tire change and they used weights that were held on using double-stick tape...........which I thought was lame. Not to mention they did a horrible job balancing them.

 

THOSE ALL SOUND LIKE DESCENT PRICES ESPECIALLY AFTER WHAT I PAID, I MYSELF TOOK BOTH WHEELS OFF DISMOUNTED THE TIRES AND MOUNTED MY NEW ONES JUST DIDNT HAVE A BALANCER SO I HAD TO TAKE THEM TO THE DEALERSHIP $30 DOLLARS FOR BOTH WHEELS TO BE BALANCED AINT THAT A B!