Is it worth rebalancing your winter tires?

Face it — no one likes spending money at an auto repair shop. So it’s no wonder we cringe when we’re asked by our counter consultant if we want to pay to rebalance our snow tire-rim assemblies before they’re mounted for the upcoming winter of our discontent. But do we really need to rebalance wheels that have been sitting in storage?

It depends on a few things. First, if you used a commercial tire storage service, your wheels and rims were likely kept in a large metal shipping container stacked on their sides. This means your set could have been weighed down by several hundred pounds of materials.

While most rims (except some exotic and ultralight alloy wheels) can stand this amount of weight, it can affect their balance. In addition to the weight on the rims, tire side walls can get their profiles slightly flattened.

Another item to consider is changing the position of a tire-rim assembly from front to rear. If a less than perfectly balanced wheel was moved to a front position from a rear, its vibration may become more noticeable — and perhaps objectionable — to the driver.

Shops and DIYers should take the time to clean off any rust or grit on the mating surfaces of the wheel hubs and rims. Even the smallest bit of grit left here can cause a wheel vibration, as it can prevent the tire-rim assembly from mounting in a perfect position.

If you want to improve your chances of not needing a wheel rebalance, mark one of each wheel hubs’ studs and the corresponding hole on the rim to ensure it’s mounted in exactly the same position it came off. This won’t make a difference if the wheels are being rotated from last season’s position.

The problem with skipping a wheel balance recheck is you won’t know if any vibration is present or tolerable until you’re back on the road. And knowing how packed shop schedules are during winter-tire season, you can face a delay in getting back for an appointment to rectify things. An average fee for checking and rebalancing is around $20 per wheel.

One part of a seasonal tire change service that should never be skipped is the wheel nut (or bolt) retorque. Almost all tire shop staff remind customers to return after 100 kilometres of driving to have this critical spec verified.

Sometimes this is compounded by a piece of rust or grit that gets trapped between the hub and the wheel rim, or by corrosion that takes the clean sharp edge off the innerrim mounting-hole surface. Either way, this two-minute job is crucial to safe driving. And if the shop did the original swap, it shouldn’t charge for a re-torque check and shouldn’t require an appointment.