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Hunter on the car balancer

Discussion in 'The Hokey Ass Message Board' started by 1oldtimer, Dec 2, 2008.

  1. I have a chance to buy a old hunter on the car balancer. Has anyone used these? are they worth getting? do they work?. I talked to a real oldtimer a few years ago that had one and he said they work great AFTER you get the feel for them. I was thinking of using it for rear wheel drive cars (straight axle and ifs).

    it's like the one in the pic.
     

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  2. TooManyFords
    Joined: May 21, 2008
    Posts: 553

    TooManyFords
    Member
    from Peotone IL

    I used them in the late seventys and early eightys. It is easy to learn and I liked it. Never used it on any thing but steel rims. Got to make sure they are clamped on right or they take off.
     
  3. t-town-track-t
    Joined: Jan 11, 2006
    Posts: 884

    t-town-track-t
    Member
    from Tulsa

    another thing you can use them for is an on the car lathe!

    Thats right. There is a guy here in oklahoma that has one of these, and he uses it to spin the wheel on the car. He has a fixture attached to it that is home made, and basically the easiest way to describe it is like a rubber chissel. he pressses it towards the tire and it cuts white walls out of the raised white letter or thin white wall tires.

    Like the sander method, but on the car, and less smelly!
     
  4. Mr48chev
    Joined: Dec 28, 2007
    Posts: 33,861

    Mr48chev
    ALLIANCE MEMBER

    I used one (actually several different ones) in different places of work including the school shop that I taught in for 13 years.

    Make sure that you get all of the pieces. There should be different size adapters to attach the balancing hub to the wheel. I wouldn't suggest using one on anything except steel wheels.
    The adapter has to fit tight in the wheel after you flip the levers to tighten it. The thumb wheel (s) is/are to adjust the adapter out to the inside of the rim.
    I would always give a few pulls on the adapter after it was on the rim to make sure it was going to stay there. (there are a lot of stories about the adapter and balancing head taking off across a shop when it wasn't on the wheel right. 10 lbs of moving mayhem.
    when you put the balancing head on make sure that it is hooked up right when you flip the levers over that hold it to the adapter.

    Spin the wheel up to speed and then use the (they were always red and green) wheels on the balancer to add/subtract weight and move the weight around.

    It doesn't take much practice and you can get things to smooth right out. I usually do it with my chin resting on the fender to get a real good feel of it. You can set a half glass of water on the hood and work to get it so there is no movement in the water when you get good.

    I usually spun the wheel/tire before I ever started to hook up the equipment to see if it was indeed out of balance.

    On the rear wheel you jack one wheel up and have a helper run it up to speed with the engine. That won't work with a posi though.

    This looks all too familiar http://cgi.ebay.com/ebaymotors/Hunt...Z360108106115QQptZMotorsQ5fAutomotiveQ5fTools
    The unit in the ebay add is most likely a truck unit an doesn't have the balancing head or adapters with it. It doesn't appear to be one of the strobe units either. Not worth near what they are asking in my book. All you would be able to do is spin a front wheel with it with no provisions to balance a tire.
     
    Last edited: Dec 2, 2008

  5. Used one of these many times years ago...work GREAT.not only balances tire but the rim and drum at the same time...IMHO better than todays crap!
     
  6. I used the Hunter set-up. Worked OK, but was much more complicated than the Alemite strobe light balancer.

    What you have pictured spins the rim/tire. I don't see the assembly that goes on the rim.

    I don't think they could sell that Hunter system today because of legal liability concerns.

    The strobe light did the same thing, was less dangerous and idiot proof.
     
  7. barney rubble
    Joined: Sep 3, 2008
    Posts: 340

    barney rubble
    Member

    Used one of them a bunch years ago when I worked in a alignment shop. They work real good once you learn how to do it but they are useless with out the wheel pieces.
     
  8. gasserjohn
    Joined: Nov 9, 2008
    Posts: 1,218

    gasserjohn
    Member

    also the strobe can be used to balance out engines&drive shafts on the car...old retired machanix....used hose clamps on drive shafts bolts/nuts for fly wheels ect......
     
  9. BAMAGUY
    Joined: Apr 24, 2006
    Posts: 21

    BAMAGUY
    Member

    I have one of the strobe wheel balancers but don't know the process of using it to balance tires/wheels.......
    Could one of the experienced users please telll me how to go about it??
    I understand that you put the "probe" against a part of the front or rear
    and spin up the adjacent tire but don't know how to determine where and how much weight to put on the rim....

    Thanks.....
     
  10. I used to use one of these Hunter wheel balancers many years ago. You could do a great job very quickly once you had mastered the touch of adusting the moving weights on the part that mounted on the wheel. Without that part and the required wheel adapters, the device that you have pictured would be rather worthless. With all the parts, it is a great tool.
     
  11. the one i'm looking at is $250 obo (the other pic is off of ebay). here's the pics of the balancer in question. just wondering if i can do a better job then just balancing the tires off the car.
     

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  12. wesk
    Joined: Nov 13, 2011
    Posts: 1

    wesk
    Member
    from Wisconsin

    Did you buy the balancer? If so how has it performed for you?
     
  13. Rusty O'Toole
    Joined: Sep 17, 2006
    Posts: 9,657

    Rusty O'Toole
    Member

    If you use one of those remember when you spin one back wheel with the other blocked, the wheel will spin twice as fast as the speedo says.

    In other words if you want to balance your tire to 80 MPH only run the speedo up to 40!
     
  14. I found this last year, but I haven't used it yet. I need to find some instructions and some time. The motor spins and it has more adapters then the others I found, it's a Dial-o-Matic that I bought for $40.

    [​IMG]

    [​IMG]
     

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