Aftermarket Tire Installation

[sansnombre]

I purchased tires online and am quickly seeing that that was a mistake. I live in Portland, OR, and many of the shops around me will not install tires purchased elsewhere or they are charging $50+/tire.

Does anyone have any suggestions for reasonably-charged install/balance?

 

Alternatively, I have never installed my own set - any suggestions there? Is this a reasonably consideration?

[Triple Jim]

If you can take the wheels off and get them back on properly, you should be able to mount and balance the tires.  It will take some learning though.  There are plenty of videos about how to do it.  I think it's a skill worth having, but not everyone likes this sort of work.

If someone asked me how much I'd want to mount and balance a tire, I probably wouldn't want any less than $50.  To do it right, it's going to take some time... longer than it takes to do a car tire.

[M. Hausknecht]

Is it a dealership that wants $50 per tire? There are independent motorcycle repair shops in many communities and, in my experience, their charges for such things are more reasonable but still not cheap (at least $25 per tire, more if they have to remove and install the wheels for you).

As someone who goes through 6-8 sets of tires a year, I decided to get a very good quality manual tire machine and balancer. Not cheap  but they'll pay for themselves over just s few years and, when/if I want to sell them, I should get 1/2 of my money back. 

Classic HD*Race Day Package*Motorcycle Tire Changer

You can spend a lot less on a set of tire spoons, bead breaker, and a balancer, but you'll put in more effort, especially until you get good with the spoons.

[Littlebriar]

For 50 bucks you can get a Harbor Freight tire changer. It works OK out of the box but there plenty of YouTube videos on using it and modifying it. 

https://www.harborfreight.com/manual-tire-changer-69686.html

It's no match at all for the NoMar but it's not 750 bucks either.

[cornerslider]

6 hours ago, M. Hausknecht said:

Is it a dealership that wants $50 per tire? There are independent motorcycle repair shops in many communities and, in my experience, their charges for such things are more reasonable but still not cheap (at least $25 per tire, more if they have to remove and install the wheels for you).

As someone who goes through 6-8 sets of tires a year, I decided to get a very good quality manual tire machine and balancer. Not cheap  but they'll pay for themselves over just s few years and, when/if I want to sell them, I should get 1/2 of my money back. 

Classic HD*Race Day Package*Motorcycle Tire Changer

You can spend a lot less on a set of tire spoons, bead breaker, and a balancer, but you'll put in more effort, especially until you get good with the spoons.

I have that same changer..... I smile every time I use it -

[Littlebriar]

1 hour ago, Littlebriar said:

For 50 bucks you can get a Harbor Freight tire changer. It works OK out of the box but there plenty of YouTube videos on using it and modifying it. 

https://www.harborfreight.com/manual-tire-changer-69686.html

It's no match at all for the NoMar but it's not 750 bucks either.

I have the NoMar also and it's absolutely wonderful. If you do a lot of aggressive riding or track days, you might go through 3 pairs of tires a year. @ $50 per tire that's only 15 tire changes (or 2.5 years) and it's paid for. If my math is correct.