Balance brake drum

1955 Century. Years ago after having new tires mounted, a wheel came off after 30 miles and damaged the fender, inner fender and rim. All that was fixed, but the only way to get a smooth ride on that car was to balance the tires on the car. Nobody does that around here anymore. Also while the wheels are off the car I finally noticed that one of the front drums has no weight on it like all of the other drums on the car and all of my collection of junk drums. I would like to check the balance on that drum since it is possible that the weight was torn off (there are no marks indicating there ever was a weight...just a slight bum in one area).

Any ideas on who could do this? I checked the tire place, engine machine shop, driveline place. I even backed off the brake shoes and loosened the bearing preload hoping for a repeatable heavy area, but no joy. If I had an old bubble balancer, I could balance the drum and tire as a unit...none of those around here anymore either.

Willie

Truck tire shop??

Ben

191137572161

L840- Vintage MAC TOOLS Tire Wheel Balancer- AUTO CAR TOOLS eBay auction # 191137572161

On the Rolls-Royce cars there are studs to attach the weights. It is done by hand, rotating to find the heavy spots and triangulating counter weights. You could do the same thing with lead wheel weights.

http://books.google.com/books?id=wcElm-oNi70C&pg=PA34&lpg=PA34&dq=rolls-royce+20/25+wheel+balance&source=bl&ots=UeGBnC-qhQ&sig=NHR7sznZ44Wj-ZadxETlmZaLseQ&hl=en&sa=X&ei=JRlVU4-8CMa6yQHl_oFw&ved=0CDsQ6AEwAQ#v=onepage&q=rolls-royce%2020%2F25%20wheel%20balance&f=false

Bernie

I used a static tire balance machine to check my drums

191137572161

L840- Vintage MAC TOOLS Tire Wheel Balancer- AUTO CAR TOOLS eBay auction # [ATTACH=CONFIG]243699[/ATTACH]191137572161

Hard to tell from your tiny image, but that looks like the same bubble balancer that Harbor Fright/Freight sells for about $80. Or since they always are issuing coupons for everything, probably 20% or so less than than: http://www.harborfreight.com/portable-wheel-balancer-39741.html

I was finally able to get a tire shop to try and they were able to get it on a tire balancing machine after I removed the inner races. I was as expected missing 3/4 oz, but was also showing some runout. Thanks to a good buddy who 'personalized' his 54 Century with disc brakes, I am back in business. (apparently flopping down on a brake drum and driving only a few hundred feet is not good for it )

Willie