The vast majority of people wouldn't feel or realise their wheels are out of balance. I've fitted hundreds of tyres using levers and tyre machines on every kind of bike you can imagine. And used all kinds of fancy balancing machines.

Here are some facts:

You only really feel an out of balanced tyre at high speed on highways.

You really only feel it on your front wheel.

If you have knobblies, you really won't even notice.

If you have a shaft or single siding swing-arm, you really won't need the rear doing.

A tyre is AT MOST 50 grams out of balance. (Usually its about 10-20 grams). If a tyre is more than 80 grams out of balance, it's classed as a manufacturing fault by most manufacturers.

So pretty much a blob of crap stuck to your tyre throws the balance off more than a lack of balance weight.

In a nutshell, if you're riding a dual sport bike with long suspension and knobbly tyres with some luggage on it, don't even think about it and carry on riding.

If you're riding a Ducati at 90mph down a motorway then you 'Might' feel an out of balance tyre if you have very firm suspension.

If you have tyre pressure sensors which weight 50 grams alone, then you should probably balance the wheel.

It would be wrong of me to say you shouldn't balance your wheels.

But you really don't need to worry about it either.


A tyre usually has a colour paint mark on the tyre which shows where you should line it up with the valve.

This is OPPOSITE the heaviest part of the tyre. So you're already balancing it out against the valve.

__________________
Did some trips.
Rode some bikes.
Fix them for a living.
Can't say anymore.