I've had all four tyres recently replaced with Hankook Ventus ST's, 255/55/19's, at my local...and very good tyre fitters.

However, the FFRR developed a judder at speed, so today took her back to get all four wheels checked for balance. Pulled into the tyre bay and watched in amusement as four guys with jacks attempted for five minutes to get all four wheels off the ground.
No matter how they tried they could not get the wheels airborne, despite having professional jacks with 'over 570mm of lift'!!

Eventually, I suggested dropping the car to 'Access height'.....'OK, they said, let's give that a go!!'
Jumped in the FF, started the car and flipped the switch...for 30 seconds nothing happened, then a sudden shout from me...' I've forgotten to shut the door!!'

Shut the door and she duly flopped down to the bump stops. After a few more attempts, the lads managed to get her off the ground, got the wheels off and successfully rebalanced them. Result!! No more judder!!

However, whilst getting the jacks under the FF, one of the fitters found a steel jacking disk...one of theirs...that had got stuck to the jacking point when I'd had the rears replaced two weeks ago. The jacking disk weights about half a kilo and is a 4 inch round chunk of steel!!

Apparently it's quite common for these disks to get stuck under vehicles, but what scared me is that these disks could fall off the vehicle whilst at speed, with the potential to cause serious damage...not just to your own vehicle but to other following cars!!

Next time you have any work done involving jacks/jacking the car up, it may be a good idea to check the jacking points. After all it's better to be safe than sorry!!

Without sounding too sarcastic... You say they are good tyre fitters but they leave lumps of metal stuck to your car and can't balance wheels properly first time round Glad it's all sorted now. As you say, always worth checking where they have been working. Previously..
Vogue SE TD6
Defender 90 2.4
Defender 110 TD5
Vogue 3.5 EFI

They are good tyre fitters though, as they rebalanced all four tyres for free...and they had sacked the fitter who had lost the jacking plate.

They were genuinely concerned about the loss of the jacking plate and actually apologised for finding the jacking plate on my car and as they said..'It (the plate) could have caused a lot of damage, not just to your car, but to innocent motorists or even pedestrians'.

Obviously with the throughput of vehicles they get every day, they couldn't track down where the plate had got to, so I suppose it's lucky I had brought the motor back.

P.S. It's notoriously difficult to get a perfect balance on 19 inch wheels and they had said that if I get any problems, to bring it straight back in...which is pretty much what I'd done.

 Previously..
Vogue SE TD6
Defender 90 2.4
Defender 110 TD5
Vogue 3.5 EFI

It's a happy ending I suppose but I personally hate having tyres fitted and balanced because I don't think anyone does it well, I can't recall EVER having tyres fitted and balanced and NOT having to go back and get it done again, and sometimes again!

Why can't they get it right first time?

I'm also sick of hearing all those excuses

1. We don't do 20" wheels - they're too big
2. We don't do many 20" tyres (like it's a good excuse why they did a crap job first time round)
3. The machine is old
4. The tyre fitter is new blah blah blah

It's hardly rocket science is it?

This is why I prefer to buy brand new alloys and tyres as take-offs. I did this with the last set on the Grey TDV8 that Fanders has bought, and I've not once had any wheel vibration or balance issues, they have been faultless.

It's rare to find an experienced tyre fitter who loves their job and takes pride in taking care of your wheels. Lord know how much stress Ferrari and Lamborghini owners go through with their wheels.  Discovery 4 HSE
1998 110 TUM HS FFR Hard Top XD WOLF
1982 Series 3 Hard Top

*Gone:L462 D5 HSE LUX, L663 Defender 110 HSE, Discovery 3 HSE, 2014MY Range Rover Sport 5.0 Supercharged AB Dynamic; L405 Exec Vogue SE 4.4, 5.0 Supercharged Autobiography, Defender TDCi XS CSW, Defender TD5 HT, Vogue SE TDV8, Vogue TD6, RRSport SC 4.2V8, Classic 3.9 Vogue Auto, Land Rover Series 3 SWB

And that's why I take mine to Event Tyres depot near Old Trafford - they do the fitting and balancing for the local Ferrai and Lamboughini dealerships!!

Never had to go back and they've never over tightened the wheel nuts (on a previous car I drilled a number of wheel studs after fitters over tightened them - not fun)

They did ask me to put it in Access mode though  2007 Zermatt Silver TDV8 Vogue SE - now sold but was a great car!

I've got one guy at one fitters that I use all the time - he always gets it right and is fine if I stand and chat to him whilst he's doing it.

I'm happy to wait until he's available rather than let one of the others loose on any of my cars.

My local tyre fitters know me so well the boss always does mine and puts the writing on the centre caps lined up with the valves and always puts the lockers in the right place... "OCD r us"

There's a 'right place' for the locker ?

Took mine off anyway, but intrigued......

If the writing on the centre cap is horizontal, where should the valve be ? 12 o'clock ?

Must tell the wife this one - she's CDO - it's like OCD, but arranged in the correct alphabetical order

The last tyre fitter I visited must have forgotten to torque up the bolts on the driver side front wheel as two bolts were loose to the touch the following day having bearly driven 30 miles I still have a slight vibration at 65-70+ mph so wont be frequenting that fitter again! ....Finding someone you can trust to do a good job first time round is rare! Better to be irresponsible and right, than to be responsible and wrong.

2010 Vogue 4.4 TDV8 Santorini Black, Jet/Ivory interior

RXWRR wrote:

Finding someone you can trust to do a good job first time round is rare!

Alistair wrote:

Must tell the wife this one - she's CDO - it's like OCD, but arranged in the correct alphabetical order

excellent  ... - .- -.




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So starts the debate, access mode is for access for passengers, correct procedure for lifting is to place the car in its highest not lowest position as witnessed several times while watching my car being lifted at LR  TDV8 Vogue SE 2009.
TDV8 Sport. Gone. Loved it but it didn't love me!
Other toys in the cupboard.......

Simple1 wrote:

So starts the debate, access mode is for access for passengers, correct procedure for lifting is to place the car in its highest not lowest position as witnessed several times while watching my car being lifted at LR

Yep, got to admit I was the one who got it wrong by putting the FF in access mode..remembered a thread on here about the best way to get the wheels off the ground and it ws me in all honesty that goofed!!

There was a guy in at the same time as me, getting tyres put on a camper van, the look on his face when the FF dropped to it's haunches and then rose up higher and higher on the jacks without the wheels coming off the ground was amazing!!

I'll have to remember the proper procedure for next time.