I hear ya. The first tire shop I took my truck to torqued the living daylights out of my lugnuts, and I had to re-torque them by hand.

After that fiasco, I took it to a Goodyear service center, and when they put my wheels back on, they kind of took it easy on them. I still need to check them though. I've been busy loading firewood for the winter, and haven't had much time to do anything with my truck lately.

 

Isnt factory torque on 04-08 f150 150 ft lbs?

 

Yes.

Also, if you have an out-of-round tire, sometimes they can be match-mounted on the rim so that they counter-balance each other, but most of the time replacing the tire is your best bet. Usd a GSP9700 balancer with a GOOD TECH, and you should have no balance issues. It's all we use.

www.gsp9700.com

 

I think part of the problem is even with those shops that have a Hunter 9700, an $8 an hour tire guy doesn't want to take the time to bust the tire down and index the tires with the wheels which I believe is the correct term for what Damon is referring to in the above post? The owner would of course, but the average tire guy wont unless someones watching over him because its more work for him. Good, professional tire shops are hard to find but tire dealers are on every corner, IMHO

 

Unfortunately true.

 

Some tire shops are just worthless. On my 89 Ranger it had threads on the studs that were pretty small and easy to cross thread. One day I ended up going off on a shop. First they burred up the edge of some aftermarket wheels with the tire mounter. Then when the guy went to put the lug nuts on he just put the nut into the socket on the impact gun and ran them down onto the studs. I ended up getting kicked out of the shop with out getting reimbursed for the damaged wheel.

Then later on when I tried to get the wheels off I couldn't get some of the lug nuts off since the stud would spin with the nuts from being cross threaded. The lug nuts were recessed into the wheels so I had to spend hours trying to get to the back side of the rotors to weld the studs to the rotors. So after it was all said and done I went back the tire shop to vent again which again resulted being asked to leave but at least I felt better. Since that experience I try as much as possible to take wheels off and take them to the shop and come back home and put them on myself.