Tire Installation
 

Recently, I had a blow-out in my MY04 rear tire. Hopefully, none of you guys ever experience this because it seems our size & brand of tire takes weeks to obtain. After several headaches with local "national" tire chains, I decided to order from Tire Rack...Thanks Jim! The tire was here in 2 days...WOW!

Anyway, the reason for my post is due to rim damage. Maybe I'm being anal about this...I took the tire to a shop who claimed they deal with performance rims. They nicked the Hell out of the rim getting the tire off!!! :mad: I then took the rim home and called another installation center. I had my tire drop shipped from Tire Rack to their shop. When I picked up the finished tire...more nicks!!!
:angry:

Is this just something I have to live with every time I have a tire changed??? Do we just have such lightweight wheels that they are damaged easily? Can a tire be removed gently without nicks & dings on the wheel??? This just seems strange...with all the performance wheels around these days...you would think that someone would be capable enough not to do damage. If such a shop does exist...how do you find it???

its the installer and possibly the machine. if they are using a newer machine then its just sloppy workmanship.

ive mounted and balanced plenty of tuner style as well as 20" and up myself at work and have no issues not damaging anything(and its not even what i do at work) and then someone can come in behind me that does wheels all day and thrash a $500 rim cause they arent careful.

sorry for what happened to you. id make the shop replace the wheel. if they screwqed it up then they are liable unless they have a disclaimer posted.

Luckily it's not totally screwed up. It only has surface blemishes. Since it is a new rim, the nicks are noticeable.

The thing that frustrates me the most...both places were "national" chain type installers. They change tires everyday! Both places nicked the rim in different areas. I can only imagine the damage if I needed all 4 replaced.

Has anyone had any (good/bad) experience with their Honda dealership changing their tires. Perhaps that would be the best bet...

It's been my experience that your big chain stores could really give a rat's ass about your or your rims. It's kind of like expecting service with a smile at Burger King, it might happen every once and a while, but as a whole, they're gonna short you an order of fries, and get mad at you if you ask for them. You can gennerally trust the dealers to do the job right, but they tend to get a little pricey. I've had better luck building a relationship with my neighborhood mechanic. It's hard to find someone you can trust, but once you do it takes a lot of stress out of taking the car into the shop.

During my ownership of 2 S2000s, I have had 9 rims damaged by careless installers. After having the first 3 "fixed" in an unsatisfactory manner, I've had the remaining 6 replaced with new rims.

In my experience, quality from national chains is variable. Sometimes no damage is done and other time there is damage. For that reason, I agree with CDjunkie's recommendation to establish a good relationship with a local specialty shop. I've also found it helpful to deliver the rims in absolutely clean condition and have the shop manager inspect them with you at the time of delivery. That eliminates a potential source of irritation when shop personnel insist that "we couldn't possibly have done the damage", or "those rims came in that way" :rolleyes:.

The lower end mounting equipment can make it difficult for even the most careful installer to mount these tires. I was just out to Billman250's for new rears and we were able to get one of the tires off. We could not remount another tire without risking damage. He ended up taking the rims/tires to another location with better equipment to finish it off.
On another note - he was able to get the RE050 the next day. I guess the Metro NY Bridgestone distributors are stocking them.

If a tire chain was neglegent in damaging or "nicking" your wheel, they are obligated to fix or replace the wheel. I had a tire fixed when I first bought my new S2000, and Firestone scraped the wheel. They first attempted to refinish the wheel and it came out great, but was refinished to a two tone look and the 2003 is one-tone. They ended up replacing the wheel.

A few weeks ago I replaced the rear tires for the first time and the center caps were dented in the process, and Firestone replaced those without hesitation.

You may have to call the Corporate HQ for the vendor you dealt with, but most companies will do what it takes to make it right if you put the effort in to complain.