KO2 Balancing Issues

Last week, I took a 3000 mile road trip on my new 265/70/17 KO2's and FN Konig Countersteer wheels. Between 62-75mph, I'm getting a super annoying shimmy in the steering wheel. Starting at around 55mph, i feel the shimmy in my seat. I stopped twice at two different America's Tire to have them re-balanced, but the ride is still shaky at freeway speeds. Both shop techs said they've had a very difficult time with the KO2 tires, and there's nothing else they can do to eliminate it (other than sell me a different set of tires). Anyone else run into this problem and find a solid fix? I had the original KO's on my 2005, and loved 'em.

 

I had the same issue with Duratracs. This is why I plan to stick with the OEM Good Years for now. I keep smashing on them thinking they'll blow at anytime in tough AZ terrain, jagged rocks, cacti, mesquite thorns, etc....they just keep on tickin'!!! Also their road manners are much better than more aggressive A/Ts i've had in the past. Also I suspect larger tires will exacerbate the issues with the doggish transmission/motor combo and I definitely want to avoid making that any worse than it already is. Those bigger tires, more ply = more rotational mass.

 

Other factors can cause shimmy such as wheel alignment. I have same tire in C load on the 4Runner with no issues.

 

My KO2s are great on the road.

 

Try rotating the tires. Also check to see how much weight is needed to balance. Sometimes it works well too break the tire bead and rotate the tire 90 degrees and reseat the bead.

 

There's a few pages you can read on the Wheel and Tire section.
https://www.tacomaworld.com/threads/bfgoodrich-all-terrain-t-a-ko2.344486/page-73

 

I've had some of the same issues with mine. The first time the tire shop put on E load instead of C load tires and one of them was out of round. I thought the whole truck was going to shake itself apart! Second time they got the right ones on at least (265/70/17 C rated KO2 on TRD Pro wheels) and it was ok up till about 45-50 and it would start to shake. Had them balanced again and it was better at low speed but would still shake at 65 on the highway. The third time (road force + Toyota wheel adapter) it was better yet and seems to be perfectly balanced up to 70. Anything over 70 it'll still shake a little, not on the steering wheel though rather the passenger seat will wobble back and forth and you can feel it's a little off so the turnpike (75) isn't too fun but funnily enough if you get up over 80 (not really practical in the Taco + AT tires or legal) it smooths back out again . After three balances I've just learned to live with it since it's fine everywhere else and I don't usually go 75 more than once a week or so for maybe an hour compared to a lot of 65-70 on the local highway going to work and back every day. I'd hate to mess it up even more.

My brother has them in, uh, 325 something size I think on his Super Duty and his had to go back a few times but it got to be pretty much perfect, so I'm a bit envious and know that it is possible. Just harder than a regular tire plus rocks get in the tread and can throw it off till they fly out. I also had the original KO's in 275 or 285/70/17 on my Tundra and it was perfect. It was also the OEM tire at the time on the RW package.

 

I've learned that if you have shimmy at certain higher speeds and if you go even faster, the shimmy goes away, that is definitely a balance issue.

Maybe try a performance shop, rather than a big box tire shop to re-balance? I had to do that.

 

Had the dealer do mine; mount and balance was $20/each.
6000 miles later, no problems; have had it up to 80mph.

 

If they are having that much trouble balancing them it might be a good candidate for dynabeads

 

my duratracs had the same problem, got a road force balance and they're good now

 

I had mine put on at town fair tire, i had to have them re-align twice and re-balance them 3 times but i still have a slight wobble at higher speeds. When i get the tires rotated next i am going to bring it to toyota to have them re-balance the tires once more to hopefully smooth it out.

 

I have had 2 sets on two different trucks and no issues at all.....were put on the factory rims on TRD Taco and Tundra

 

Two of my Duratracs have the same issue. The steering wheel and passenger seat vibrate like crazy at hwy speeds when the bad tires are up front. Roadforce balancing did not help. My next tire will probably be a Michelin since they don't seem to have this issue as often.

 

try a road force balance and make sure they line up the yellow/red dots on the sidewall correctly. and if you need to find a hunter road force machine goto the hunter website and they track all shops that carry which model of wheel balance machines bought.

http://www.hunter.com/gsp9700

 

Is the Haweka adapter still a thing?

 

Op,
Did you install hub centering rings on your konigs ? Unless the newer countersteers are hubcentric, the rings may be needed. Dustin at FN used to sell the centering rings with those wheels. Also important to not use an impact wrench on the countersteers. Tighten lugs by hand and tighten evenly using criss-cross pattern. Also already stated use the haweka adaptor (lug centering adaptor) when they balance the wheel/tire.

 

I'm having major issues with my K02's since purchase date 4k ago, had them balanced 3 times…each time I could feel a difference, but they either got worse over time, or a shake would reappear. It has never been perfect.

 

A road force balance is what you need. You can have perfectly balanced tires but they can still be out of road force. What happens is the tires don't seat on the rims in a good pattern and they sit egg shaped. This will cause them to give you a high speed vibration no matter if they are balanced to zero. I have a road force balancer at my disposal and what I have to do if the road force is bad is rotate the tires on the wheel until they find their sweet spot. Find a road force balancer and I can almost guarantee they will be out of spec. A good road force will be under 30lbs for a truck. Had 35/12.5/17 tires on my wrangler and had to mess with them a couple times to get them right. Hope this helps

 

Aftermarket wheels and lugs, who would ever have thought how difficult and can be sometimes..not saying this is your issue, but if you just have 60 degree conical lugs you may not have these mounted the way they need be, double check and see if you need ET lugs...and check your torque. Get some bite and snug em up.