It is soon coming up on that time again to install my winter wheels/tires. I had brand new winter steel wheels and michelin xi2's installed on my 2010 civic sedan at costco last year. The steering wheel vibrates a lot with those on, but with the stock wheels on it's perfectly smooth. Costco re-balanced the winter wheels a few times and it didn't fix it. Anybody know why this would happen?

 

you could have a bad tire/ uneven wear. Take a look at the wheels is there any one with more than 2oz of weight at any one point? If there is they may need to break the bead one the wheel and rotate the tire reseat the bead and rebalance the tire

 

Do the wheels fit right? could be one or both of them don't seat correctly against the rotor, if you know the wheels are right->

Have a someone else try and balance them, it could be costco is trying not to give you a new tire or tires, because what they sold you were not 1st line tires.

It wouldn't be the first time a tire retailer did that.

 

I would get the re-balance somewhere else just to see if it solves the problem!

 

Did Costco road-force balance them? If not, I would start there. This may involve dismounting the tire and spinning it to align with a different part of the wheel. It may also reveal a flat-spot or bad belt in a tire that may not be felt until a higher speed.

good luck, and keep us posted!

 

My brother works there and is the one who re-balanced them the last time so I know for a fact there is no issues there. He said next they will give me 4 new wheels and see if that fixes it.

 

Cool. I was gonna say rotate tires and see if vibration gets better. If it does then the ones that went to the rear is bad. But nothing beats 4 new tires =]

 

Already tried swapping the fronts and backs around to see if we could localize the issue, but no change.
They are just going to replace the steel wheels at first, the thought is maybe the wheels are defective(slightly warped or something, they are just cheapo chinese wheels they sell). They will just swap my tires over to new wheels, the tires only have a few thousand miles use anyway. But either way, he said they will get it fixed and if they don't then they'll just take the wheel/tire package back for a refund.

 

If they are those cheap knock off wheels, you might be best served if you picked up a set of decent but not perfect alloy's or steel wheels that are made for honda, last year I sold a set of my new then 07 civic I had laying in the basement for 100.

Those Chinese wheels bend so dam easy you could have hit a pot hole and bent one or two of them, even if the tire guy had a hard time getting the tire on, which happens, the wheel could have bent.

Happy the people at the shop are going to try to help you, that doesn't always happen.

 

Yeah they are just cheap black steel wheels used for winter cost like $50 each, equivalent to ones you would buy at canadian tire or wal mart. But tons of people buy them and have no issues with them. I have had them myself on a couple previous cars without issue. So I am hoping when they replace them it will be fine. I live in a small city so I can't find any old used stock civic rims for sale so I would have to buy them from the dealer which would cost a fortune, so that is not an option.

 

Ok I had the wheels replaced and I still have the same issue, the steering wheel shakes at highway speeds. These are multi fit wheels, so maybe the lugs are not getting them 100% centered? Can you use hubcentric rings on a steel wheel?

 

I can't see why the lug nuts don't center the wheel when you tighten them, so there is no need for centering rings on that type wheel.

 

They are replacing the tires today. They said there could be a belt gone. I am not sure I agree, because the steering wheel still shook after rotating the tires. But you'd think it would only shake if the tire that had the broken belt was on the front. But oh well, 4 new tires I can't complain!

I can go with the xi2's again or blizzak ws70's. What do you guys think?
The ws70's are cheaper so I would get $85 back on those.

 

Just an update. So after trying new wheels and still the same problem, and new tires and still the same problem. The supervisor tried re-balancing them personally this time and he took the car for a ride which his reaction was "wow that is terrible". Then they installed the tires on the oem honda wheels and problem solved. So it was the multi fit wheels causing it as I suspected. Weird though that I have had these type of wheels on previous cars with no issue and costco sells thousands of them and they said they never had this type of complaint before.

 

What I would do if I were you is buy a set of regular honda alloy's you are bound to find a set that has been curbed or had been driven all year long, that don't look so great.

A set like that wold be great just repaint them and use those for your winter wheels.

They don't have to be honda, I have a set of Nissan Altima wheels all ready to go for my winter wheels, those I got as new car take offs for 100 ea.

Visit some local junk yards, know your bolt pattern and offset and match up a set.

 

The altima has a 66.1mm hub pilot(from what i gather from a quick google search) and the civic has 64.1mm, so that means those rims would have to be centered up by the lugs which is no different than the multi fit steel wheel that caused me the issues. Maybe it would work out fine, but I am not willing to take that risk anymore. I am just going to buy direct fit steelies now and they are going to mount my winters on them for free.

 

This is an old thread but I always tell my friends to never buy non oem rims. People see excellent prices on winter rims at Costco, or buy used tires installed on rims and get all excited about the price, but they end up with problems described by ac attak. Universal lug-centric rims are cheap but full of problems. Always buy original OEM hub-centric rims. Just my two cents.

 

Many people buy aftermarket wheels. You're overgeneralizing.

 

Hi Y'all. I just joined this forum, looking for wheel information.

I'm trying to source some used wheels to mount some snow tires for my daughter's 2012 Civic LX. I believe the factory wheels are 15x6 but on some sites there is a 15x6.5 option. Should I be looking for 15x6?

Thanks, Jack

 

Hi Yak and welcome to the forum.

You can use either 15x6 or 15x6.5 or 15x7 if you are going with the stock size. Which ever is cheaper for you (most probably the 15x6).

15 is the diameter of the wheel and the 6/6.5/7 is the width. As long as you are staying with a stock or close to stock size of tire you shouldn't have any issues.

 

Hi Dave,

Thanks for the quick reply. I was thinking I should match what is already on the car, which has the stock 195/65R15's. Would that be the 15x6's?

Jack

 

195/65/15 would fit on either one but I would go with the 15x6 just cause they would be a little cheaper.

 

What tires are you planning on getting for your daughter?

 

Thanks!

 

I hadn't gotten that far yet. What do you like?