So,.....I gave up and started my search for a local shop to dismount and mount the tires on my five wheels. To start, I needed all of them dismounted so I could clean the inside of each rim carefully, and replace the stems. Then I need all five remounted with new tires. Only one shop had the type of machine with teflon/delrin grips so it wouldn't nick or mar the rim edge, and was willing to put my car tire on the back wheel. He wanted $20/each to dismount/mount the motorcycle tires, then he wanted $65 to dismount/mount the car tire on the rear wheel. That would have been $125!
I came home and started my search on CL for a manual tire changer that could be modified to work with our wheels. Nothing! Then, while looking for Kawasakis and parts, a slightly used Cycle Hill No-Mar changer showed up. $250 with several accessory additions included. They are normally $400 with no accessories and with appropriate additions will push $600. So, his $250 was a good deal. I watched their video on this changer and really liked it. I called him this morning to get directions only to be told somebody else was just loading it into their truck! DAMN!
Next stop, Harbor Freight to see what super deals they might have during their three day sale. HF offers one manual changer for car tires and an add-on adapter for cycle wheels. Total for both would be about $100, but the cycle adapter has no mar-proof protections for the rim edges. So, I stood there staring at the adapter and mentally engineering what it would take to add delrin rim grips to protect the edges. Ah, ha! The light went on! So, I was about to load up the two pieces when I saw a pile of stuff being sold as-is on a make-offer basis one at a time. I saw two of the car tire changers and three of the cycle adapters in the pile, so I got in line for my turn at dealing with the manager. The two that I picked out to deal on had their hardware sets missing, but everything else was there, if a little scratched up. I offered him $45 for both and he said load 'er up and pay the cashier! WooHoo! The nice thing is I can also change smaller car tires with this basic machine!
A quick stop at the local hardware store and I have everything that was missing, plus the new shoulder bolts to make the modifications to make it mar-proof. Now, all I need to do is order the 1-1/2" diameter delrin rod to machine into the little grips on each leg, just like the Cycle Hill machine has. The mounting bar will need a delrin tip made up, too. It will also need a hitch-mount adapter made to use my truck's hitch for a solid mount.
Here are pics of the Cycle Hill machine (blue) and the HF machines (red). All I need to do is add the little delrin grips on top of the pads on the HF machine. I will take pics as I go along to show what mods I make to this machine to make it more useable.
If you have a tire changer machine that you use and like, I would like to see it and hear about how it works.
Very nice !
