So, after looking far and wide, finally found a suitable place for GenToo to get his paws and boots balanced and aligned. It was a tough thing to do as balancing and alignment isn't as simple as it seems. There's on wheel off wheel balancing, and also positive and negative chamber. Though the rule of thumb is still always to get the wheels spinning in a proper manner and the proper direction to even out wear and also provide the best comfort and handling.
The place was introduced by a fellow Gen2 CPS owner, pedanglaut at Bandar Baru Bangi. He's very familiar with that area and have been a regular at this particular tyre shop and bets his money that this is the best place to do balancing and alignment. So we woke up early, and went to the meeting point at a Petronas station early in the morning. This was adviced because we're not the only people going there given its a Saturday.
We met up and begin following him to this shop since I have no idea where it is. It was actually kinda easy to go to since I've been there now. So, after about 5 minutes drive, we reached the place and the name of the shop was Ah Man Tyre Auto Service Sdn. Bhd. There we saw lots of Government Perdana Executives and even some of the police Wajas there, waiting for their tyres to be done. So, we parked and went into the shop to meet the boss. After a lil chat, he says it'll take about 2 hours to get my car done since there's lots of cars there that day.
Pedanglaut then suggests that its best when my turn comes, he informs us so we can have a look at how things are done. We then went of in pedanglaut's car. His was a modified Gen2 CPS manual, so he showed what his car is about for a while then went to a shop nearby for drinks. The shop had a signature drink made from ice cream soda with ice cream and lime jelly. Sadly, was too busy enjoying the drink and chatting, that we forgot to take pics and the name of the drink.
After getting to know each other a lil better and since GenToo was still in queue, we stopped by a Proton showroom to check out the newly launched Persona Face Lift. It still looks like a Gen2 especially the CPS now with the new front bumper. Like the LED side mirrors though but loves the design of the one on GenToo now. Maybe we can DIY a hybrid of the two someday. While there, the tyre shop called.
We rushed back to see what the proper way to do balancing and alignment is. There, they prefer the on wheel balancing method as it is said to be more accurate and lasts longer. Usually a car doing balancing will have its wheels taken off, brought to a machine which will spin it and then weights added to places so the wheel is balanced (spins flatly). As for alignment, the car will be lifted with sensors attached to the wheels and measured using a machine to see what angles are the wheels in and whether they are aligned.
At Ah Man, basically, both are done with the wheel still on and the car partially jacked. To align the tyre, the car is raised at either end and a machine brought to measure them. Adjustments are then made and the measurements taken again. Here, the boss told me that the alignment for rear tyres are ok while the front tyres are off and that they had corrected it but that wasn't the reason why my tyres were shaking at speeds exceeding 80km/h.
Next goes another machine that will rotate the wheel while it shines a flash of light at the tyre to do the balancing. One side of the car was lifted, and the front tyre will be spun using engine power while the rear will be spun using the machine. While spinning, the machine flashes light at the wheel like a photographer. Then a reading is taken, weights are added or removed based on the readings obtained.
- Applying weights to balance the wheel.After all four wheels have been done, GenToo was left there waiting for the boss to take it out for a test run. While waiting, one of the less friendly and worst looking employee slammed a car jack to the left front of GenToo's wheel! He just pretends nothing happened and no word of apology came out. Seeing me furious at that, pedanglaut went over to the boss to complain. The boss then shouted at that employee and only then he mumbled the apology. Fortunately, that was the only negative experienced at that place.
- Scratched part of the front left rim.All in all, it took a lil more than 2 hours, alignment costs RM15.00 with tax of RM0.75 while the balancing costs RM9 per tyre with tax of RM1.80. I find it quite reasonable since that's the price I got when sending my C.L.K. for balancing and alignment earlier. The boss even touched up and polished the scratched part of my rim and apologises repeatedly so no hard feelings. Hopefully the employee will soon learn to appreciate cars and love them the way we do~
So, this is a shop recommended for everyone who wants to align and balance their tyres. Just be there when it happens to prevent sh*t from happening.
Ah Man Tyre Auto Service Sdn. Bhd.
No. 153 & 155, Jalan 8/1,
43650 Bandar Baru Bangi,
Selangor Darul Ehsan.
Tel/Fax: 03-8922 2328
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