Ballast Filling tires

[TomOfTarsus]

I don't know why, but the search didn't work. So just a quickie. Conventional wisdom, when filling tires with calcium chloride, is to put tubes in so as to prevent rusting your rims out, correct?

And how do you know the shop made up the correct solution? I'm new at this, the shop is new to me, and they haven't exactly covered themselves with glory so far.

Glad to be back,

Tom

[intel]

I used a mixture of used antifreeze and windshield washer fluid without a inner tube.

[TomOfTarsus]

Yeah, I was going to, but the antifreeze would've cost me just as much AND required me going to get, so I said just go ahead and put tubes and CC in 'em.

[JDeerekid]

First of all I would not recommend calcium chloride. I would go with either rim guard, windshield washer fluid, water/antifreeze, beet juice, or something that is not corrosive. Now I have heard that you can put the CC in tubes or tubless just have the fluid cover the rim completely. If the rim is fully sumerged in the CC it will not rust or at least prolong the rusting. This is what I have heard not sure though. My old ford 8N had the CC in tubes on the rear and the valve eventually started leaking and the rims started rusting through. This took all of 15 years to do but they eventually have to be replaced. Its not my problem now becuase I sold it but I warned the no owner of it and recommended when he changed it to put rim guard in it.

[TomOfTarsus]

Blast it! I forgot about Rim Guard...

[JDeerekid]

I dont know what size tires you have but mine are a bit larger and I just called 2 days ago and it is going to cost me $192 a tire which I thought wasn't bad.

[TomOfTarsus]

Yeah, mine will be $200 total including tubes & 13 gal CC each tire, but I'm pushing for a discount. I took them in Monday before last, and we determined that CC was the way to go. Then they told me they'd not have calcium till the next day. They called me the next AM to say that afternoon they'd be done, I drove down and they weren't; they claim they tried to call me but my cell was with me the whole time and I had no calls from them, missed or otherwise.

So the calcium was on "backorder" and they weren't supposed to get it until today. At this point I'm ticked and I take exactly two phone calls to locate a local wholesale source for the CC. After that, I had to go out of town for a test. But no phone calls, no nothing until I called them back and lo and behold, they're done! I leave work early, bust it to get to the shop before closing... they didn't put the inner tubes in!

So that's two unnecessary trips and 10 days without my machine. I'd taken vacation time last week to try to get stuff done, now all that's gone... I hope I don't have a fight on my hands and I hope they did a good job, but short of taking a sample to a chemist to determine the concentration level, I have no way of knowing.

Hey, thanks for the info!

Tom

[Diamondpilot]

Thats why we do them ourselves around here with WW Fluid and a cheap fitting at TSC.

If you want it done right you have to do it yourself.

Chris

[SPYDERLK]

So that's two unnecessary trips and 10 days without my machine. I'd taken vacation time last week to try to get stuff done, now all that's gone... I hope I don't have a fight on my hands and I hope they did a good job, but short of taking a sample to a chemist to determine the concentration level, I have no way of knowing.
Tom

I have done tests with CaCl added to distilled water. 5# added to a gallon makes a solution that weighs 10.6# per gallon. 6#/G yields an 11#/G solution

7#/G gives 11.4/G but some of the salt precipitates out at 0F. Bottom of tire will be a little slushy with salt until it warms back up.

So you could weight any of the solution they have left over....
larry

[Bird]

Tubes keep the calcium from rusting the wheels until you get a puncture and then it leaks in between the tube and the wheel and starts the corrosion. In my part of the country, nobody uses calcium chloride; wouldn't even know where to get it (thank goodness), but a friend and neighbor bought a used tractor that came from Minnesota. He had no idea the tires were filled with calcium until one sprung a leak and since he was very close, he drove up to my shop building with a pencil sized stream coming from one tire. It was about 3 years before the grass started to come back where that stuff leaked on my grass. And he eventually bought new wheels to replace the original rusted out wheels, but the tractor was about 25 years old when he had to buy new wheels. We don't know whether they had ever been replaced before that.