Tires Ballasting tires with saline (not calcium chloride)

[pat32rf]

Canoetrpr- What part of Ontario are you located?
I priced around a few years ago and got WWAF for just under $1/4L jug at Can Tire. Coulda got the RV stuff but price was better than double. Didn't have to add tubes, just jacked up the tire and pumped it in using an old 12v RV pump. (dumped the jugs into a 5gal pail first) Every so often as the fluid is going in you should stop and let the air out that it is displacing as the flow goes down as the pressure in the tire goes up.
I only filled 2/3 full of fluid and have NO problems with sloshing, even when road running(except for funny noises when you stop and kill the engine). This way the weight is ALWAYS on the bottom, which makes a big difference to me on the hillsides around here in Bancroft.
I run the pressure around 12-15lbs in R4s on a JD4300 (3000lbs plus,without the hoe), chains in snow or spring mud.

 

[canoetrpr]

Hi pat32rf:

I'm in Queensville - north of the GTA.

You sure make it sound easy!. If I was doing this myself I might have gone the WW route. Although I haven't been able to find it for that kind of price around here - but I haven't shopped either.

I decided to go with CaCl2 and tubes cause I just started working on my first project requiring real use of a loader. Did some digging to lay a 20ftx12ft concrete pad for some dog kennels I am building and realised that even with the ballast box I REALLY do need more weight in the back. I need to get this done pronto so that I can start getting in the tons of crushed stone that just got dumped on my driveway today .

Sounds like it might have been a fun project.

I figured out quickly that there was no such thing as a perfect answer for what to load with and I might as well go with CaCl2 and tubes cause this is all people seem to know of around here.

 

[Farwell]

I have calcium chloride in my 1960 JD 2010. There is a slow leak around my valve stems and there is a streak of rust being left on the rim by the leak. I try to park with the stems up so there is no leak and keep it cleaned off. If I have to replace my tires in my life time I will probably have to buy new rims. I will search for wheel weights to replace the fluid or windshield washer fluid.

 

[tawilson]

That leak could be anywhere and it may just be finding it's way out through the valve stem. After having 4 onsite repairs done at $250-300 each, I decided it was time to bite the bullet and do my own. It helps that I have a bh and can use the outriggers to get both wheels off the ground to spin the tires. I just replaced both my rears and I figure doing it myself saved enough to buy 1 of the tires. I had rust on my rims from previous leaks, and after getting the tires off and cleaning it up I can see it was just surface rust and I think it would take a long time to actually rust a rim to the point that it was unusable. Only thing I may have screwed up on is I used some spray lube sold by Autozone to help the tires over the rim and I see someone mentioned it is a no no, may be bad for the rubber. We'll see. I sure do like my new Akuret R1 tires. I never heard of that brand before, but they seem like good tires.

 

[canoetrpr]

Not sure if I did right or not but my tires now have CaCl2 with tubes in them. The price was right - $262 all inclusive: service call, CaCl2, tubes and all.

I washed the outside of the rims after it was done. Tire guy seemed to know what he was doing.

Said he had loaded with winshield washer fluid which the customer supplied before. If I had time, this is probably what I would have used and might have done the project myself. Right now what little time I have needs to be spent getting going on my project - got 10 tons or so of gravel to move around to the site of my dog kennels.

Tire guy also suggested that in about 10 years or so I could expect are around the valves to leak so I should keep an eye on that and get the tubes replaced at that time.

In a sense it was good for me to get things done this way. Got to establish a relationship with a very good local tire guy who has been in the business a long time and did not rip me off on price.

Can't wait to move that gravel around with loaded tires!

 

[kevinj]

Retail on a tube is $40 to $50 depending on size. The highest price I've seen on 50# bags of Cal chlor is right at $50. So worst case, $100 per tire for matl. That leaves $300 on the table for a trip to the job site, labor to break the bead down on 2 tires, install the tubes, air back to set bead, mix and pump in fluid, and pack up tools. A GOOD tire man should be able to do that in less than an hour per wheel. Trip to and from site, we'll figure an hour is fair. So that's $100 bucks an hour for his time. Not cheap, but not unheard of for on-site tire service.

Never heard of using "rock salt". And the claim that it's "not nearly as corrosive" is plain ol' bogus.

For $100 you can EASILY buy tire irons, a pump and the valve stem air bleeder adapter. Then you never have to pay anyone again. Nice to have in the event of a flat tire.

This is supposed to be non corrosive ballast. It is what my dealer is using due to the cold weather pumping issues of beet juice.

Road Way Solutions Inc of Charlevoix Michigan

 

[Podunkadunk]

Originally Posted by john_bud
I hear that enviro angle a bit and for some reason it made my skin crawl. Finally the quarter dropped and figured out why. We snowy land folks see salt used on the roads every winter. They are pure white with salt in the spring! The ditches are full of weeds, grass and flowers even after 50-80 years of putting salt down. How much damage is being done when a tire with 40-50-100 # of CaCl2 gets a flat vs the thousands of tons of salt spread by the county every year for the past 50 years?

What I find "SKIN CRAWLY" is the attitude that "Theres a lot of it (it being the whatever) in the system (aquifer, air, river, ocean, or wherever) already, so if I contribute a bit more it won't matter".

Can I dump old oil in a hole in my back yard ? Say a gallon or two each oil change ?
How much does it add to what the town, county, state, country, lays down deliberately as "black top" for roads ?
Awwww, trivial, right ?

Where is the "away" that everything we don't want goes ?

"We all live downstream"
{source forgotten, for the moment}

It's interesting that someone would use saltwater in their tractor tires. It seems it would be a little corrosive on the rim if a leak in the tube were to ever develop, especially if it were a "pin-hole" leak in which you wouldn't know it was leaking for quite some time. Also, it seems the salt would pull draw out the protectant properties of the tire which keep it from dry-rotting. It wouldn't be something I would allow them to do to my tractor. I just added weights to the front, haven't needed any on the back yet, but if I do, I'll seek other options rather than adding any kind of liquid to the tires. Weights just seem more practical TO ME.

I concur with John_Bud. A little salt water isn't going to hurt anything. The earth's water is approx. 97% saline. Yes, the earth has oil, but hey, it's trapped underground, needs to be drilled and sucked out, needs to be refined to the "state" we know oil as. Comparing saltwater and oil on the environment is a bad analogy.

 

[canoetrpr]

A final note on this thread.

I've had my tires loaded now for a week or so. The difference is PHENOMENAL and I wish I had done this much earlier. I've been working on preparing a site to pour a concrete pad which involves moving bucket fulls of gravel. The tractor has been stable, stable, stable.

Thanks for the advice all.

 

[SPYDERLK]

A final note on this thread.

I've had my tires loaded now for a week or so. The difference is PHENOMENAL and I wish I had done this much earlier. I've been working on preparing a site to pour a concrete pad which involves moving bucket fulls of gravel. The tractor has been stable, stable, stable.

Thanks for the advice all.

You got a lot more weight withthe CaCl. 11#/G vs 8/G for WWF.
larry

 

[IslandTractor]

Just to update this thread a bit....I've been looking into loading my 16.9x24/8 tires with about 45gallons each of either RimGuard or windsheild washer fluid or a homemade WWF mix of 50:50 methanol/water. That would add about 700-900lbs of ballast.

Costs: RimGuard is about $3.50/gallon and the local dealer here wants to charge 2 hours installation labor on top of that. Difficult to load RimGuard yourself as it is quite viscous and requires a special pump apparently. Est cost done at dealer: $600

WWF seems to be going for over $2/gallon now and I cannot tell easily what percentage methanol it is. Would need appox 40-50% methanol to get -30F. Est cost done myself: $180-230 but would need to confirm it has sufficient methanol as antifreeze. Special deicer versions with higher methanol content seem to cost $3-4 per gallon which would push cost way up.

55gallon drum of methanol costs $250 now. Apparently prices go up in the winter for methanol so that might drop before next summer. Diluting this 50/50 would end up costing $250/100 gallons

Wheel weights are over $1/lb plus special mounting hardware so adding even 500lbs would be more expensive than any of the self serve options.