I bought 5 used OEM FJ Cruiser alloy wheels (6 spoke style) and had them blasted, prepped then powder coated. I bought 4 new Cooper Dicoverer AT/3's (LT265/70/17, load range C) and had them balanced at my local dealer. (hoping to get 2 front wheel studs replaced while there) Dealer charged me $60 for balancing 4 tires. The kid at the dealer who did the work had 8-10 ounces of wheel weights on 3 of the wheels and 20 ounces on 1 wheel. He had weights on each wheel, on each side of the wheel opposite of each other. WTF ! Needless to say the steering wheel shook at 55 mph up to 65 mph. I went to my tire shop today where I bought the tires and after they scraped all of the stick on weights off each wheel, they balanced them. The highest amount of weight on 1 wheel was 8.5 ounces. The lowest was 3.5 ounces. But I still am getting steering wheel shake at 55-65 mph. (while at the tire shop, we spun the 5th wheel with no tire, and it was out of balance by 1 ounce) My 2010 4R goes back to my dealer Monday for a front end alignment and I'm telling them that the alignment should be free after the idiot kid screwed up my balance job. Is it possible that the baking process to the alloy wheels in the powder coating oven, warped the wheels ? Or do I have a tire problem ? HELP !

Update..... its not the wheels. It is the tires. Going back to the tire shop this week.

My local Toyota dealer did my front end alignment on Monday, and he said that it is within' spec. It pulls to the right MORE now than it did before I took it in. I am so disgusted with that dealer. Should I call another Toyota dealer and re-schedule an alignment, telling them what happened at the 1st dealer, or go to a private shop for the alignment ? Also, still getting some steering wheel shake at 55-65 mph. I think that I might have a bad tire mounted up front. I have tire pressure set at 36 lbs on all 4 tires.

find a good private shop & get a road force balance. Hunter GSP9700 Wheel vibration Control System solves wheel vibration and tire pull problems that balancers and aligners can't fix

Thanks chaz. I'm gonna' call around tomorrow and see if any of my local shops use the Hunter Road Force.

A couple of the Firestone Complete Care shops have the Road Force balancer. They want $30 per wheel/tire to balance. Is this the going rate or are they asking too much ?

Not sure what my tire shop uses for a balancing machine but they had no problems balancing my FJ wheels with nitto tires.
I also ditched my TPMS sensors and had them only do stick on wheel weights since I didn't want them ripping up the lip of the rim.
Not sure on the exact weight they installed on each wheel but last I rotated my tires it appeared to be hardly any weight at all.
Almost 10k on the tires now and have had no vibration whatsoever.

Road force balancing and don't forget the Haweka adapter when balancing.

What is a Haweka adapter ?

You can do a search here or google it, but here is one link...

http://www.toyota-4runner.org/perfor...must-read.html

I would like to Thank everyone who recomended the Road Force balancing. I got all 4 wheels/tires balanced today by a private tire shop (Bruce Bros Tires) who has a Road Force, and I don't have any steering wheel shake or seat vibration whatsoever. I will be dealing with BBT's from now on.