Lead Wheel Weights

[birch3x]

Apparently some states are banning lead weights used for wheel balancing.Anyone have any info on this?

[steve_biegler]

Originally Posted by birch3x

Apparently some states are banning lead weights used for wheel balancing.Anyone have any info on this?

I suppose a kid might find one on the side of the road and chew on it. I'm beginning to think there is NO common sense any more!

[DealerEx]

send'em to me...I melt'em down to make cast bullets to reload .45's and .44's...lol

[birch3x]

Originally Posted by DealerEx

send'em to me...I melt'em down to make cast bullets to reload .45's and .44's...lol

That's what I use them for. .45 black powder.

[FixedOpsGuy]

Originally Posted by birch3x

Apparently some states are banning lead weights used for wheel balancing.Anyone have any info on this?

Wurth (the nuts and bolts company) has been attempting to convert us over from lead weights to steel for the last year.

The price is a little higher. They have all sorts of literature on the subject along with poster and flyers for your customers. The big push is that steel weights are more "green...environmentally friendly".

They also state that within a year or two, it will be mandatory in many more states.

To me, the cost is just too significant to switch right now. We sell about 150-175 tires a month and our cost of weights would go up about $300-400 per month with the figures thay gave us.

There are 5 different types of weights we use right now. (a type for steel rims, alluminum rims, CJD, Ford, etc...). A couple of the types, steel weights are about the same price; and a couple types, steel weights are priced out of the ball park.

Wurth tried to suggest that I stock both and up-sell the customer to steel using the "green" as a moral responsibility to the customer. I'm not going to start buying both steel and lead like Wurth is suggesting. Makes no sense.

I'll wait till it becomes law.

[birch3x]

Effective 1/01/2011 we cannot use lead when replacing tires. Then on 1/01/2012 we cannot sell new or used vehicles with lead weights on. Hope the factory sends them with steel.

[steve_biegler]

Originally Posted by birch3x

Effective 1/01/2011 we cannot use lead when replacing tires. Then on 1/01/2012 we cannot sell new or used vehicles with lead weights on. Hope the factory sends them with steel.

Is that a state law or federal?

[birch3x]

State law.

[DealerEx]

Everyone of the legislators in your state, that voted in a retroactive law, should be required to spend a few weeks going out to every new and used carlot and removing and replacing the lead weights in already in place! If they want to change the law so that from a certain date forward you have to use them, thats fine...but to impose a requirement to replace them on pre-existing vehicles is just a typical government regulation they passed without actually stopping to think about how much time and expense that will cost the dealers. And none of the millions of vehicles owned by individuals will be affected...until they trade them in and the dealer has to do it.

[birch3x]

As it turns out, Loons like lead. For some reason they are attracted to it in water as lost fishing gear sinkers. Now the freshwater fishing tackle stores aren't supposed to stock lead, either. I can see this in the sporting world as being an animal friendy item. We can use steel weight with bobbers, etc. But the only loons I see walking around that might eat a wheel weight look distinctively human.http://http://www.mass.gov/dfwele/df...kers_loons.htm

[Ralph]

Originally Posted by FixedOpsGuy

Wurth The big push is that steel weights are more "green...environmentally friendly".



Wurth tried to suggest that I stock both and up-sell the customer to steel using the "green" as a moral responsibility to the customer. I'm not going to start buying both steel and lead like Wurth is suggesting. Makes no sense.

I'll wait till it becomes law.

That pesky element...lead. You know how nice the planet was when we didn't have that awful stuff present? Then Man...went ahead and invented it and ruined the environment. Oh Gaia...on behalf of all the human vermin...I apologize for them inventing lead.

I heard the Government's going to ban Arsenic and Mercury too. They're really bad too. People die from that stuff, come on. They do, really...how could man have invented this lethal stuff? Where do we get off anyway?

(Just some tongue in cheek)

[Slo]

Wait until some gooberment genius realizes just how dangerous dihydrogen monoxide is....