I'm going to buy a set of rims that have tires mounted on them.

I know UPS will ship these (but they won't insure them).

Is this a safe and effective way to ship (safe for the rims, and I guess for the tires) or would you ask the seller to

demount and just box and ship the rims?

TIA

If you dont need the rubber then dismount them. UPS has insured several boxed and packed rims for me.None had tires though. If they are 15" ask to have them sent in two 18"square boxes slip fit end over end.Fill with sryro chips and separated by corrugated cardboard. Tip: Because of the weight it will be cheaper to call for a pickup than if he takes them in.

www.iship.com or the UPS site. Figure 85LBS. If it's close they won't weigh it.

Mark

I've had one wheel shipped in a box by UPS, and it arrived fine. I've also had 4 tires shipped by UPS, and the tires were just tied together in pairs. They also arrived without damage. If the tires on the wheels are in good shape, then I'd leave them on to ship, but in most cases it seems the tires are junk.

A couple of months ago I had a fender shipped through UPS, and the guy who shipped it either didn't box it, or packaged it so poorly that the box fell apart. The fender arrived with only my address taped to it, so it was pretty beat up to say the least. Even the delivery guy was surprised that it went through w/o a box. As long as everything is packaged well, UPS shouldn't be a problem.

Good luck.

If UPS is in a bad mood they will throw the boxes around. Keep the tires on. IT might save the rims.

Depends. If the tires are good, it's worth having them shipped. If not, you're paying to ship dead weight.

If you DO have the tires shipped, have the seller deflate them.

I wouldn't consider UPS even an option to ship tires and wheels. It will be infinately expensive. You need to go with a truck freight company. There are several in the yellow pages. It will be much cheaper and probably just as fast. Typically shipping a mounted tire is okay. Ask the freight company for their preference as to the air in them. Sometimes it is easier to deal with them if they don't bounce and try to roll around, sometimes they prefer to have them so they can roll them. As far as having them dismounted. It is likely to cost another $40 to have them dismounted, another $40 -$90 to have them remounted and rebalanced. If the tires aren't worth the extra money, have them taken off and ship rims only. Most used tires aren't worth much. They typically loose about 80% of their retail value in the first 200 miles. Like everything else, there are exceptions.

Leonard

former Manager 4day Tire Stores, former shipping/receiving for Les Schwab Tire Center. (shipped and recieved a lot of tires......)

$40 to dismount tires??? What frikkin' thief do you go to? The Tire store I go to dismaounts them free...

$40 seems REALLY stiff for 4 minutes (MAX) on a machine. That's $600/hr!

I ran into this a week ago. Wanted to get old tires dismounted so I can blast and refinish my wheels. Drove into a National Tire place (which also sells Batteries) and they wanted $7.50 a piece to dismount. The computer screen called it a mount/dismount. The sales woman would not listen to my argument that I only wanted half of the mount/dismount operation.

I left.

Neighborhood repair shop did it for for me for $20. Included him disposing of the tires for me. That alone costs $2.00 each here in the wealthy North East USA.

-David

It depends on a lot of variables on what it costs. Typically the labor is the same for a dismount/mount as it is for a dismount only. It matters too on what type of wheel it is, steel or mag/aluminum. The latter costs more. Same holds true for balancing. It varies by geographic location and size of the tire store chain.

Leonard