harbor freight tire changer

So I have a whole in the sidewall of my front tire (after on 2k miles), and the local shop is closed for the holiday weekend. I decided to just go to harbor freight, get the tools, and change it myself. They will eventually pay for themselves anyway. I ended up buying the tire changes, motorcycle attachment, and motorcycle tire balancing stand. All in all, out about 160.

Keep in mind i have never done this before. I put everything together and it looks very simple and straight forward. But I did end up with one question that I wanted to ask before I get started:

How do you keep from scratching the rims?

You use a metal bar to remove the tire, and metal clamps hold the rim on the stand while the tire is being removed. Will this not scar up the rim?

I figure this has been covered before, but I am stuck at home on dial up and don't really have time to search through the forums. If anybody that has experience with this could chime in that my fears are unfounded, or with a tip of how to keep from scratching my rims, it would be greatly appreciated. Not only did I only have 2k miles on the tire, I only have 2k miles on the bike. It would make me sick to scratch up my rim right from the beginning.

Thanks in advance.

if you use that setup as stock you will scratch your rims. this and this are things that people have used to help make the harbor freight system work without scratching your rims. this doesn't really help you quickly though, because you'd have to order them. since i would have to order things, i ordered a cycle hill changer. but you don't really want to wait and order something. for quickness you could try using plasti-dip (the name is close to that) on the rim grabbers. as far as the bar...

take a look at john's videos on how he made the hf tire changer work
[ame=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=C09E84rDV7M&feature=related]YouTube - Motorcycle Tire changing 101 - PART I[/ame]
[ame=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gDFMVzKdji0]YouTube - Motorcycle Tire changing 101 - PART II[/ame]
[ame=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wZPklAAkAMA&feature=related]YouTube - Motorcycle Tire changing 101 - PART III[/ame]
[ame=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U8Rj5fk_6eM&feature=related]YouTube - Motorcycle Tire changing 101 - PART IV[/ame]

Well crap. Being as how i am on dial up, I can not see youtube videos. If I put a towel between the actual grabbers and the rims, would that keep it from scratching? If not, I guess I am just going to pack it back up and try to return it Tuesday, as it is kind of worthless to me.

If a towel will not work, I hope they will take it back. They money I spent on that could have bought my pazzos, lol.

Harbor Freight will take a return on most anything.

And that tire changer will tear up your rims in stock form.

I put mine out on the street (it was several years old) and let somebody take it away. I don't miss it at all.

Cycle Gear is open 7 days was week, even this coming Monday.

you keep from scratching your rims with the HF tire changer by getting the mojo lever and mojo blocks

I've only changed a car tire before...is there any disadvantage to just using 2 2x4s covered with a towel to support the tire, 2 rim protectors and a couple of tire irons?