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Help - I need correct values for wheel alignment on an LH

suspension wheel alignment

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#1 Torryhead

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Posted 15 November 2012 - 08:12 AM

Hi guys,
after months and months trying to get my Torry into the states, it's now here in Philly!!!
Anyway I need to get a wheel alignment done and was wondering what castor, camber, toe etc I should run. The suspension is all original with new replacement parts. I have LX stubs and UC rack but to my knowledge, that wont change anything.

So throw some measurements and suggestions my way. Oh and i'm running 225/40R18 and the car will be used for a weekend driver with the odd bit of hard driving.
Thanks

#2 axistr

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Posted 15 November 2012 - 07:32 PM

Hi Torrie head,

Now I have to start thinking about the settings being back to front. or should I say left instead of right.

I set up all my Torries up with around 1/4 negitive camber on your right and 1/4 positive camber on your left.

Try to run possitive caster, with LH-LX front ends around 1 1/2 deg positive caster is about the most you will get without buggering up you camber.
If the drive angle is good even caster will be the go.

Set the toe to around 1.5mm toe in. When I set them up on the wheel alignment machine I push out on the front of both tyres (tires) with around 10kg 24Lbs LOL of pressure and if the toe goes to zero then the toe is set right. Using this principle sometimes I have to set the toe to 2.5mm in to get zero at the same pressure.

These are my personal setting that work well for street use and good tyre wear.

One thing it needs thow is power steering LOL.

Lenny.

Edited by axistr, 15 November 2012 - 07:35 PM.


#3 Torryhead

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Posted 16 November 2012 - 02:18 AM

Thanks Lenny,
I really appreciate the info and i'll pass it on to the boys at the performance shop. I didn't know about applying pressure out on the wheels so cheers for that also. thanks for the conversion into Lbs. I'm trying to persuade the boys over here to move to the metric system but there a stubborn bunch :-)

I'll start looking into a possible power steering setup (lots more after market options over here - and a bit cheaper too) later but right now i want to get her on the road and start spinning a few people out. Cheers again mate.

Dan

#4 76lxhatch

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Posted 16 November 2012 - 06:36 AM

I set up all my Torries up with around 1/4 negitive camber on your right and 1/4 positive camber on your left.

Your roads are probably different to ours but I prefer even alignment left to right for all settings rather than attempting to cater for the roads which vary too much anyway. Also because of this:

Try to run possitive[sic] caster, with LH-LX front ends around 1 1/2 deg positive caster is about the most you will get without buggering up you camber.

... I wouldn't think you'd get away with such a small amount of camber, but I'd be happy with anywhere between 1/4 to 1 degree negative on any road car.

Remember that the shim stacks are not supposed to exceed 1/2" total thickness.

If you struggle to get any positive caster on the pre-RTS front end then zero static toe or even a mm or so of toe out can help a lot with dialling out some of the understeer. Only as a last resort because it does have an impact on tyre wear, although small in my experience.

#5 _robslxhatch_

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Posted 16 November 2012 - 06:47 AM

Your roads are probably different to ours but I prefer even alignment left to right for all settings rather than attempting to cater for the roads which vary too much anyway. Also because of this:

... I wouldn't think you'd get away with such a small amount of camber, but I'd be happy with anywhere between 1/4 to 1 degree negative on any road car.



I

Yep Cambers are great between 1/4 -1 degree neg on a street car in my opinion and i certainly would not run positive camber ??

#6 axistr

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Posted 17 November 2012 - 07:51 AM

G'day guys, as they say the quickest way to get into an arguement is to ask a room full of wheel aligners what setting they use. I agree it depends very much on the local roads and the conditions and way the vehicle will be used.

I will try and be breif to why I use the these settings and why.

The toe should be set so the drag of the tyres on the road will give zero when driving down the road. slight toe out will effect the inside of the right front tyre, excessive toe will effect both insides.

CAMBER
I will work in minutes for camber & caster , for those unsure there is 60 minutes in 1 degree. 30 min = 1/2 degree.

All roads have camber to make sure that any rain water falls to the gutters sides, so when we drive our vehicle on the road we have a slight lean to the left (right hand drive). Towards the center of the road the camber is closer to zero before falling to the opersite side of the road positive camber.

Now if we set our cambers to 20-30 min negitive left & 15min positive on the right static, then sit in the drivers seat, those cambers will change some what to around 40-50min negitive left & around 30min positive right. (Put a fat chck in the front left and look how much change you get then).

Because the right wheel is close to the crown of the road and the car is on a slight lean to the left the best tyre foot print contact to the road is around 30min positive camber. The left front tyre is close to the road edge or gutter and starts to flatten out a bit and trucks tend to push the tar around a bit and leave a slight rut in this area the tyre foot print contact angle is around 15-30min negitive camber.

As we know if you are doing track work all the time we would need lots of negitive camber both sides due to hard cornering at every corner, the flex and twist of the vehicle will make the outside wheel stand up. If you look at a racing car through a hard corner the outside wheel will look close to vertical from the road surface giving max tyre contact with the road and the insde wheel most of the time off the road serface or only sligt contact.

On the road we just dont drive or carn't hook in enough to justify running lots of negitive camber, if we drive hard through bends 10% of the time we still have 90% left to get good tyre wear.

CASTER.
Running positive caster will induce more positive camber on the inside wheel and more negitive camber on the outside wheel. The more caster the more camber change we will get which is perfect and also in the correct direction.

Caster will give the driver more road feel but make it heavier to steer. A lot of aligners still think positive caster is only there to return the steering wheel to centre yes it does aid it but you would be wrong K.P.I (king pin inculation) is what returns the vehicle to centre and thats why they return even with negitive caster.

Neg caster has the opersite effect in inducing camber in the wrong direction and thats why when we drove our HQ & LH toranas they squealed so much doing a u-turns. no to mention bugger all toe out on turns.

Hope this helps.

#7 Torryhead

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Posted 17 November 2012 - 04:15 PM

Ok,
I had about 5 cups of tea, sat down, read and reread all the info and it makes a tonne more sense. At first I didn't make the connection to your comment axistr about things being back to front, but as i'll be driving on the right (wrong) side of the road, its now clear. Your comments about running positive and negative camber respectively make sense to and i'll be sure to ask if the wheel aligners over here use a positive/negative method or run an equal positive camber. I noticed some of the boys above prefer the same camber and not to rely on the road surface. I'll be honest, the roads in Philly are either super nice, beautiful highway/ tollway's or nice scenic roads full of bloody inspection lids and potholes. Here in the states, the cambers vary but look to be basically the same as Aus.

With regard to Caster, how is it adjusted? excuse the ignorance of the uneducated :-) but the upper and lower control arms are fixed in place. The pin that holds the upper arm to the upper part of the K frame isn't elongated is it, to be able to move the King Pin forward or back? Just curious. I want to throw every option at these guys and know as much as possible so that I know they are doing the alignment properly.

Again, thanks for everyone's input and axistr, for your detailed explanations, it's greatly appreciated.

Dan

#8 Torryhead

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Posted 17 November 2012 - 04:24 PM

On a somewhat unrelated subject,
how do i find all the forums i have commented on? I dont receive notices when you guys reply to my threads so i have to look up the forum entry. I have tried searching my username and only a few old forum entries have shown up..... If anyone knows how to keep track of forum posts, that would be very helpful. Cheers,

Dan

#9 76lxhatch

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Posted 17 November 2012 - 07:52 PM

With regard to Caster, how is it adjusted? excuse the ignorance of the uneducated :-) but the upper and lower control arms are fixed in place. The pin that holds the upper arm to the upper part of the K frame isn't elongated is it, to be able to move the King Pin forward or back?

The top pivot has two bolts which attach it to the cross member, by shimming them the camber is adjusted. By shimming the two bolts different amounts, the upper arm turns and moves the ball joint forward and back, adjusting the caster also. You've got to adjust both camber and caster together.

With the roads here we can't rely on any particular camber being built in, often they are off-camber not to mention undulations and pot holes. Generally the understeer in a Torana front end will wear the outside edge of the tyre too so a good setting for camber is often where the inside and outside wear matches.

#10 ls2lxhatch

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Posted 17 November 2012 - 11:36 PM

On a somewhat unrelated subject,
how do i find all the forums i have commented on? I dont receive notices when you guys reply to my threads so i have to look up the forum entry. I have tried searching my user name and only a few old forum entries have shown up..... If anyone knows how to keep track of forum posts, that would be very helpful. Cheers,

Dan


In the top right corner you will find your username. When you click on that link a menu will pop up. The "My Content" option will show topics you have posted in. On the left of that page there is an option to just show your posts.

At the top of each topic there is a "Follow This Topic" button to track updates to a topic.

Personally I just use the "View New Topics" button in the top right each time I go on the forum. Once I have read the topics I am interested in then I click on the "Mark Community Read/Mark All Read" which is on the bottom left.

#11 Torryhead

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Posted 18 November 2012 - 05:06 AM

Thanks 76lxhatch,
after i posted my comment i realized that must be the only way to adjust caster. It also makes sense with everyone's comments about the caster adjustment changing the camber etc. Cheers,

And ls2lshatch, as always you helped me out once again. I have sorted out the task of tracking topic posts. Cheers,

Dan





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