T5Mika

I have been measuring toe and camber for years on my garage floor, and I could easily get 1/16" accuracy with the contraption I made. Today I had some free time, so I thought I'd try measuring caster also.

I went to Home Depot and bought a dead on ***** accurate Bosch laser level. The car was recently aligned so I had a baseline to compare with. I measured front toe, camber and caster a few times, and got the same angle numbers as the machine within one 1/10th of a degree.

lh4x4

It's sure good to have time on your hands. My wife has too many things on her to do list.

olbear1962

so true, so true

dgrant3830

Its really no different than a professional equipment alignment just slower. What would be nice is if you were willing to post pictures of each step that you went through and exactly how you accomplished the measurements. This could save us all a lot of money using your techniques.

T5Mika

I'll do that when I check the alignment the next time. It's hard work really, kneeling down there and squinting to get good readings.

Here's the level I used, Bosch GPL3T:


It has three lasers and it fits snugly on the wheel for toe measurement and turn angle measurement for caster (mark the spots on the floor and measure).

For toe, instead of using a measuring tape, I use a straight plank that I put first behind the wheels, line the other end up with the passenger wheel with laser. I have a scale in the driver's end of the plank, and I point the laser there and get the reading. Repeat in the front of the wheels and I get the difference between the readings and the total toe. There are so many other ways to do it with lasers, and you can get individual toes also with some more effort.

For camber, the laser can be put on the floor, leveled off and then you can measure the distance from the rim to the laser beam.

For caster, I measure two turn angles and camber difference and use the formula: caster = (180/pi)*(camber1-camber2)/(turn angle1 - turn angle2).

Nver2loud

Figure out a work around for that yet? If so let me know...