I'm thinking about fitting on my 69 427 both the "smart struts" and the "anti bump steer" kits , but I hate the idea to take the car to the tires shop for the alignement without making at least an initial "safe " setting.
and I like also the idea to try different camber settings and see if the car behaves better, but I can't go every time to the alignement shop

any homemade way to set quite precisely the front wheels toe in and camber and the rear wheels camber?

I have a couple of ideas about but any input is helpful

 

I haven't been to an alignment shop in years. I use this:
http://www.eastwoodco.com/jump.jsp?i...emType=PRODUCT

For camber you can use a level, a caliper and some Trig or Eastwood has these fancy things;
http://www.eastwoodco.com/jump.jsp?i...emType=PRODUCT

When you do your alignments you need to let the wheels move after each adjustment. You can buy some turn plates, make some with tow pieces of masonite with grease between them or just adjust, roll the car back and forth and readjust...

No matter how you do it make sure you take the car for a short drive and recheck to see if things are still where you want them.

The best part is you can chage the alignment what YOU want to!

 

You can set the toe really easily with just a tape measure or you can eyeball it by standing about 10 feet from the front of the car and sight down the outside edge of the tire. Adjust so that it points to the outside edge of the rear tire. Here is a good write up on using the string method. http://wrx.grapon.com/techdocs/howto...0alignment.htm
Instead of knowing the track width you can measure off the frame rails (under the side rocker panels) at the front and rear of the doors. Here is another link http://www.skidmore.edu/~pdwyer/amc/align.htm

Also, like 427V8 said you can set camber with a level and tape measure or use one of these cool tools. There are less expensive gauges from other suppliers in the $120 range. It is all pretty simple. I think there is a write up on this forum as well, do a search in the how to section.

 

what nice tools-toys . I'll go for them for sure. thanks for the valuable inputs...

 

Here's an article from Car Craft that will get you going in the right direction http://www.carcraft.com/howto/48938/index.html

 

Global West, above is a company I did business with almost 20 years ago on the front end of a '70 Lemans/GTO convertible I had quick ratio Camaro steering, Caddy spindles, G West balljoints they special machined down to fit the goat arms, and the spindles dropped the car some distance....1-2"....

that alignment thing above is essentially how I do all my own home alignments, but I do it including caster, the one thing you need to so all this with is a piece of straight steel tube you can mark your garage floor where the tires set, move the car, and then get a level on that steel to plumb up the garage with shims under the wheel....a 4' carpenters' level works fine for this...then you have essentially the same thing as a alignment rack.....I happened to have some ~12" square boards with formica on them....grease and a collapsed beer carton for the front end, and to raise the rear to being plumb for the caster, otherwise don't bother....most garages drain toward the door.....mine was 2" on one rear tire, and 2.5 on the other...

set up jackstands with monofil fishing line strung taught between them.....shark offset is 3/8 inch less width on wheel center in back than in front...per side...once you are set to that centerline you can easy adjust the toe in/out.....then take the 2" carpenter's level to the wheel RIM vertically and do the camber....then to do caster, just use the same tool and adjust that....there are tables for this readout....you can find them on the net....do a google, I have them printed out somewhere...

Last time aligned my vette was maybe 6 years ago, still fine....been through one set of tires lasted about 30k miles in that time frame...the second set shows minimal wear and totally symetrical....

and you wind up with a BETTER alignment than most any shop will do.....bet on that....

I know I will catch grief for that last statement, I don't care, I know it's true.....

 

I did not know that. I set mine using the string method without taking into account the offset. But I have been very pleased with the alignment. Now you have me thinking that I should reset it to this centerline. I will check the offset at my hubs.

mrvett....I agree with your statement about getting better results than most alignment shops. I started doing alignments myself using nothing more than fishing line, a level cut down to the rim size and feeler guages. I think the problem with the alignment shops is that the c3 suspension does not settle properly if they have the type of machine where they have to jack the car in order to place the slider plates. Doing this at home provides the time and benfit of driving it around the block several times while rechecking and dialing it in closer each time.
Lars also had a writeup on alignment with the trig tables.

 

hi....go to duntov motors web site for complete instruction on how to do this

 

Thats assuming you have the same wheels / tires in back as in front.
I have 8" wide wheels in front, 10" wide in back...
So my rear track is 5/8" wider.

 

You measure from the center hub on the rim. As long as the hub material is the same thickness I think it does not matter what rim size you have, or offset.

I think mevette is saying to subtract 3/8" from the rear measurment(hub to string), because the rear wheel track on our C3's is 6/8" wider in total. Subtract by 2 for each wheel.

I just found this on another site which matches what mrvett is saying when you convert 10th's to 1/8" measurements. Difference is .8, which is about 6/8th according to my math

Tread-Front--58.7“
Tread-Rear--59.5“

 

I have identical rims on all 4 corners, with the same thickness wheel adapters......therefore the track width front to rear, any differences are identical as stock....

now if you have differant wheels, you going to have to do some math and think it through very well.....