Anybody have any advice on getting my car aligned. I'd like to take it autocrossing sometime. I have a stock setup with 1.25 swaybar up front and 3/4 swaybar out back. I also have zr rated tires if that makes a difference. I have a Vette Brakes catalog that I was going to go with it suggests up front
0 toe
-.25 camber
2.75 caster
and 1/8 " toe
-.50 camber out back.

 

I occasionally auto-X. The VB&P books gives some base line figures. Camber is dependant on two things. #1. How much your tires roll under with correct air pressure when max “G” turning. #2. How much camber change your wheel has during its vertical travel.

The only way to really dial in the correct numbers is a tire temp gauge and measure each tire on the outside edges and the middle right after a series of hot laps. For a lapping only car the settings will be different from side to side. Which is impractical for a dual purpose street machine unless your have your own gauges.

Your zero front toe is good. More like .75 neg. front camber. Then put in as much caster as you can. My 79 is set to 3.96 degrees. I can’t put any more shims because they tend to fall out if you try for anymore.

I have mixed feelings about running any rear toe. Years ago I set up my trailing arms with Zero toe. I didn’t want any induced side thrust bearing loads. Rear toe just like front toe creates self-straightening factors to the vehicle. My Vette is not my mothers Oldsmobile!

IMO – Rear Smart struts are the only way to go. They nearly eliminate camber change throughout the whole range of tire movement.

It’s a big job to change existing rear toe. So if it’s within spec just leave it and set your rear camber to something like .75 degrees negative. Again if your serious about your lap times. Get a tire temp gauge.



[Modified by gkull, 10:36 AM 8/14/2003]

 

Thanks gkull. I'm just out to have a little fun so a tire temp guage is probably overkill for me. To be quite honest I'm not good enough to know the difference anyway. Your right I do remember the last time I had it aligned they had a hard time setting the rear toe. I think it was pretty close to 0 afterwords. I'll give those numbers a shot. i don't know what smart struts are but I do have the adjustable strut rods. I'll do some research on that.

 

I agree w/ GKull. I autocross w/ the advanced street settings and get a lot of cupping on the outside edge of my front tires. I could probably use more negative camber.

For a "romping" on the car, without using the full range of the tires, the advanced street setting is perfect.

-Steve

 

Just got back from the alignment shop. The toe on the back was outrageous. I'm sorry I let it go for so long now. They set it to the VB advanced and your right it feels great. Car is much more responsive now.

 

What does your print out say for alignment specs now?

 

Gkull, do you have any suggestions on how you set your rear toe at home? I'm doing a frame off and am just hooking up the rear components. Just looking down the frame rails, one tire looks ok, but the other points way out on the front edge. I put the shims in the way they came out, so I'm not sure what is going on. Could be it was way out before the tear down. I'd like to get it as close as possible while every thing is easy to get to. Do you need the rear spring attached, or can you do it without it or a lot of weight on the rear end? I've heard you can use a lazer level somehow to get things aligned. Thanks.

 

You can "ballpark it" with it in the air, but as the suspension loads, camber becomes MORE negative and I believe toe goes OUT. Could be wrong, but nonetheless, you can only hope to ballpark it unless you make all your measurements with the suspension fully loaded.

-Steve

 

LT1er,
I'm embarrased to say that the spec sheet they gave me flew out the window when I was "testing" my suspension. :bb But the toe on the back wasn't quite zero but it was within spec. The rest of the numbers were close to the top post. I just wrote it down and they tried to match it as close as possible.