Any instructions available besides the ones at corvettefaq.com??
What tools do I need? Should I attempt it? Who can describe good and bad expieriences with this? I've just put the suspension all back together (body off right now) and would like to get aligned.

 

Would like to do a self alignment also. Vibration is much less with the new spring but still feel it when accellerating.

 

See if this helps

http://www.vettenet.org/align.html

 

Fred Puhn's book "How to make your car handle"

Thats another source for instructions, and basic guidelines...

 

Do yourself a favor and pay a good alignment shop to do all 4 wheels. Wearing out the tires or the car steering incorrectly won't be worth it. JMO.

 

I don't see how you can do an alignment without the weight of the body on the chassis. Anything done at this point will have to be done again.

 

I agree, you need all the weight and you have to drive the car first to get everything 'settled'

You can get it close with water level and a few measurements but it's not worth it.... get it close and drive it to a good alignment shop...

 

Hate to be so contrary, but in fact I find 'good' or highly recommended alignment shops to be all over the freaking MAP in accuracy, and it's as much to do with their gear/rack as the guy doing it....

MY advice, DIY.....

all you have to do is mark off spots on the garage floor where the wheels are sitting, outside and front/back of each tire is ok....

back the car outta the garage and put a level across the spots on a steel bar or at least a straight 2x4.... and adjust accordingly, making a pad about 12" x 12" square....and adjusting the height for each....side to side, f/back....so doing this repeatedly for about an hour will yeild good results....
you got a level table....flip your carpenter's level around so to verify results....

once you got pads shimmed into level, you can use identical aluminum or formica coverings, with slick beer wrappings and some grease, you can make the car turn by hand from flipping the tires...so no problems there....

just know the rear is slightly wider than the front in stance, and so you need to put the strings 3/8 inch further out in front than rear, using axel centers as referance....

after that, align away.....

I use 4 jack stands and fishing line for my referance points, hard to keep tripping over them, but they work fine....

GENE

 

Sounds good. Is there a relative posistion the steering box needs to be in when the wheels are pointing straight?

 

I agree....jeeeez...they've got all the equipment and it's about $50.00 !

 

I have far more faith in my home alignement then an expensive equipment. I did invest in a caster camber gage, about $130 and special toe gage, another $100 and feel my accuracy is as good as any.
You can be withing specs and still have a bad alignment. If the right side is on the high side of specs and the left is on the low side of specs , both are within specs but unequal side to side and this makes for very bad steering.
I fiddle, takes hours but in the end is is equal left and right and to specs that I want, not some outdated stuff.
I also play with different settings to get driving impressions and play with toe out and toe in.
If you are not sure of how to go about it you need to read, understand and invest in a few pieces of equipment.
Forgot I also use a laser level.
Twice I had my car aligned by the best shops I could find and never liked either alignment.
Patience , rotating plates, caster/camber gage, laser level and toe gage are the tools I use.
Alot of the time a mechanic apprentice is doing the job and they know nothing about bump, they only know specs from your car and as long as they fall within those specs they cover themselves.
Time is important to them and getting it equal side to side falls outside their time allotment.
NO one touches my alignment.

 

Yes the box must be in the center of it's travel and you need to really learn alot about your steering before attempting a home alignment.
I also agree the body must be one, the suspension settled and drive a few miles to work everything in.
For a really rough alignnment use a tape measure and a level for now.

 

I agree. $500,000 in lazer alignment tools and the jrekes have never been able to impress me, grrrr.

I can do as good with a tape measure, a level and a little trigonometry....

 

Trig?? I never even got close to match calculations of any kind...much less do them without a calculator....

I just read my tape and level really close, take your time and above all Patience!!!!

this crap took me over 1/2 a day to learn how to do it, and don't give up, the results ARE repeatable, assuming the suspension is in good shape, you got sloppy parts in there, you got sloppy results...case closed....

GENE

 

Here's a tip that really helps. Make up four 12-18" squares of 1/8" thich teflon sheet. Put a wad of grease between two so you have a pair of greased plates. Drive you car onto them. You cannot jack the car to do this because the suspesion wont' be right. Now you can adjust anything and the wheel will slide easily. Now align to specs with trammel points (or tape measure) and a laser level or protractor.. After you do it a couple of times it is pretty easy.

 

Any metal will work for plates, I have a set of heavy sheet metal ones and also a set of aluminum ones, both about 18 inches square and greased. You can push the car sideways , rock it up and down and the wheels slide out to prevent the suspension from binding.
You definitely need something.
This is a caster camber gage

 

Norval does such NICE machine work, now if we all can just get him to do more OF it, we will ALL be fine....


whattya say Norv???


GENE

 

What am I machining Gene. I finished installing the cage today. The new carpet is in which allowed me to bolt in the cage. It looks really good, gloss black powder coating, fits right up close to the interior. When the Tee roofs are on you don't even see it.
I couldn't be more pleased. Only took me about 2 months but it was worth it.
I also redrilled the bolt holes on my new 18 inch American racing rims. That was a little scary.

 

I've had several shops align my cars. Every one of them screwed it up. The last alignment on the vette was supposed to be -0.25 camber, 1/8" toe-in (front). That's what their computer said it was. But the car felt weird driving down the road and pulled to the left. Also noticed the right a-arm had much less shims than the left.

I did my own alignment and found the left had -0.3 dgr camber. The right wheel had +0.4. Yes, it was positive camber where it should have been neg. No wonder the car pulled. I added the shims to get it to -0.3 and gee-whiz, now both sides had the same amount of shims. What a coincidence.

Then I measured toe and felt like going back to the shop and slap them. It was almost 1/2"! Reset the toe to1/8" and the car drove like it was supposed to.

Moral of the story: Doesn't matter how nice of equipment you have if you don't know how to use it or are too lazy to do it right. The shop had a state of the art hunter and still screwed it up.

 

here is an interesting article from hotrod. http://forums.corvetteforum.com/show...=diy+alignment