First the basics: 2000 MN6, 18X9.5 inch Thin spokes at all four corners, with 275X35 front and 295X35 rear, C6 Z06 Sways, C6 Z06 Shocks, C5 Z51 Springs, lowered approximately 3/4" front and rear. Daily driver, may see an occassional auto cross, track day.

Question is I just lowered the car and have let it settle in for a couple of weeks and now going to have it 4 wheel aligned. What would be the optimum specs to use to make the most of the suspension upgrades and not adversely affect tire wear? Standard 2000 C5, C5 Z06, or some custom blend? I have searched the forum and there are as suspected a number of different opinions, but I found these specs to be a set most mentioned as a compromise:

Front Individual Toe +0.04 degree

Front Sum Toe +0.08 degree

Steering Wheel Angle 0.0 degree

Front Individual Caster +6.9 degree

Front Cross Caster within 0.50 degree

Front Individual Camber -0.70 degree

Front Cross Camber within 0.50 degree

Rear Individual Toe -0.01 degree

Rear Sum Toe -0.02 degree

Rear Thrust Angle 0.0 degree

Rear Individual Camber -0.68 degree

Rear Cross Camber within 0.50 degree

I have noticed that more negative camber with a .5 degree difference between front and rear is mentioned a lot in recommended specs.
Any input is greatly appreciated.

 

Daily driver ? The I would deffanately leave ALL specs STOCK---GM engineeers have spent months on achieveing the best compromise bewteen handling and tire wear--
The only time I would mess maybe--- with algnment is on a serious autocross car--Most drivers simply don't have enough "seat time" to get any benefit fromchanges beyond stock
This company specializes in aftermarket suspension parts--In the back of their catalog they post some autocross and racing alignement recomendations


http://www.vbandp.com/

 

are you going to the place I told you?

Mike and his guy know their ****....they will get you taken care of

 

Thanks. I would tend to agree. While I am not a serious autocrosser nor have the seat time currently to probably appreciate an agressive alignment, I just was looking for a set of specs that would give me the most advantage for learning while not degrading tire longevity. Stock might be the answer for now.

 

I am in fact going there. I was talking to them yesterday and they were asking if I had any particular specs in mind. So not having any, I searched and now I thought I would ask the experts here for any sage advice before showing up and discussing with Mike and company. And thanks for recommending them.

 

ask Mike to see his car

 

Front toe looks too high which would cause excessive inside wear on the tire edges. The cross camber should be 0* otherwise you're giving a spec with a 71% error tolerance. This is the spec I used on my car and the tire wear is very good.

Front Individual Toe +0.1*
Front Sum Toe +0.2*
Steering Wheel Angle 0.0*
Front Individual Caster L=6.6* R=6.9*
Front Individual Camber -0.40*
Front Cross Camber 0*
Rear Individual Toe -0.1*
Rear Sum Toe -0.2*
Rear Thrust Angle 0.0*
Rear Individual Camber -0.4*
Rear Cross Camber 0*

Next alignment, I might try toe in on the rear instead of toe out.

 

Ok I will.

 

Thanks for the input.

 

I wouldn't use these on cars with run flats. The stiff sidewalls will amplify inner edge tire wear due to the increased negative camber.

 

Toe in causes outside edge wear! This compensates for the increased negative camber, which causes inside tire wear! Toe in also gives you increased high speed stability. If you toe out the car will have poorer highway straigt line performance, but will have better turn in for cornering.

 

i am more of an inches guy. But I agree the left and right should be EXACT, not with in any range.

Measurements should be left and Right, Not a sum.

Caster must / should be identical Most shops put more caster on Right side to compensate for the roads crown. Not best for handling.

Camber: rear is 1/2 of front.

for an aggressive street alignment.

Front
Camber: -1.0*
toe: 1/32" out
Caster: 6.9* but Identical

rear
Camber -0.5*
toe 1/32" IN

AutoCorss would be much different toe. and road racing / track days a lot more camber.

I run -3.0* front and -1.5* rear camber

 

Thanks. Not running run flats (say that three times fast).

 

I'm not sure how that would work. Turning the front of the wheels in will make the camber more negative, causing the tire to ride on the inside edge more. Then, the tire is required to slide sidewas slightly as it travels down the road causing even more wear.

 

Toe out in front will create good turn in for cornering, but not good highway stability. The steering will feel loose and wander a bit. Also, it will wear the inner edges, thus accentuating the inner edge wear caused by negative camber.

 

Lets take this to an extreme. Suppose that you toe in each side 45*? Would that wear the inner or outer edge? I think NOT the inner!

 

Pfadt has some alignment specs on here somewhere. I used their street suggestions, I'm happy with that setup. they have 3 or 4 different sets of specs, depending on what you want. I went with the street setup with some autocross use, but mine is NOT a DD.

Edit: If you want to see them, I have it saved somewhere on my computer. Just ask and I'll look it up and post them here.

 

Not with 1/32"

Not loose but precise steering input.

Most ppl are just use to poor alignments and steering response.

You could run 0 Toe and 0 neg camber, plus 6.9* Right front caster and 6.0* left front. too accommodate for right lane highway driving and road camber.

However, when you get to good flat road, with a few twistie, you find out how so called "Good" highway alinement is really poor for driving.

 

Instead of just making claims why don't you explain why? Toeing in 45* would give the wheels some level of camber around -4* so the wheels would be riding heavily on their inside edges. So, why would the tire wear on the outside edge? Also. I had excessive camber and toe-in on my car and it was eating the inside edges off the tires which is contrary to your statement.

 

My coupe was recently aligned by the Chevy dealer to specs I got from Solofast.

I asked for:

Front Camber -1
Front Caster +7
Front Toe 1/32 toe in

Rear Camber -0.5
Rear toe 1/32 toe in

I got:

Front Camber -1
Front Caster 7.2 Left, 7.4 right
Front toe 0.1 deg right, 0.1 degree left

Rear camber -0.5
Rear Toe .09 left, .08 right

Toe numbers stated elsewhere in this post are more like .01deg, which has to be near 0. Solo explained 0 to toe out will make the car turn in fast, but not be good for ruts.

Solo explained to me that toe in would help with "rut hunting"

So how do the numbers in degrees relate to inches? I was told there would be no math.

This alignment did help the rut hunting greatly. It was flat scary before. But on smooth roads it wants constant micro corrections, maybe that's normal, I've never driven a vette before.

Also, how about corner weights? I lowered a tad as many do, but counting turns on the bolts doesn't seem to be real precise....I would think fine tuning of the bolts while scaling would be beneficial? I notice that after a long drive on straight roads the tire pressures that started equal all end up different.......1-3 lbs.

Ron