Eminitrader

I could no longer resist.. I just ordered the PS2's and some repro. wheels on tire rack .. woo hoo... Man this corvette sure does eat up all my extra money

MTsVette

When I purchased my '06 AW coupe (58,000 miles), the front tires were worn on the inside. I called the dealer and he stated that GM sets up the alignment with negative camber for performance handling from the factory. I had the dealer do the alignment, and he said he would set the camber to 0 degrees for me, at my request, for better tread wear across the tire and the handling would be fine (I don't track it or drive it to it's limits). I'm happy so far. He also stated that the alignment would be good until I can replace the front tires.

MT

fnsblum

Keep an eye on the outside edge for excessive wear now. The C6 has a gain camber suspension. I don't exactly how much down force/passenger weight etc. it takes to gain .4 degrees of negative camber but I am sure the GM engineers do. Most folks will get excellent mileage from their tires with the center of the OEM specs. Everyone who takes an interest in their tire wear should have a tread depth gauge and know how to use it. The fronts are real easy to measure with a full lock turn. Later! Frank

FortMorganAl

I think we actually agree. I was attempting to contradict the idea presented by others that alignment never changes when tire sizes are changed or that you can do an alignment even without tires on the car. But if you change from normal tires to tires with a 6 foot diameter on the front and 2 foot on the rear, obviously something is going to change. When people change from the factory specified tires they normally are forced to make at least small changes in the diameters of the tires.

You are correct that if toe is measured as an angle then it would not change but the specified angle should be related to the tire diameter since the toe in inches is what you are really trying to control. Again, using an extreme example of a 2 foot vs. a 6 foot tire and you should see that the needed angle to get a desired force would be much less with the 6 foot tire.

In any case, I hope we agree that when you start changing tire sizes you MAY need an alignment which contradicts those who say you never need an alignment after changing tires.

marc8090

No problem, I agree. I was actually a little off in my original post. If one was to add one inch to each tire, the rake and therefore the caster would not change. However, since the front and rear tires must vary in diameter by a certain percentage then adding the same percentage of diameter to the front and rear would change the rake ever so slightly since you are adding the tiniest bit more diameter to the rear tire and therefore change the caster. That being said though, it should never be an issue since diameters must be kept close to stock to not upset the TC/AH.