I bought a 3' piece of SS all-thread ($10?) cut it to length for the studs and spot-welded a lump onto it to act as a stop when threaded into the hole. I also added loctite. That was four years ago and have had no issues. I also use the u-shims and the Pfadt Camber kit.

 

How about grade 8 set screws? (not sure what size is needed?) Might be a safer option than hardware store threaded rod. There are all sorts of matls and grades of threaded rod, from junk to really good.

 

If I were to make my own, it would most likely be Zinc plated grade 8 bolts with the head cut off and threads cleaned up. I'm having a hard time justifying $90 for the same thing. I like the U shaped washer / fender washer idea for ease of adjustment. I will look into the set screw idea, but think it will be tough finding one long enough.

Thanks for all the responsed and ideas.

Sean

 

68sixspeed, where are you from? I grew up in Groton... Small world.

 

looks like Mcmaster has M12 set screws in stainless, or alloy steel (my preference on hardware) up to M20. Although I might actually go with Fastenall or MSC supply to make sure I get Holokrome or a US made screw for sure.

taken19- I'm up in Torrington, kind of cold but at least Lime Rock is a very short drive!

 

Any idea what size bolts are in the car now? If not, I can take one off and match up at the hardware store.

 

How is caster adjusted on the C6?

 

I thought it wasn't adjustable on a C6 but I could be wrong. Caster is a black box for me, most likely because you can't "see" the adjustment while looking at the car. Never paid much attention to it since most cars do not need faster adjustment.

Anyone care to give a cliffnote version?

 

Easy way to understand caster- think of an old straight axel front suspension or what is under the front of a semi-truck-- kingpin angle when looked at from the side. Or in independant suspensions the angle off vertical of the line drawn between the upper and lower ball joints when looked at from the side. Usually adjusted by unequal shim stacks on the upper a-arm, or using the eccentrics on the lowers.

 

Here's an old thread about it:

http://forums.corvetteforum.com/auto...he-caster.html


If I were racing and trying to work my way up to better rides, more podium finishes, more big bucks sponsors, etc., then I'd worry about it.

I'm doing HPDE track day events - no competition, no prize money, no sponsors giving me lots of money.

So.....I'm not worried about doing race car setups on my car - mine is a street driven car that I take to the track for fun.

All I'm interested in is a safe car that gives me good control and feedback.

I quit using Hoosiers because I'm just out there to have fun in my street car. I do all my own prep and just got tired of changing suspension settings so often.

I do check and adjust the alignment a couple times during the HPDE season, but caster is not something I'm concerned about - I just run what ever it was built with.

Bob

 

I got that part but I'm weak on how adjusting caster affects cornering. The camber and toe is easy because you can see the tire position chance during adjustments - not so much with faster adjustment. Guess I need to read on on that, but I'm with Bob... Not gonna bother trying to adjust that one.

 

Bob, in your earlier post #3 you said that you removed washers/shims up top. That did change your caster especially as you took out an unequal amount on the upper a-arms. It's worth checking what you have in there now.

I don't change caster from street to race settings and typically remove the same number of u-shims from all four studs on each side on the front to change camber. Toe adjustment is then pretty consistent going between settings. Every 3-6 months I'll check rear thrust angle as it gets off slightly each time you change camber just as the steering wheel will move.

 

I purchased a set of studs/nuts online although haven't installed them yet. All you need to know is size/thread pitch and length of the stud and where you want the non-threaded section. The shims can be purchased on line as well.

Bill

 

Measured the garage this afternoon - pretty good side to side. Fronts are equal, rears within 1/4" or each other. Front to back is about 1-3/4" low. One question...

I know that perfectly level is ideal, but is front to rear leveling absolutely necessary? I understand that it will affect corner balancing slightly, but I don't think it will have much of an effect at all. I would prefer not to level front to rear because i would either have to make a pretty elaborate setup to drive onto or jack up the car (unloading the suspension in the process).

Thoughts from the experts? Without running the math, I bet the 1-3/4" height difference would make less than 20 lbs difference front to rear in corner weight. If I compensate with half of a fuel tank or counterweight in the front I think I'll Still be pretty close with suspension loading.

Sean

 

I don't bother with front to rear level differences although my garage floor is fairly level about an 1/8 of an inch difference across the car width and a little more from front to rear. Watch for dips and swales in the concrete that can vary from 1/16 to an 1/8 in deep. I parked the car in the garage where I thought it would be the closest to level, marked the spots where the tires touched the floor, backed the car out and used a 6 ft carpenter's level set on two small 3/8 drive sockets to see how many asphalt floor tiles needed to be used to bring the low side up to the height of the high side. I used one tile on the high side to set the baseline and it took 3 tiles to bring the low side up to the same level. Then I spray painted a line around the outside of each set of tiles to mark where I had to put the car when doing an alignment.

Biggest issue with doing your own alignment is raising and lowering the car. Everytime I made an adjustment I would jack the car up, change a cam or remove a wheel to change the shims and then lower the car followed by driving it around the block to settle the suspension, then remeasuring and so on until I had it set. It usually took me about 3 hours of which most of the time spent was raising/lowering/parking/driving around the block.

Bill

 

I always remove/replace an equal amount of washers - 3 from each bolt up front, and 2 from each one in the rear.

By front I mean the entire front wheel upper A-arm, and by rear I mean rear suspension. The C6 Z06 has the same dogbone mounts for both the front wheel and the rear wheel upper arms.

I've never even measured caster, but I guess I should - it's easy enough using David's method of turning the steering wheel 1/2 turn right of center and 1/2 turn left of center and measuring camber change and multiplying by 2.62 to get caster.

Even though I don't care, I probably should know what I'm dealing with - and then I'll probably feel some need to square up the car, corner weight it, go back to Hoosiers, start measuring tread temps, etc., etc., etc.!!!!

Geez - one thing always leads to another!!!!

Bob

 

As Emily Litella would say, "Never mind."

 

Great tips in the rest of that post Bob!

I did what he said above. My Z06 I ran with street tires and drove to track, so I had an aggressive alignment that turned out not to wear the tires too badly. My C4 track car with track tires was trailered, so it was pretty radical, but even when I returned it to street use, tire wear wasn't bad.

I never had the ***** to do all of the setup myself - I'd just take the car to my tire shop and give them the specs. Although I did tweak toe a bit, just by feel (we don't need no stinkin' string!).

 

I had every intention on bringing it to an reputable alignment shop but after ciphering on the total cost involved ($140 to setup for track, another $140 to return to street specs), I couldn't justify NOT trying it myself. Whats the worst than can happen? I mess up, can't figure out how to fix it, and take it to a pro anyway? I'm only $60 in tools (digital level, aluminum square tubing, floor tiles) and I will most certainly learn something along the way even if I can't get what I want.

I'm a firm believer in buying the tools to do the job yourself rather than pay somebody even more money...

 

That is a great plan.

I have been doing that since my first car 40 years ago. I took it to a dealer for service and later that day I was with a friend across town and saw my car running parts for the dealer at a parts store. ( I took it back from the parts store and then went to the dealer in my friend's car to ask if my car was done.)

Buying the tools has been a great way of learning about the cars, getting the jobs done right, and saving a lot of money too.