taimysho0

hello i called firestone to get one of those life time alignment packages and they said my car was too low. i recently bought new tires and coilover suspension around november and have not gotten an alignment yet. so i was thinking if i raised my car, and get the alignment at firestone and then lower my car to its current position again, would i need another alignment or would it be okay? basically: do u need an algnment again every time you raise or lower your car? thank!

ckycampmember

i have always heard that everytime you mess with suspension components you should align it.because there is a specific geometry involved in the way all the components work together properly.

but i could be wrong. i got alignments with both of my suspension set-ups.

35r_hatchie

i agree.. ne time you mess with suspension its good to get an alignment...

jdm_1

Well to me, when ever you lower a car your messing up the camber (front and back) so...whats you need is, buy a camber kit for the front and same as the back...

newtron63h

100% no questions, when you do anything with the suspension, you need an alignment. tearing up tires is no fun, been there.

Warhawk

not true at all. Your camber is affected by lowering your vehicle but camber is NOT the reason why your tires wear prematurely, therefore you do NOT need a camber kit.

TOE is what will eat through your tires and you MUST get an alignment every time the ride height of the car is changed, otherwise your toe settings will be out of spec and your tires will disappear an a matter of weeks.

This has been covered about a trillion times in the suspension forum, do a search and you'll see.

batallic

u dont need a camber kit, toe eats tires, and the OP everytime u raise and lower the car u should be gettin an alignment, im learning that right now, toe wear show really fast, but my tires were in need of replacing anyways

jdm_1

so your saying, you don't need a camber kit to bring it straight instead of your wheels inward.. i gree that you need to align' after you lower the car i was just saying that, that's what else he needs..

newtron63h

camber will eat tires too, just not as fast as toe because its not causing the binding. BUT if the car is riding on the inside corner of the tire, it will wear prematurely

Warhawk

yes you do, but negative camber helps improve handling anyway, so why remove it? Unless he's sittin on 5 degrees or something it shouldn't be a problem to roll with negative camber.

I made the mistake of getting a camber kit on my civic and I regret it to this very day. There are many people on honda-tech that have been rolling without camber kits on dropped cars and got very even tire wear as long as their toe was aligned. I will actually be removing it as soon as I need another alignment. First off, my alignments went from $60 to $100+ and when the tech dialed in the settings I ended up with POSITIVE camber, which made a negative effect on handling... to say the least I was not happy. alignment techs hate having to deal with them too, their a pain in the *** and most won't even touch them unless you actually talk to the dude aligning your car.

jdm_1

lololololol.....i was just sayin' ....anyways...s#!^...i got crazy camber on my soarer too....

angel_i

why don't you raise it...lower it on the rack thing...and then raise it up to get it off,...then lower it back when on the ground?

cvcrcr99

Yes, allignment is necessary. I would suggest to get a lifetime allignment from your mechanic or shop. I paid $160 for my lifetime allignment about 3 months ago. I have the car alligned twice so far. (BTW each individual allignment would have costed me about $85-$90).

newtron63h

he already said that since the car is lowered, the shop wont give him the lifetime alignment. thats the whole purpose of the thread

ALLxMOTOR EG

Yes.

toyota999

So adjusting toe in is pretty simple for a diy person.
When you buy new tires they come with a line running around on the tread. Im talking about front end alignment.
On my vw bug which wasn't very heavy in front, on level ground I would roll the car forward a few feet to put "load" on the front tires. Starting with a correct front end that does not have loose ball joints and tie rod ends is important or your just wasting your time
Once rolled forward I set the emergency brake (rear) and 2 people use a steel tape measure and burn 1 foot (that means the guy holding the end of tape that is the beginning of the tape line up the 1 foot mark exactly on the tire line instead of the very end of the tape mark, it is more accurate)
you take measurements between both the 9 o clock and 3 o clock position on the front tires. One would think that both front wheels should be perfectly parallel but that's not good. Every vehicle once it starts moving down the road the front tires have a tendency to tow out. It is the way the road meets the tire tread it wants to split the car down the middle you could say. So, when you push the car forward a few feet on level ground first, you've simulated what the road will do to the front end. Taking this measurement at the 3 and 9 o clock position tells you exactly your rolling toe measurement.
A correct alignment on most cars is a few mm of toe in when rolling. when the car is in forward motion, a couple millimeters toed in your steering is crisp and the wheels stay where you point them. With parallel and toe out, your front end wanders everywhere and you constantly need to correct your steering. Drunk driver syndrome. This worked for me once I understood the way to do it. AND TIRES LASTED A LONG TIME INSTEAD OF 500 MILES AND IT IS DOWN TO METAL CORDS ON THE INSIDE!
Alignment shops will say "no,your cars too low" But what they are thinking is, "This car is going to be a nightmare to align and they will keep coming back blaming me for poor handling" Alignment shops dont need customers that bad to take on liability issues. Nobody woould align my bug and it took me a while to realize what the reason was in not working on modified at home front ends.