So I'm at the point where I'm working on lowering my car. I don't want to slam it just lower it so it doesn't look like an 4wd off-roading ek, ek owners probably know what i'm talking about. Right now the car is sitting like 4 inches off the wheel and I can stick my hand in there perfectly vertically. I just want to bring it down to almost half that to even out the gap between the wheel and fender all the way around.
Question #1: Lowering my car will have camber issues and I've searched and read about using washers for the rear. I don't care if I get a tiny bit of camber, so how many or thick of washer do you suggest or used? Or is that a waste and I should just get adjustable rear camber kit.
Question #2: I'm getting a adjustable uca for the front. Is it easy to do it yourself or take it to a shop.
Question #3: How much have you paid for your 4 wheel alignment.

 

Camber will not wear out your tires very noticeably. It is TOE that will wear out your tires very rapidly on the inside edge. 4 wheel alignments cost anywhere between 45-100 dollars. If you take a lowered car into a place, usually they will get you a "specialty" alignment for $100, this holds very true if you have an aftermarket camber kit.

Camber kits are a waste of money if all you're going to do is correct your camber for tire wear. Again, camber doesnt cause tire wear really. There will be a tiny bit of wear from camber but NOTHING close to what toe does. When you lower a car, and everyone says "camber wear" , they're actually talking about toe wear. When you change camber angles, toe changes as well. You can reset toe without buying any parts. For the front, the alignment shop just adjust the tie rods, and the rear, they adjust the toe link.

Not getting/installing camber modifiers will get you money saved in two ways:

1.) you save money by not buying the part (duh)
2.) If you go into an alignment shop and ask nicely to just be charged for the standard alignment since all you really need adjusted is the toe, then they charge you less for the alignment.

If you do end up installing camber arms, have them dialed in at a shop. Even if your camber "looks" right, the slightest change in camber will affect toe. A slight amount of toe incorrectness will chew up tires, thus defeating your purchase of camber arms.


My tires always wore even....but i cornered pretty hard all the time and did roadrace the car. So camber actually HELPED wear tires even. But if you're lowering a car, its usually so you can corner harder anyway, right? Negative camber (to a certain point) will help your car corner harder.
How much are you lowering your car? look at my old hatchbox's drop and camber angles. The car always wore thru tires almost COMPLETELY even:

 

i dont know about that guy ^ but i have a the skunk2 camber kit up front and did the rear washer trick in the rear. No camber wear for 2 years what so ever...i've heard too many stories of people lowering there cars and having wear on there tires and complaining about it. Like he ^ said you may not need a camber kit and get away with a alignment but thats if your dropped mildly...i mean mild...just spend the money on a front camber kit and do the washer trick in the rear, it works great, and your wallet will be alot happier

 

B serious's old car look so much like mine. cept i have a ctr spoiler and waiting on the lip. As for how low compared to the pic, I'm not looking to go that low, but almost there. I'm riding on some kumhos ecsta that I accidently ordered in the wrong size, it's actually the right size for the y7 vss and 96 hatch, but I don't care if I wear through these tires and get new ones and in a higher profile. just a sidenote, I found out only in 96 did hatches come with 13" and all others above come in 14".

So I guess I'll do the washer trick for the rear and hold off on the camber kit for now and just get toe done if I see major wear in a short period of time. How many washers did you guys use and how low is your car?

 

<TABLE WIDTH="90%" CELLSPACING=0 CELLPADDING=0 ALIGN=CENTER><TR><TD>Quote, originally posted by eh2: &raquo;</TD></TR><TR><TD CLASS="quote">When you lower your car sometimes the camber can be different at all four wheels... when i took my car in for an alignment, all my camber angles were uneven. I am ordering a F/R camber kit as i speak so i can have the alignment shop make all the camber specs. even. So for thosse who just say "slam it, and get the toe within spec." dont know expletive. Do it right the first time and get the car even (camber wise) on all four corners.

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well...why was your camber off like that? It shouldnt be off from corner to corner by very much unless your car was in an accident, or you have other problems. Or if you didnt lower your car evenly.

 

<TABLE WIDTH="90%" CELLSPACING=0 CELLPADDING=0 ALIGN=CENTER><TR><TD>Quote, originally posted by bmoua &raquo;</TD></TR><TR><TD CLASS="quote">i dont know about that guy ^ but i have a the skunk2 camber kit up front and did the rear washer trick in the rear. No camber wear for 2 years what so ever...i've heard too many stories of people lowering there cars and having wear on there tires and complaining about it. Like he ^ said you may not need a camber kit and get away with a alignment but thats if your dropped mildly...i mean mild...just spend the money on a front camber kit and do the washer trick in the rear, it works great, and your wallet will be alot happier</TD></TR></TABLE>

Camber is an alignment angle. If your car has adjustable camber, it is part of an alignment.

Camber barely wears tires unless youre only driving in a straight line or doing burn outs.

Camber kits are good if you want to drag race and you want a square contact patch.

Just because you keep describing it as "camber wear" doesnt make it "camber wear". Thats a common misconception. People can visually see that the camber is out so they call it "camber wear", even though it should really be called toe wear. If camber wears out your tires (it does...a tiny bit like i said), there will be a SLIGHT difference in tread from inside to outside in a much more gentle rise than what you usually see.

If you're seeing just about an inch or so of the inner of the tire completely gone, and the rest of the tire in relatively good shape...then its toe...NOT camber. Unless you have something like -10 degrees of camber...which trust me....would be the result of a broken control arm or something, and the car would be un-driveable.

 

well B serious is right.. it is not camber that eats your tires, its toe.. so when you lower your car, dont bother buying a camber kit, waste of money IMO.. head over to a shop and tell them you want your front toe adjusted and that will fix it all... you can do it yourself if you'd like.. pretty simple, there is a link somewhere on the site that will guide you the right way..

 

Completely agree with everything B Serious has said. I've had my Falken Azenis on my hatch lowered 2-2.5 inches for 1.5 years and have just gotten alignments everytime I messed with suspension with NO CAMBER KIT of any kind(no washers, nothing). Still have the tires till this day with about 60% tread left with even wear.

Bad toe is what kills tires.

 

Here's my experience with this situation. Im not saying anyone here is wrong, but i had my Eg coupe lowered for two years and every 6 months id have to change the tires due to the insides getting worn out quickly. I bought a progress front camber kit and noticed a huge difference in tire ware on my front tires after i put the kit on, they were definatley wearing out more evenly after i put the kit on. I still havent gotten the car alligned at a shop yet, so i dont know what my TOE situation is, but my front tires dont ware like they did when i had the car just lowered. Where you drive your car will be a factor, however, in response to B serious... "if you drive straight lines or do a lot of burnouts" Honestly, even though most of us would love to live in a dream world of nothing but curvey roads, most of a persons time spent driving on the streets of thier town are spent in straight lines. Get a camber kit, get the car alligned and have your toe checked. I mean c'mon, my progress kit only cost me a hundered bucks and DID make a very noticable difference, get the kit, put it on, and get your car checked out, its the best of both worlds, i mean they dont make them for no reason! Check out progress's angle diagrams on how camber affects your car, its all makes sense to me. thats my two cents on this situation.

 

<TABLE WIDTH="90%" CELLSPACING=0 CELLPADDING=0 ALIGN=CENTER><TR><TD>Quote, originally posted by daluv &raquo;</TD></TR><TR><TD CLASS="quote">Here's my experience with this situation. Im not saying anyone here is wrong, but i had my Eg coupe lowered for two years and every 6 months id have to change the tires due to the insides getting worn out quickly. I bought a progress front camber kit and noticed a huge difference in tire ware on my front tires after i put the kit on, they were definatley wearing out more evenly after i put the kit on. I still havent gotten the car alligned at a shop yet, so i dont know what my TOE situation is, but my front tires dont ware like they did when i had the car just lowered. Where you drive your car will be a factor, however, in response to B serious... "if you drive straight lines or do a lot of burnouts" Honestly, even though most of us would love to live in a dream world of nothing but curvey roads, most of a persons time spent driving on the streets of thier town are spent in straight lines. Get a camber kit, get the car alligned and have your toe checked. I mean c'mon, my progress kit only cost me a hundered bucks and DID make a very noticable difference, get the kit, put it on, and get your car checked out, its the best of both worlds, i mean they dont make them for no reason! Check out progress's angle diagrams on how camber affects your car, its all makes sense to me. thats my two cents on this situation. </TD></TR></TABLE>

Well, when you put your camber back in spec, toe also goes back in spec. Toe moves as camber moves. But you can move toe without moving camber.

Here's my point in a nutshell:

Even if you set your camber to -3 or -4 degrees: Set to toe to factory. You will BARELY get any inside edge wear.

Now even if you set your camber to factory specs, and set your toe out to the amount it would be out if you lowered the car. Lets say 1/4'' or so. You'll need new tires in a few months because there will be wear on the inside of them.


<TABLE WIDTH="90%" CELLSPACING=0 CELLPADDING=0 ALIGN=CENTER><TR><TD>Quote, originally posted by eh2: &raquo;</TD></TR><TR><TD CLASS="quote">

i have some lowering springs that give the car an even drop... i will show you my alignment spec. print out. and NO the car has never never been in a wreck?... let me ask you a question, were all of your camber angles within spec. of eachother when you got the alignment? or are you just assuming so... For me however, i prefer adjustable camber kits for fine tuning the suspension.

Modified by eh2: at 10:53 AM 3/28/2007</TD></TR></TABLE>


I can see your point and i do agree with you that rarely camber is out of spec on one corner for no reason. But...why wouldnt you just wait to buy a camber kit after you find out that your camber is whacked out in one corner vs. all the others. Alignment CHECKS are free. So lower the car, and have it checked...if the camber varies by a lot (a degree or more), then get a camber kit or whatever. Then go back and have it all aligned. Takes more time but could save you $$.

Your problem is that one corner of that car probably weighs more...so it sits lower. Im sure its common with springs, but usually its negligible.

If my camber was out on a car with coilovers, I'd just adjust the ride height slightly or have the car corner balanced (if i had the $$). This would, instead, add performance over the camber kit.