Hi... I would like to buy a camber kit for my R, and I am wondering what else do I need to complete the suspension setup. I already have Spoon coilover now. Moreover, do I need to do an aligment after install the camber kit and etc,.. THANK U

 

if you already have the coilovers, i'd suggest a front camber kit for sure. you can cheaply and easily correct the rear camber with a couple of washers and some longer bolts. also, some good, grippy tires woud be helpful (if you don't already have them). after all of this is done, you can fine-tune your suspension with some swaybars if you wish. also, i would definitely recommend an alignment any time you alter the suspension of the car. hope that helps some...

-tony

 

You only need a camber kit if you've lowered your car a lot.

 

or you're like me and want to play with your camber settings.

-tony

 

These are the only 2 readons to change camber really and it seems a lot of people blow money on kits before they even know what their camber is. Why fix something that isn't broken. Tires can run -2 degrees of camber without abnormal wear. Toe is what will ruin a tire quickly.

http://www.spcperformance.com has some camber kit options. My reccomendation is to have your camber checked first.

 

Anytime you a) lower your car, or b) get new rims/tires..... you should realign your car to insure that everything wears evenly.

 

Ditto. This is not to say camber will be affected enough to need adjustment. Camber will only go negative from lowering (without a kit) and if you are less than -2 degrees you don't really need one.

Toe shoudl certainly be adjusted everythime a change is made.

 

I agree with Asahi to a certain extent.

Maybe he is just speaking of Hondas/Acuras in general? But camber DOES wear out tires, NOT QUITE as significant as TOE. Maybe he says that camber does not wear tires on Hondas and Acuras because most of our chassis is light to begin with.

On the otherhand, a heavier car would wear quick, because obviously they are heavy. Mercedes, BMW's, Lexus are cars with common camber readings of -1.0 and more.

IMO, through what Ive seen and deal with everyday, I would rate Toe to be 80% of your tire wear and camber being the remaining 20%.

 

Was referring mostloy to integras and Civics but applies to most Hondas.

And -2 degrees is a general rule I have found to not noticable affect wear prematurely. I have run down plenty of tires on the 4 integras I havbe had and camber has never been an issue. Toe however ruined a set. That being said I have run as much as 1/4" total toe out without too much wear but I woudl not suggest that much toe out for a daily driver.

Good % ratings IMO.

My only real point here is people should know what their camber is before they buy kits to "adjust it" unless your purpose it is to set it to a certain setting. I have camber kits all the way around and I added negative camber to all 4 corners when I got it on the rack.

 

i have a camber kit so that i can run slightly more aggressive camber for track days -- not because i'm worried about tire wear.

-tony

 

First of all you always have to realign your car whenever you change the ride height. When you lower it, you gain toe-out in front (not sure about the rear), and gain negative camber both front and rear.

If you have a camber kit for either "correcting" the camber, or add more negative camber, after change the camber setting, you need to realign the toe again.

An upperarm camber kit with sliding ball joint is a popular piece. When you slide the ball joint in (towards the car) for more negative camber, you gain toe in. When you slide the ball joint out (away from the car) to "correct" the camber, you gain toe out.

Because of the correlations between ride height, camber and toe, IMO the suspension setup sequence should be:
Ride Height Camber Toe
After everything is set, go out and drive around for 5, 10 mins then come back and measure everything again. Usually things would be off a bit. Then repeat the above sequence again (and again if needed) to get the settings as close to what you desire as possible.

HTH