Well, there have been a few posts regarding alignements and I was hoping to get a final word on whether camber is at all adjustable when doing an alignment.

I recently installed my Eibach Pro-Kit and Tokico Blues as well as my B16a, which has added further weight to the front. My Kumho tires were brand new back in October, never rotated. The steel belts are showing through on the inside of the tires now after only 6 weeks of moderate driving since the installation of springs/shocks/engine. Inside half of the front tires are totally gone, no tread visible, steel belts showing on insided. The outside half is very worn but still showing maybe 20% tread left.

I'm by no means pissed off that they are bald already, I realize that with the lowering and heavier engine it will result in premature tire wear. Not to mention the increased speeds I'm acclerating at with the B16! I just want to avoid the same thing with my brand new Potenza S-03's!! So, when I get an alignment, should I get a camber kit for the fronts? The rear tires have no wear issues yet and look fine, no visible camber problem. The fronts on the other hand, are clearly tilting inward at the top of the wheel.

So, when I get the tires mounted and balanced to my K1's, and I get an alignment, will that solve my camber issues? I'm dropped 1.25" up front and 1.00" in the rear. Daily driven car and expensive Potenza tires mean I can't afford premature tire wear!!

 

if after only 6 weeks your tires are shot, you have more than camber problems, your toe is seriously screwed too, i have -2.5 deg. camber all around and i have had my tires for over 20k mi,(kumho also) and have mor than 30% tread left,

toe is more damaging to tires than camber is, oyu should always get an alignment if you change the ride height, or get different size(height) tires

 

prokits should not cause camber issues at all if installed correctly, and the weight of a b16 is not an issue. somethings screwed with your alignment, get it checked. if youre camber is indeed screwed up for some other reason, yeah, youll need to get a camber kit, but likely its your toe. easily adjusted.

 

I would recommend you getting a camber kit. My car is only lowered 1" all around, and I benefited from one. Make sure you get an alignment after any adjustment to your suspension.

 

sounds exactly like my car,
turned out my toe was way stumped

toe was out -1.86

and the camber was off 1.5

 

<TABLE WIDTH="90%" CELLSPACING=0 CELLPADDING=0 ALIGN=CENTER><TR><TD>Quote, originally posted by SeaBass &raquo;</TD></TR><TR><TD CLASS="quote">So, when I get the tires mounted and balanced to my K1's, and I get an alignment, will that solve my camber issues? I'm dropped 1.25" up front and 1.00" in the rear. Daily driven car and expensive Potenza tires mean I can't afford premature tire wear</TD></TR></TABLE>

Lowering 1.25" is not going to cause camber issues. You'll be lucky to have -1 deg. camber in the front! That is not causing your tire wear issues. Your toe is likely very f***ed up. Don't waste the money on a camber kit, which is not necessary at all.

In addition, if you noticed your tires were wearing so badly, why didn't you rotate them? You probably could have gotten quite a few more miles out of them if they'd of been rotated.

 

then he would have to replace 4 tires instead of 2

 

Dude, with the car being lowered it's harder to see the inside half of the tread. As I mentioned, the outside half still has plenty of tread left, it's very low but not completely bald like the inside. Again, I didn't realize the tires would wear this quickly as the car hasn't been driven too much since the installs.

Sure, I should have checked but that's my excuse and I'm sticking to it

So toe angle is fucked, huh? Okay, cool. I didn't think it was camber but hey, you never know.

Thx for the replies. BTW - is camber adjustable at all when doing an alignment?

 

<TABLE WIDTH="90%" CELLSPACING=0 CELLPADDING=0 ALIGN=CENTER><TR><TD>Quote, originally posted by SeaBass &raquo;</TD></TR><TR><TD CLASS="quote"> BTW - is camber adjustable at all when doing an alignment? </TD></TR></TABLE>

not unless you have a camber kit. you can get them for 135 shipped (for the front) from ardperformance, takes about an hour to install, and then when u go for the alignment they can adjust it. im happy with my camber kit, it improved the way my car feels on the road and the tires arent lasting a week.

 

If your toe is off really bad and you dont want to spend the money to get it aligned you can adjust it yourself, its easy I did mines after i replaced the tie rods because i didn't have time to get it aligned right away.

1)Get a long piece of wood or something that is long and straight so you can line it up against your wheel to measure it and also find someone to help you hold the stick.

2) You dont have to jack the car up that high, just enough to take the rim off. After you get the rim off you have to loosed one of the nuts on the tie rod. After you do that you can use a wrench to turn the rod to adjust the toe. You might want to have the toe very slightly in, toe out makes your car pull.

3) Make sure you take it to a shop to get it aligned becuase this is just temporary to get is close to straight. If your toe is really off your tires will eat away mad fast.

oh and you should get a camber kit for the front, your rear shouldnt need one if its not a big drop.

 

How do my teg axles affect the alignment? Because the back tires look fine after the drop but the front wheels have really ******* bad camber.

Will shops not do an alignment on my car?

 

Bad toe on the S-03's tears them up FAST. This was 1200 miles on my brand new S-03's before I knew how bad it really was. Check out the wear angle on the tread. Outside still looked NEW.

http://www.imagestation.com/pi...g.jpg

 

Toe, toe, toe. It's always toe. I have friends that are too cheap to get an alignment ($30), instead they get to buy new tires all the time (+$200). Really doesn't make sense.

I've had my car lowered for 5+ years, with AT LEAST -2 camber front and back and have had NO problems with tire wear. That's with a couple of track days and almost weekly autocrossing.

Align it once and forget about it. It's a money save fer sure.

Later, Overkll

 

Damn bro, that sucks the S-03's ain't cheap!

Well, I'm mos def getting an alignment so I'll see how the tire wear is. Unfortunately, I'd rather test them out with cheaper tires... Oh well.

 

Hey, I just spoke with my local tire shop and they kinda gave me **** about doing an alignment on a lowered car. Like, he said 'Well, we try to get it back to factory specs...' etc and then he said something how they won't guarantee it will be correct.

Anyway, what can I honestly expect from this alignment? Is this something I need to get used to with lowered cars (excessive tire wear)?

Plus, how long should it take them to do the alignment because he said they "don't do alignments on weekends" so I need to take off work and thus I won't have a ride home, so I'll have to wait there. All they are doing is the alignment, not mounting/balancing my new tires.

 

<TABLE WIDTH="90%" CELLSPACING=0 CELLPADDING=0 ALIGN=CENTER><TR><TD>Quote, originally posted by Overkll &raquo;</TD></TR><TR><TD CLASS="quote">Toe, toe, toe. It's always toe. I have friends that are too cheap to get an alignment ($30), instead they get to buy new tires all the time (+$200). Really doesn't make sense.

I've had my car lowered for 5+ years, with AT LEAST -2 camber front and back and have had NO problems with tire wear. That's with a couple of track days and almost weekly autocrossing.

Align it once and forget about it. It's a money save fer sure.

Later, Overkll</TD></TR></TABLE>

dude, what camber kit are you using? i'm thinking of getting the spc camber kit, but since i might autocross the car, i want something that's not going to have any negative effects on suspension travel!

 

SOOOOOO basically we, those people that have changed anything suspension wise(in my case my tie rod end, my car is pulling to the left now) I should just get it aligned at a shop....but for 30 bux? WHERE?

 

<TABLE WIDTH="90%" CELLSPACING=0 CELLPADDING=0 ALIGN=CENTER><TR><TD>Quote, originally posted by PSUCRX &raquo;</TD></TR><TR><TD CLASS="quote">SOOOOOO basically we, those people that have changed anything suspension wise(in my case my tie rod end, my car is pulling to the left now) I should just get it aligned at a shop....but for 30 bux? WHERE?</TD></TR></TABLE>

YES

 

well I just jacked up both sides, and got underneath it, and counted threads on each tie rod...worked out fine, now my car isn't pulling anymore...

 

<TABLE WIDTH="90%" CELLSPACING=0 CELLPADDING=0 ALIGN=CENTER><TR><TD>Quote, originally posted by Overkll &raquo;</TD></TR><TR><TD CLASS="quote">Toe, toe, toe. It's always toe. I have friends that are too cheap to get an alignment ($30), instead they get to buy new tires all the time (+$200). Really doesn't make sense.
Later, Overkll</TD></TR></TABLE>

Dayam, alignments cost $60 over here where I live.