Anyone want to recommend some alignment tool brands? I'm liking the smartcamber, but it's $240 with the adapter, a little pricey for me. The $40 RPW caster-camber gauge looks pretty hokey. I need something that will work without a level surface. I'd like to be able to do the toe, but for the price, I'd rather just make my own toe plates.

 

I have a $40 (but free to me since it was a Christmas present!) toe gauge from Eastwood. Works pretty well but I don't think it would work on a car that was slizzammed into the ground. I haven't paid for an alignment in over a year. Go to http://www.eastwood.com and type in "toe" in the keyword search.

Pat

 

hi.

i made my own toe plates out of 10 gauge 304 s/s scrap. put the notches in 'em for the tape measures, and a crease along the bottom for added rigidity. they work great; have aligned 4 different cars; very easy to use and quick, too, especially for use at the track.

oh, and i think that they should last a looooong time!

todd

 

sweet thanks for the ideas i'm deffinitely checking out an eastwood setup. would that work on the rear also?

 

Toe is no problem for me if you check my post I was actually asking about a camber/caster gauge.

 

I have the aluminum RPW (back when it was just RW) DIY camber guage and seem to recall it being about $40. It is a simply aluminum channel with a bubble level and a thumbwheel.

I have had it for years and done a large number of cars with it with good success. As long as you have some expectation that the surface the car is on is relatively flat (a bit of an angle is OK but not crowned), it is accurate to 1/8 degree or less. Works great for me and I have zero intention of replacing it.

 

Hey, I've been doing the strings alignment, but I'm not too happy with how hard it is to measure from the string to the wheel, especially when I have steel wheels. Can anyone recommend something that would make it easier?

 

There was just a thread about this.

I think I'm gonna try this one: http://www.pelicanparts.com/te...n.htm

 

Here is what I did for DIY alignment.

https://honda-tech.com/zerothread?id=597192

It might work for a non level surface, but why not just bring some squares of Masonite or something to level the tires.

In my post, I was using a friend's Smart Camber. I bought this tool which measures both toe and camber (using the same digital level as in the Smart Camber). I think it is much better than anything you could ever build, and only $85.00 for the toe board (too bad, now it is $125). You can add the camber part later when you have more money.





http://www.mktechnologies.com/

 

I built my own castor gauge out of 1" square aluminum tubing and a plum bob. I measure toe with a measuring tape and masking tape.

 

Problem with that toe board is that it only has two point contact with the rim. In order to accurately measure camber, you have to hold it perfectly perpendicular to the rim. So a third point contact point is needed.

This would also help measure toe, but I pretty much use the string as a reference point to level out the board which I hold flat like a table surface, opposite of how I hold it when measuring camber.

Further, the contact points are metal bolts. They slip against the metal rim easily, making it difficult to hold it steady for a reading. Also scratching the rim. On a customers car, that is bad business. They should have used rubber instead.

One of the little rulers peeled off the adhesive on the board when I hung it up against a wall. They also don't look perfectly aligned with the edge of the board.

For these reasons, I dont think the MK board is "special" enough to be worth the cost. You could easily fabricate something yourself, not nearly as pretty, but just as accurate and much cheaper considering that shipping is $40 due to a brokerage fee since MK is in Canada.

I like the Smart Camber gauge, but for $85, I'd rather buy one of those $8 squaring rulers from home depot. Place it on the floor up against the tire, then measure the distance out from the top of the rim and the distance out to it from the bottom of the rim. A little bit of scratching it out on paper I could tell you how to get that into degrees, but I have to hit the shower right quick.

 

You don't need level pavment to do an alignment even tho it helps alot. I pull the wheels off on the end I'm working on and throw a jack under each rotor hat. I try to bring the the car down back to ride height and bounce on it several times to get the suspension settled. Then I put a level on the lower control arm bolts and jack or lower each side until the car is level. This method works pretty good for me with a bubble guage from Speedway. Tho I'm still looking for better tools for toe and a better way to measure it from the center of the car.