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  #11  
Old 05-08-2021, 11:54 AM
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As long as your tire wear is not a problem, I'd say you have nothing to worry about, but if you want to think more about the alignment ...

---------

Nice pics! They look a whole lot nicer than what I found in my car, posted in the link above. Those are from the nut side, so hopefully the bolt side (forward side of the swing arm) look equally good.

The first thing I notice is that the third pic (left side) is not adjusted to its full travel. At full adjustment, you'd have the center of the bolt pushed a little further to the right, and the eccentric washer would be symmetric top to bottom. So that means just by adjusting that bolt you could reduce your left camber a little.

But why didn't they do that? Well the printout shows -2*38' left and -2*55' right (2.63* and 2.92* vs. the 1.83* spec). So maybe since the right side was out, they did not want to fully correct the left side since it would create too much of a cross-camber between left and right.

And BTW, cross-camber is one of the few things in an alignment you'd actually notice from the driver's seat - the car would pull to one side. When my car had its ball joints, etc. issues it still drove perfectly. Tight, straight, etc. My only issue that I noticed was tire wear, and I think that situation (suspension / alignment issues / accelerated tire wear, yet it drives great) is common with these cars.

But when I looked again at the printout, I see that the "before" rear camber numbers were closer to spec than the "after" ones. So the alignment process made camber worse. I know the guide links back there were adjusted to correct rear toe, but the effect of those on camber is pretty minimal, so ???

Also, I see the right side one has a flattened bottom, as if the car was once jacked from that point, but not a problem.

In general, as I think I mentioned in that other thread I linked, deciphering things now as you are doing is a tougher problem than doing it yourself since you need to try to figure out the why and what was done by the pros.

I have a Klein Tools 935DAG digital angle gauge

https://www.kleintools.com/catalog/l...auge-and-level

that gives very repeatable measurements (sub 0.1 degree), and can be easily calibrated. A straight edge (I used an 18" bubble level) laid vertically against the rim edges with the DAG on it gives a very accurate camber measurement. Your top pic shown in the parking structure looks like you have a flat place to park. You could measure the slope of the floor, correct that out, and quickly do some measurements to confirm what's going on. But that's just what I'd do ...
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  #12  
Old 05-08-2021, 09:53 PM
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Quote:
Originally Posted by oldskewel View Post
As long as your tire wear is not a problem, I'd say you have nothing to worry about, but if you want to think more about the alignment ...

---------

Nice pics! They look a whole lot nicer than what I found in my car, posted in the link above. Those are from the nut side, so hopefully the bolt side (forward side of the swing arm) look equally good.

The first thing I notice is that the third pic (left side) is not adjusted to its full travel. At full adjustment, you'd have the center of the bolt pushed a little further to the right, and the eccentric washer would be symmetric top to bottom. So that means just by adjusting that bolt you could reduce your left camber a little.

But why didn't they do that? Well the printout shows -2*38' left and -2*55' right (2.63* and 2.92* vs. the 1.83* spec). So maybe since the right side was out, they did not want to fully correct the left side since it would create too much of a cross-camber between left and right.

And BTW, cross-camber is one of the few things in an alignment you'd actually notice from the driver's seat - the car would pull to one side. When my car had its ball joints, etc. issues it still drove perfectly. Tight, straight, etc. My only issue that I noticed was tire wear, and I think that situation (suspension / alignment issues / accelerated tire wear, yet it drives great) is common with these cars.

But when I looked again at the printout, I see that the "before" rear camber numbers were closer to spec than the "after" ones. So the alignment process made camber worse. I know the guide links back there were adjusted to correct rear toe, but the effect of those on camber is pretty minimal, so ???

Also, I see the right side one has a flattened bottom, as if the car was once jacked from that point, but not a problem.

In general, as I think I mentioned in that other thread I linked, deciphering things now as you are doing is a tougher problem than doing it yourself since you need to try to figure out the why and what was done by the pros.

I have a Klein Tools 935DAG digital angle gauge

https://www.kleintools.com/catalog/l...auge-and-level

that gives very repeatable measurements (sub 0.1 degree), and can be easily calibrated. A straight edge (I used an 18" bubble level) laid vertically against the rim edges with the DAG on it gives a very accurate camber measurement. Your top pic shown in the parking structure looks like you have a flat place to park. You could measure the slope of the floor, correct that out, and quickly do some measurements to confirm what's going on. But that's just what I'd do ...
Thanks for the heads-up about the camber being closer to spec before the alignment. I didn't notice that until now. I'll call them on Monday.
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