elripster

The pictures are huge, I'm working on shrinking them......

So quite a while back I had my truck aligned at a shop. I pointed out my drivers side tire had positive camber, they pointed out it was in spec, I said it was obvious to the eye, they said the numbers are green not red so must be good..etc... this went back and forth, I left the shop with a truck that didn't really drive right but then I knock the alignment out all the time so what is "right". Further inspection revealed the cross caster was set such that each wheel was on opposing ends of the adjustment window. This makes for quicky steering.

Fastforward to a few months ago when our shop tech and myself aligned this car.



Since it's a one off there isn't really a spec. He used a method which has worked well for him on a lot of exotic sports car and race cars he's worked on in the past and present. This process worked great on the Engima which requires all 4 wheels to be aligned. It worked superbly on my truck which only requires the front wheels. In fact, this is be best alignment it has ever had.

Things to know. Toyota has the front wheels aligned square to the rears as opposed to specifying a toe in. I could be wrong but I've been told this many times by alignment shops. That's what I did here with outstanding results.

Toe in/out: Wheels pointing towards (in) or away (out) from one another.

Camber: Looking at the truck head on, positive camber is where the wheels lean outwards, negative is inwards.

Caster: This is the rake of the wheel spindles. It should be such that they lean back like the forks on a motorcycle. (If I'm wrong, chime in, but I'm pretty sure this is how it goes) Caster is a funny spec. What matters is the spindles rake back some and close to the same amount. Many trucks, all prerunners, etc... don't have a prayer of "in spec" caster. The shop just doesn't tell you this. It totally depends on how the truck sits and other things. Some trucks sit such that their caster is a slam dunk. Either way, trucks drive fine as long as the cross caster is close. To drive it home, you load up the back, the caster goes out. Does the truck steer poorly? Nope.

Prior to my home grown alignment, the driver's side caster was good, the passenger side was way wrong, leaning forward.(passenger tire closer to the firewall)

Here is the order of steps I followed.

1. Pull the truck straight into a flat surface, turn off the truck and pull the key so the steering wheel locks straight.

2. Check the camber with a right angle like this.



If it is not vertical, loosen the cams and adjust them inwards or outwards. NOTE: You want the rear bolts to point outwards and the fronts to be more inwards. This brings the caster into where it should be while increasing firewall clearance. You will likely have to roll the truck back and forth to allow the tires to relax as pushing out the rim will flex the sidewalls a bit making it hard to align to the square.

3. Tape a string to the front wheel and walk with it to the rear of the truck. Measure against the front and rear outter surfaces of the rear wheel. The string should be the same distance indicating the front wheel is are pointing the same direction as the rear. If it isn't, loosen the adjuster on the tie rod and tweak it until the front wheel is straight. You can use a small ruler and easily get to where the distance between the front of the rear wheel and back side surfaces within .125". (1/8) At that difference, the front wheel is toed in/out a whopping .25 of a degree. That's nuttin'. If you wanna be anal, you can get it spot on.





Repeat these steps periodically rolling the truck back and forth to releive tension on the tires if you have pushed the camber in or out.

Unless you have bent the daylights out of your front bracketry, the two front cam bolts should point inwards while the rears outwards roughly the same amount. If one is vastly different and your camber/toe is looking good, you probably have bent something. However, if that is so, that bent something should be obvious to the eye.

I think I spent about an hour and could do it way faster a second time. It was totally worth the effort to save the dough. I'm thinking of adding this to the spacer install instructions it worked so well.

Good luck.

Frank

ovrrdrive

Pics are gone now... Any chance of bringing them back?

I'm going to do this to my truck tomorrow. I just did my lift and need to get close to spec so I can take it in and get it aligned. I don't think I trust myself enough to do it all on my own, but if I can at least get it close I can drive it in instead of having it towed.

Thanks in advance.

Mason Dixon

http://www.sdori.com/SDORI_Alignment.htm