Alignment Specs

[3vilE30]

What are your guys Alignment Specs? I need some agressive alignment settings. Im getting my car aligned soon and need something to go off of. I have camber/caster plates with coilovers and a fully adjusable rear subframe. Its not a dedicated track car and will see some occansonal street use.

[TobyB]

Which tires? Painfully, which size on how wide a rim? Seems to matter for radials...

The best money I spent on alignment was for a cheap tire pyrometer, and beer
for friends who took tire temps in the hot pits...

Seems that -4 camber front and rear's not too much for radials, a little toe- out in
front, a tiny bit of toe- in in back, and as much caster as you can have in front
seems to be a decent starting place. Rake the nose down 1/2" or so, again, to start.

t
at the back of the grid, mind you.

[berlow94]

Which tires? Painfully, which size on how wide a rim? Seems to matter for radials...

The best money I spent on alignment was for a cheap tire pyrometer, and beer
for friends who took tire temps in the hot pits...

Seems that -4 camber front and rear's not too much for radials, a little toe- out in
front, a tiny bit of toe- in in back, and as much caster as you can have in front
seems to be a decent starting place. Rake the nose down 1/2" or so, again, to start.

t
at the back of the grid, mind you.

Agreed on all fronts except for the rake part. Having the car flat or even a little bit nose up gives you a tremendous amount of weight transfer when the brakes are applied.

I also haven't really found any good reason to have more than 3/3.5 degrees of front or rear camber on my car. No noticeable increase in traction by feel or by data. Just heated my tires up and wore them out quicker.

Fully caged, full blueprint S52 (295 to the wheels), GC coilovers with race plates and solid RSM's, 550 springs up front and 800's in the rear, 25F & 22R sway bars, Z3 rack, all solid bushings/bearings, wing with about 300 lb's of downforce at 100 mph (Why i have the car flat instead of slightly nose up).
Manual brakes with custom linkage and dual MC's. Wilwood SL6 front and SL4 rear calipers with 320mm rotors.
Car weighs just under 2400 lb's with me+gas corner balanced.
Im running 235/40r17 Toyo Proxe RR's on 17x8 Apex arc-8's.

[Jb325is]

Agreed with both posters above. Regarding rake, it's very dependent on the driver and shocks/settings. On a soft car, a driver that threshold brakes and gets back to gas really hard does well with some de-rake while someone who is less aggressive on the brakes and rolls in pretty hard does well with some rake. Once you get into good shocks the weight transfer is dealt with by making comp/reb adjustments front to rear.

OP, your car sounds like a street car. 2-2.5* max front camber, zero toe front and a hair of toe in rear

Berlow, your car sounds pretty fun!

[TobyB]

Yeah, agreed about the rake- it made more difference than I expected, and
to start, the half- inch was rather educational.

As to camber, it seems to be tire/rim dependent- if you have a wider rim, it hurts,
but running the 7's with a 225, the temps and lap times seem to agree with more...

t

[3vilE30]

Totally forgot about this thread, on my way to the alignment shop literally the first 10 miles on the refreshed suspension/brakes the pressure plate fingers demolished the clutch. So I was bummed about that. But hey now I can rip it with the new clutch and not worry about it blowing up! I went with a south bend daily clutch basically a little stronger than oem with rhd engineering's 7lbs flywheel.


I should have been more specific about the suspension
I have a full GC kit 550 f 800 r
21mm vert bar with spherical m3 end links and a 14.5mm e30 m3 rear bar
75d bushings where applicable
M3 offset cab
And welded on rear camber toe kit
With 225/45/16 on 16x7.5 wheels
Zhp rack with e46 inners and e36 outers
Debating on star specs or r888's ill probably get the star specs and move up to the r888's when I've developed a feel for the car.

I'm settling on -2.5 front -2 rear max caster
0 toe up front if I can with the tie rod set up and a touch of toe in the rear

[TobyB]

Star Spec is a good idea, I think.

GC likes a stiff rear spring. Don't be afraid to soften it
(by #100 or more) IF you find that the car is too tail- happy.

You may find that you are pretty sensitive to camber with rims that wide
and tires that short, so likewise, don't be afraid to play with camber in 1/2- degree
increments. The $30 bubble camber gauge is a real asset if you are careful to
level your car first.

Good luck!
t