Wheel alignment at home

[kambites]

General Madness said:

I have found a company in Edinburgh who sell tube and tube clamp fittings. I am heading to see them this afternoon as I have looked through their catalogue and it seems they have the suitable fittings. Bonus is they are all allen key adjusters.

Keep us updated on how you get on. I've been thinking of doing this myself for a while (when I finally finish rebuilding the garage) so if you find a good source of bits, that'd be useful to know.

[richwig83]

35-70 for full alignment. Corner weight is a waste of money for most peoples usage.

[kambites]

richwig83 said:

35-70 for full alignment. Corner weight is a waste of money for most peoples usage.

Maybe, but people on here aren't (or at least like to think they aren't) "most people".

Last time I had it done (corner-weighted camber, toe and caster adjustment) I think I paid about £120, plus a good 30 quid in petrol to get to the place and it was by far the best money I've ever spent on my car. It really needs doing again now, and I'll almost certainly do it myself as part of a full suspension rebuild.

[General Madness]

kambites said:

General Madness said:

I have found a company in Edinburgh who sell tube and tube clamp fittings. I am heading to see them this afternoon as I have looked through their catalogue and it seems they have the suitable fittings. Bonus is they are all allen key adjusters.

Keep us updated on how you get on. I've been thinking of doing this myself for a while (when I finally finish rebuilding the garage) so if you find a good source of bits, that'd be useful to know.

I will do mate, Thanks for your advice.

[bitwrx]

General Madness said:

Very true, will have a look for something like that.

When I lower my 306 off a jack at the front it never settles back to the same height. The wheels visibly lean out due to geo change as a result of the height. I guess trying to do any alignment in this state would be a non starter.

[General Madness]

bitwrx said:

General Madness said:

Very true, will have a look for something like that.

When I lower my 306 off a jack at the front it never settles back to the same height. The wheels visibly lean out due to geo change as a result of the height. I guess trying to do any alignment in this state would be a non starter.

You are correct, however if you roll the car backwards or forwards then the wheels should settle nicely.

[CrutyRammers]

General Madness said:

Any ideas where I could source the box section and joints?

Try ebay. Loads of metal sellers on there.

[Prizam]

Making my own 4 wheel rig at the moment.

Got hold of a cheep front wheel alignment tool from ebay and going to bolt on some lasers and make my own rear flags for the rear.

Should be a good 4 wheel system.

I have used string in the past, and it is good. But when working on the floor it can be easily knocked, and then you need to start all over again.

[The Wookie]

kambites said:

Slidingpillar said:

Unless the car has zero bump steer, any attempt to set tracking while jacked up will not be successful.

He was talking about lifting the car up, but with the support on the unsprung components (such as the rear beam) which should work fine.

If the OP is planning to do it this way then he'd be wise to measure the trim height (wheel centre to lip of wheelarch directly above, preferably marked with a sticker).

Personally, with the amount of bump steer built into many cars (Lotus tend to use a fair bit in fact) I would only ever do it at rideheight and loaded to the correct conditions. It's not unheard of to have over 25 degrees per meter of wheel travel which doesn't take huge variations in rideheight to render toe setting tolerance bands useless.

[shtu]

General Madness said:

Nearest Aalco is in Glasgow. I am in Edinburgh so that's a no go.

Blake Group in Leith will have\obtain anything you need. They're mostly steel but will have ali.

[Muncher]

I always do mine using a similar method for my VX220, you don't need box section or anything like that, just 2 lengths of wood, a couple of sponges and some masking tape.

EDIT:

Photos of my setup here:

http://muncher.org.uk/geo/

[Paddymcc]

Has anyone tried the devices available on ebay like these:

http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/Gunson-Trakrite-Wheel-Al...

http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/Trackace-Laser-Wheel-Ali...

[Muncher]

Lasers go out of alignment, the tens of thousands of pounds laser kit that was at the ferrari dealership I used to work at never got used because it wasn't accurate, the technicians were always coming out to adjust it but it was junk.

No experience with the drive over one, but I am sceptical. The reason I like the wood and string method is you can check your measurements so you know it is always reading true. I don't like the idea of any kit which you can't verify the reading of yourself.

[The Wookie]

Muncher said:

Lasers go out of alignment, the tens of thousands of pounds laser kit that was at the ferrari dealership I used to work at never got used because it wasn't accurate, the technicians were always coming out to adjust it but it was junk.

No experience with the drive over one, but I am sceptical. The reason I like the wood and string method is you can check your measurements so you know it is always reading true. I don't like the idea of any kit which you can't verify the reading of yourself.

A properly installed and calibrated Hunter on a correct ramp is more or less unbeatable, but from experience there are some things that can upset the results like:

- Industrial heaters that give off a lot of infrared
- Not dropping the ramp onto the right latch at the height where it's been calibrated to
- Leaving a vehicle up on a ramp for an extended period of time (or a heavy vehicle overnight) causing the ramp to sink and go out of calibration
- Not following the correct procedure (like putting a car straight on after jacking it up, which generally applies to any tracking measurement I suppose)

Ours was (and probably still is) completely accurate and repeatable within acceptable tolerance.

On the other hand I've driven plenty of stly strung race cars

[Prizam]

Paddymcc said:

Has anyone tried the devices available on ebay like these:

http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/Gunson-Trakrite-Wheel-Al...

http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/Trackace-Laser-Wheel-Ali...

Both rubbish and exceeding easy to throw out of alignment.