Setting up 4 wheel alignment/camber?

[caduceus]

My wishbones, ball joints have been off the car, etc. How do you set up the correct camber and align? Is it off the floor, wheels off, and some fancy magnetic spirit level that sticks to the brake discs?

Thanks
Cad

[phazed]

When I stripped mine down completely and renewed all the bushes I assembled it and set everything up by eye.

I then trundled the hundred mile plus to Mat Smith who set up the whole car .

Apparently, all my settings weren't 1,000,000 miles out and the car fell perfectly good enough for the drive to his workshop.

[Classic Chim]

caduceus said:

My wishbones, ball joints have been off the car, etc. How do you set up the correct camber and align? Is it off the floor, wheels off, and some fancy magnetic spirit level that sticks to the brake discs?

Thanks
Cad

Very difficult. You’ll need to get the car level and flat first. ( not easy if it’s jacked up. )

Do your wishbones show signs of wear where the washers crush into them as that might be a guide.

I’d set top ball joints almost all the way out so if anything would give positive camber then drop the car, bounce and drive it back and forth until suspension settles then use your spirit level on your wheels. If your lucky it will be about virtical so little camber at all then go get the geo set.
up. If your rears are still set to standard 1/2 3/4 degree camber you can look along the body of the car from front to back and using the rear wheel for reference see where the fronts are in relation.

[TV8]

One of the best things I saw in the various old car race meeting I attended this year was watching some old school mechanics setting up a car with string.

[phazed]

That's exactly what I did with mine before I had the four wheel alignment done.

I used to set up my motorbikes like this all the time.

[Classic Chim]

TV8 said:

One of the best things I saw in the various old car race meeting I attended this year was watching some old school mechanics setting up a car with string.

Perfect for 4 wheel alignment but not much good for camber.
This is where you need a very accurate spirit level or one of the old Dunlop camber gauges which is just another spirit level really.
And a flat floor.

[Classic Chim]

What you see here is actually quite simple.
Using fuel tanks isn’t the best for accuracy I’d have thought.
The idea here is you run two strings either side of the car in line with the centre hubs. Using steel rulers you then centre the car between these two strings and the hubs.
If you’ve done it before you will have some reference measurements so does not take long.
Then you can measure tow in/out by using your rulers on the wheel edges. Toe out suggests a smaller gap at the front edge compared to the back edge of each wheel.

You can get mounting contraptions made up so you don’t have to use fuel tanks, this way you can raise the car up for adjustement and the strings stay put and in line with hubs.

I made some marks on the car and using the steel bars either end you simply move them left or right to centre the stings accurately.

In racing you often bang wheels so this is why you see this happening quite often.
In the series my mate raced, a low powered formula required neutral toe in/ out so you didn’t drag and loose speed on the straights so I was doing this sometimes 3 or 4 times a weekend,,,
I often did other drivers cars if they never had the know how,,, much to my mates disgust,,, but then I’d usually point out how he’d hit the guy causing the problem!
I don’t believe in knocking people off!

I made a lot of friends

[Classic Chim]

We tended to corner weight the car first using scales and ride height adjustment to get the best crossweight with fuel and driver in the car then do the alighnment and camber adjustement last.
At Donnington for the last meeting of the season in 2015 we went testing on the Wednesday before the race meeting and I studied my mates driving as I could hear where he shut off etc, I’d had enough and had a right go at him for lying to me about the cars performance or more to the point his... i then called him a puff and not to worry about the barriers,, it won’t hurt I said,,
fking worked. Ran second in qualifying until about half way through and ended up 5th I think it was. Went backwards in the races but his pace all weekend was the best he’d achieved.
The nut behind the wheel is the most important part to motivate

I was faster on a simulator that weekend than the guy challenging for the Championship,,, for accuracy he did beat my time but not before he’d removed his shoes great craic.
Abbey Eaton came out on top in the end and won the thing.
If Facebook is correct she’s now the new stig on the 3 loonies car show.
She kissed me once
That’s my claim to fame that is,,,

Edited by Classic Chim on Wednesday 27th December 10:11

[Sardonicus]

A common mistake after letting the car off jacks ramps etc is not to load each corner (bounce) and roll the car backwards and forwards a few cycles of this you will be surprised how things change in most cases pre-geo checking tyre pressures need confirming too yes I have known of workshops do this wheel-alignment malarky with suspension hanging free (on lifts) tracking for example

Edited by Sardonicus on Wednesday 27th December 10:15

[Classic Chim]

Sardonicus said:

A common mistake after letting the car off jacks ramps etc is not to load each corner (bounce) and roll the car backwards and forwards a few cycles of this you will be surprised how things change in most cases but yes I have known of workshops try to do this with wheels hanging free tracking for example

Some of the stories you could tell Simon

[Sardonicus]

Classic Chim said:

Sardonicus said:

A common mistake after letting the car off jacks ramps etc is not to load each corner (bounce) and roll the car backwards and forwards a few cycles of this you will be surprised how things change in most cases but yes I have known of workshops try to do this with wheels hanging free tracking for example

Some of the stories you could tell Simon

I could tell a few Alun yes but heard of many more horrors from reliable sources who have been in the game or trading longer than I Merry Xmas everyone

[Classic Chim]

And yes the beauty of car mounted strings is you can still move the car freely back and forth.

Oddly a bit like a 30 min engine change ( not that I did that) it always draws a crowd

As can be seen by the fuel tanks in the pic above, if the car requires changes your going to have to move them out the way each time to move the car.
It could be the springs are so hard you could pretty accurately adjust this car without the settling needed as on a road car but it looks more like checking something else rather than setting the car up. Still very surprised to see fuel tanks used in this way.
Pit stewards are very strict these days especially in garages.

[QBee]

I agree with Phazed. Take it to Mat Smith at Downham Market, Norfolk. 30 miles north of Cambridge, so not far from you.

He charges less than £100 for a full 4 wheel alignment on a Hunter computerised 4 wheel aligner, will check all the joints etc are fine before he starts, and you can watch while he does it. He also has an excellent knowledge of the various set ups available to give you the best driving experience for what you want to do with the car.

You won’t regret it - time and money well spent.

[Classic Chim]

Looking at the rear tyre it’s been off road!
Looking at the two guys working they have a familiar look of confusion or more like frustration

Nothing like thinking you’ve got the car balanced then one lap later the driver comes in with 3 wheels!

That’s some car and some value,,, I’d question the race teams approach,,,,

[Sardonicus]

QBee said:

I agree with Phazed. Take it to Mat Smith at Downham Market, Norfolk. 30 miles north of Cambridge, so not far from you.

He charges less than £100 for a full 4 wheel alignment on a Hunter computerised 4 wheel aligner, will check all the joints etc are fine before he starts, and you can watch while he does it. He also has an excellent knowledge of the various set ups available to give you the best driving experience for what you want to do with the car.

You won’t regret it - time and money well spent.

This ^ you cant fk around with these cars, far too many adjustments to make the car lethal/dangerous to drive with poor initial set-up

[caduceus]

Thanks for the replies chaps.

How about making one of these?



I'm not bothered about getting the correct factory settings. Just straight and aligned will do. I'll take her to a TVR garage to get the alignment done when it's all back together, etc.

[Classic Chim]

QBee said:

I agree with Phazed. Take it to Mat Smith at Downham Market, Norfolk. 30 miles north of Cambridge, so not far from you.

He charges less than £100 for a full 4 wheel alignment on a Hunter computerised 4 wheel aligner, will check all the joints etc are fine before he starts, and you can watch while he does it. He also has an excellent knowledge of the various set ups available to give you the best driving experience for what you want to do with the car.

You won’t regret it - time and money well spent.

This is about right, Matt will get all 4 wheels sitting on the road properly.
If you can afford it and have adjustable ride height shocks get him to corner weight the car as this has the biggest effect on balance.
This has a big effect especially when braking and cornering, not so much on a road car but when it’s wet the car will behave better this way.
If the chassis is not accurately built then just using ride height measurements to the ground will never get you the best balance unless your lucky and corner weighting is the only way to be sure. I’m going down the route of non adjustable ride height shocks so corner weighting will be limited but it can still be done by adding weight ( ballast ) if say one wheel sits light on the road add weight to that corner which will bring the pendulum over and more towards that corner.
Not ideal but better than having a light wheel or tyre footprint not contacting the road.

If you have adjustable shocks you’d actually jack up the opposing corner to throw the pendulum over towards the lighter wheel rather than lower the problem corner.

As racecars get knocked about the bodywork is often not level or square and you might notice the car doesn’t look too level, as long as the weight on the wheels is correct it matters little.


Best part in racing is setting them up.
I’m no expert and still had much to learn but could string a car up easily enough

[Classic Chim]

caduceus said:

Thanks for the replies chaps.

How about making one of these?



I'm not bothered about getting the correct factory settings. Just straight and aligned will do. I'll take her to a TVR garage to get the alignment done when it's all back together, etc.

I love it if it’s accurate.

I’d use a steel upright or three in the garages to set the old Dunlop gauge up and it’s surprising how accurate you can get it.

If you have 4 axle stands and some fishing line with two long tubes of steel it’s easy to make up this set up.
Measure the centre of the tubes and as near damn it the centre of the car and mark them.

Hack saw small grooves at each end of the tubes as accurately as you can.

Sit your axle stands at each end of the car far enough out the way for you to work.

Tie the strings to each end of the tubes that are now sat on your axle stands and at a height that will see them running through the centre of your wheel hubs and pull tight.

Using ideally two people and some steel rulers start at the back and centre the two strings by moving your tubes until both sides are equal to the hubs and then move onto the fronts, do this a few times until you get the same measurements
If your rear wheels or hubs sit further out than the fronts you need to take this into account as your measuring.

You end up with strings dead square to the cars hubs.
We simply used a point on the wheel centre rather than remove the wheels.

So when you move a wheel in or out you can check two measurements as in the front edge and back edge of the wheel.
Tracking can be set too.

Or just guess and drive it to the garage. I’ve ran as much as 1 1/2 degrees at the front for a laugh and other than wear the tyre out it was drivable.

[caduceus]

Thanks for the write up Alun, much obliged. But I'm just going to get them pointing straight and level with a simple contraption, then take it somewhere to get it done. As long as the camber is ok, it'll do. The toe should be ok as it was set before the rebuild and I haven't touched the toe adjusters.

[TwinKam]

If you've changed any bushes or ball joints, the toe will probably have been affected, even if you've made no change or adjustment to the track rods/ ends.