Home alignment, what about thrust angle?

ValiantOne said
Hey All,

I read some really great threads on fabo about doing home alignments. I am tempted to try it.

My question is about the relationship between the front and rear wheels though. When I used to do alignments at Merchants Tire back in the day, we aligned the front end off the rear wheels (we called it a thrust angle alignment) so that if the rear was cocked at a slight angle, the front wheels were in unison with them. Basically the wheels would all be facing the same direction, and the body of the car would be ever so slightly cocked.

Can this be done in a home alignment? Is it usually necessary? As we did all alignments that way, I don't know if it ever becomes much of an issue or not.

Thanks CE

What RustyRatRod said. You need to insure the strings are the same distance apart front and rear and that the car is centered between them and parallel. The distance from the wheels to the string may not be the same front to rear because the track width may be different but it needs to be equal left and right for both the front and the rear.