Well, all the guys who are thinking it's done in minute, sorry about that. We are talking of angle minutes.
Where does a proper wheel alignment starts? Not in the tire shop.....way long before!
I hope i can give you some inputs where the critical points are.
It starts during your first step in the restoration, you're replacing frame rails and sheetmetal,
this is very critical and should be done professional on a rectifying bench like from Celette.
The factory has given all the necessary measures and you should reach this as perfect you can. Don't try to meet the tolerances, set it to zero! It's a really big pain in the *** to find a chassis failure when your car drives like ****.
Now you are ready to install the K-member and the rear end, at this point you're axles must be parallel, if not, you will have a nice driver for the next Indy 5oo, it looks like that:
Of corse all you're bushings must be in perfect condition. Install you're front suspension and use the correct spindles and A arms! There are a lot of nice threads in the net. On a street car, you're springs should match the front to rear weight distribution for a nice ride. The final ride height affects the caster, lowering the front or rise the back, will lower the caster, rising the front or lowering the back will increase caster.
On a fully assembled car, set the corner weight setup, so the load on your tires from left to right is equal. This will became more critical on a really stiff chassis and hard springs.
Install your steering box, be sure you find the middlepoint, you must have the same amounts of turns to left and right, the same for a rack and pinion. The ratio in a steering box is not the same from lock to lock, it varies! Install the steering column, be sure the release of the flasher is in the middle (if its done from the spindle, depends on the brand). Install you're steering wheel. It looks like **** when you drive down the road and the steering wheel hangs to left or right. Next will be the pitman and idler arm, they should be from the same ratio, don't mix T/A fast ration arms with regulars!!! Align the pitman arm on the steering box. Install the tie rods and be sure they are easy to turn. Pretty close to the wheel alignment job, install the best set of wheels you have, set the tire pressure. Most wheels are POS, a good set of a wheel has less than 30 grams balance weight, and almost no wobbling! Why is this important? Because most wheel alignment adapters are installed to the wheel. There is one exception, Mercedes. They use an adapter to the wheel hubs, that's the reason they have the small holes in their wheels! Your car must be ready to drive, fill up the gas, install everything you have.
Can you do a perfect wheel alignment at home, NO. Because you don't have a floor which is in every angle 0 degree. I do wheel alignment at home only for pre settings, it safes time when i do it professionally in my shop. In our shop we have a Butler and a Bessbarth pro wheel aligner, both installed on a pit, we don't use a car lift. We have trainrails 300 ft from our shop, you will see it on the computer during the measures when a train runs on the rails!!! Once the car is installed on the pit, never lift it up, you're car needs some miles to settle down. Be sure the guy from the shop do the wheel compensation, because your wheels never run straight! If you can't reach the factory settings in case of your ride height, be sure they are equal on both sides. Be accurate as much as possible!
Don't waste money with cheap shocks and tires, buy cheap, buy twice.
I hope i didn't forget to much....
Enjoy your ride.
Marco
