wheel alignment in a minute

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plymouth4onthefloor

plymouth4onthefloor

FABO Gold Member
FABO Gold Member
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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
 
plymouth4onthefloor said:
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
Click to expand...


While you make some good points, you haven't explained how to actually DO any of this.

And some reality. These cars weren't perfect from the factory. Not at all. The tolerances were there for a reason, and the factory absolutely made use of the tolerances. As in, if a chassis was within them, it left the factory. These cars were not all dead nuts from the factory. That is not to say that you shouldn't pay attention to the tolerances or aim to put everything right on spec if you're doing chassis repair work, but you may not be able to achieve perfection. The factory did not.

Corner weights will not be identically the same. And on a street car they don't need to be. Sure, there are tolerances there too and the closer your corner weights the better you'll handle, but not even purpose built track machines are perfect in that respect. And they take a lot of liberties most won't want to take on a street car. Corner scales are also pretty expensive, and not something that everyone needs. That's a high level of tuning not necessary for most street cars.

You can do a good wheel alignment at home. In fact, you can do a better wheel alignment at home than you can get at a lot of shops these days. Many shops will not align a car to custom settings anymore, they insist on factory settings. The factory settings for these cars are for bias ply tires, and are *** backward for radial tires. And the more modern your tire/wheel design, the worse the factory settings are for you. A lot of shops will also not align cars that have a lot of aftermarket suspension parts. So, if you've gone to tubular UCA's and things to correct the factory lack of positive caster and put a more modern alignment on your car to match your tires, you may find most shops won't touch the car for liability reasons. I do all of my own alignments at home. I have turntables, slip pads, and a decent caster camber gauge. Are my alignments "perfect"? No. But they're more than close enough, and I check them against alignment machines when I can. But even when I do, most of the shops that check the alignment do not want to alter the alignment on my car because it's not factory. And again, all factory alignment settings have a tolerance range. Unless you find an alignment shop willing to work with you, all they're going to do on a standard alignment is "put it in the green", not make it perfect.

Perfection is the enemy of good. And 50 year old mass produced unibody cars are rarely perfect, they weren't even that way from the factory. Nor do they need to be. Everything has tolerances.

cchrishefish said:
Maybe this should be in the how to section?
Click to expand...

If it explained how to actually do any of those things, maybe. It's just a general overview of best practices, and is a bit over the top at that.
 
72bluNblu said:
While you make some good points, you haven't explained how to actually DO any of this.

And some reality. These cars weren't perfect from the factory. Not at all. The tolerances were there for a reason, and the factory absolutely made use of the tolerances. As in, if a chassis was within them, it left the factory. These cars were not all dead nuts from the factory. That is not to say that you shouldn't pay attention to the tolerances or aim to put everything right on spec if you're doing chassis repair work, but you may not be able to achieve perfection. The factory did not.

Corner weights will not be identically the same. And on a street car they don't need to be. Sure, there are tolerances there too and the closer your corner weights the better you'll handle, but not even purpose built track machines are perfect in that respect. And they take a lot of liberties most won't want to take on a street car. Corner scales are also pretty expensive, and not something that everyone needs. That's a high level of tuning not necessary for most street cars.

You can do a good wheel alignment at home. In fact, you can do a better wheel alignment at home than you can get at a lot of shops these days. Many shops will not align a car to custom settings anymore, they insist on factory settings. The factory settings for these cars are for bias ply tires, and are *** backward for radial tires. And the more modern your tire/wheel design, the worse the factory settings are for you. A lot of shops will also not align cars that have a lot of aftermarket suspension parts. So, if you've gone to tubular UCA's and things to correct the factory lack of positive caster and put a more modern alignment on your car to match your tires, you may find most shops won't touch the car for liability reasons. I do all of my own alignments at home. I have turntables, slip pads, and a decent caster camber gauge. Are my alignments "perfect"? No. But they're more than close enough, and I check them against alignment machines when I can. But even when I do, most of the shops that check the alignment do not want to alter the alignment on my car because it's not factory. And again, all factory alignment settings have a tolerance range. Unless you find an alignment shop willing to work with you, all they're going to do on a standard alignment is "put it in the green", not make it perfect.

Perfection is the enemy of good. And 50 year old mass produced unibody cars are rarely perfect, they weren't even that way from the factory. Nor do they need to be. Everything has tolerances.



If it explained how to actually do any of those things, maybe. It's just a general overview of best practices, and is a bit over the top at that.
Click to expand...

The total of all tolerances is way off. You should at least try to get the target in the middle. You're right the factory was in a hurry and they put the cars together as fast they could, sometimes with a minimum of quality. Invest the time, you spend so much money and time, so a half hour should not make the decision. And every measure has it's tolerances pending on the instruments and user!

As i wrote, corner weight setup becomes more critical in stiff chassis and high spring rates, adjusting in a Mopar with the torsion bars is a dream. You're right, its very common on race cars, but levelling the car just by the fender lips height can be wrong, especially if the body is not straight.

When i pay for a wheel alignment, then i am the boss and he has to adjust what i will!! A tire shop worker gets a 1/2 hour for the job, this is too tight if the car needs more love. Tell them that you need a full job and they give you more time. If you have adjustable A arms, its necessary for a pre setting, the cams for caster and camber adjusted in the middle, so you can meet your goals. You can't do this at the shop during the short time.
 
plymouth4onthefloor said:
The total of all tolerances is way off. You should at least try to get the target in the middle. You're right the factory was in a hurry and they put the cars together as fast they could, sometimes with a minimum of quality. Invest the time, you spend so much money and time, so a half hour should not make the decision. And every measure has it's tolerances pending on the instruments and user!
Click to expand...

Yes, I am fully aware of how tolerances stack up, thank you. I also "try to get the target in the middle". But again, these are 50+ year old unibodies, and you haven't actually explained how to do any of the things you say everyone must do. Of course you need a relatively straight chassis to get a proper alignment. This is not new information, regardless of what the yahoo's on RoadKill will do for some views. You don't need any fancy frame machines either, by the way. A good level, some shims, length of string, a plumb bob and some geometry will yield the same results IF you know how to use them. People were setting up chassis long before there were machines to put them on, and those folks had some real skills.

plymouth4onthefloor said:
As i wrote, corner weight setup becomes more critical in stiff chassis and high spring rates, adjusting in a Mopar with the torsion bars is a dream. You're right, its very common on race cars, but levelling the car just by the fender lips height can be wrong, especially if the body is not straight.
Click to expand...

Again, this in nothing new. But I'd bet of the thousands of members on here with cars currently on the road, only a handful have ever had them on a set of corner scales. And that's just fine! Sure, measuring to the body with the factory body tolerances on these cars can be pretty inaccurate. But for most peoples intended use of their vehicle a quick measurement to a frame point or following the method described in the factory service manual would be more than sufficient. The factory ride height adjustment is based on suspension measurements. Scales are not necessary. My Duster has a stiffened, reinforced chassis with large torsion bars and increased spring rates. Never had it on scales. It handles very well (in my opinion), far better than it did before. Could some tuning with a set of corner scales improve that some? No doubt it could. But since I am not competing with my car at this point, it's not at all necessary. What happens if I drive with a passenger? Or put a load of groceries in the trunk? That's right, the corner weights change. Do you reset your suspension when you carry a passenger?

plymouth4onthefloor said:
When i pay for a wheel alignment, then i am the boss and he has to adjust what i will!! A tire shop worker gets a 1/2 hour for the job, this is too tight if the car needs more love. Tell them that you need a full job and they give you more time. If you have adjustable A arms, its necessary for a pre setting, the cams for caster and camber adjusted in the middle, so you can meet your goals. You can't do this at the shop during the short time.
Click to expand...

Alignment shops in Switzerland must be quite different. Here if you need more time you pay more money, especially if you're the one making it take more time. As I said, most alignment shops here will ONLY use factory alignment settings for liability reasons. So, that means the factory settings in the FSM for bias ply tires on one of these cars. Yes, that's wrong for radials, but the tech behind the counter will follow company policy. I've been down that path with more than one alignment shop.

I am also fully aware of how adjustable control arms work, I do my own alignments remember? But as I said before, most major alignment shops will not even start an alignment on a car with aftermarket suspension parts unless they were the ones that installed them for liability reasons. Starting to understand?

Maybe in Switzerland you can waltz in, request whatever alignment specs you'd like on a car none of the techs in the shop have even ever seen because it was built 25 years before they were born, tell the tech to spend an extra hour getting the numbers where YOU want them and not just within the factory specs and that you're the boss. All while you stand in front of the customers for the next 5 jobs they have lined up for the afternoon. Not exactly how it works here. Quite frankly, I'd love to see you walk into an alignment shop around here and see what kind of response you get when you tell them all that.
 
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