Front alignment questions.

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younggun2.0

younggun2.0

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I have not yet had my car properly aligned. I have just eyeballed it and been driving it. I have no vibration or wandering. Actually steers pretty good. I have the RMS upper control arms and adjustable lower struts. I have noticed that when i back the car up and stop. the front end looks way outta whack. the driver side especially. top of tire leans way in. when i pull it forward it looks normal. what would cause this? all parts are new and installed with factory torque specs.
 
Sound to me like your lca is moving. Due to the use of poly bushings and the wrong strut rod bushings. My car did the same thing. Just a thought on something to check. Look to see if the lca is moving front and back at the K-member
 
Oldmanmopar said:
Sound to me like your lca is moving. Due to the use of poly bushings and the wrong strut rod bushings. My car did the same thing. Just a thought on something to check. Look to see if the lca is moving front and back at the K-member
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thanks. will check that out. i have the rms strut rods. there is no bushings. they have aluminum spacers. I have brand new rubber lower control arm bushings installed. I will have to check the lower arm stud. I may have screwed up and forgot to tighten it down after i lowered the car. i left them loose then dropped the car. i would swear i tightened them up but im only human. could have forgot.
 
It will do that to some degree even when things are right. You definitely want possitive caster, I say 5-6+ others say 4+ max. If you think it drives good now just think after its aligned RIGHT how it could drive.
 
72BBSwinger said:
It will do that to some degree even when things are right. You definitely want possitive caster, I say 5-6+ others say 4+ max. If you think it drives good now just think after its aligned RIGHT how it could drive.
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I have the RMS upper arms in the car with the rod ends. I have the upper control arms installed putting the ball joint as far back as possilbe. im sure i have plenty of caster. i will jack it up and look really close at it all and see what i can find.
 
Geez bud get busy and ALIGN it, LOL. I'm lucky enough to have a caster / camber gauge, but you can MAKE a camber gauge, and if you Google some, there's some math you can do to "figure" camber. The only difference with a caster/ camber gauges is that the scales act as a slide rule to compute caster

Toe? All you need is a scrap wood support with a nail to scribe the tires, and two of you with a tape measure.

http://www.forabodiesonly.com/mopar/showthread.php?p=1969894749
 
67Dart273 said:
Geez bud get busy and ALIGN it, LOL. I'm lucky enough to have a caster / camber gauge, but you can MAKE a camber gauge, and if you Google some, there's some math you can do to "figure" camber. The only difference with a caster/ camber gauges is that the scales act as a slide rule to compute caster

Toe? All you need is a scrap wood support with a nail to scribe the tires, and two of you with a tape measure.

http://www.forabodiesonly.com/mopar/showthread.php?p=1969894749
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i am having a tough time finding a shop that i trust to do it. that and i have been having way too much fun driving the living **** out of it. hell i had 900 miles on the car before i even had glass in it. ha ha ha
 
Jim Lusk said:
It likely has too much toe-in. Get it aligned.
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x2...

from your other post it appears to be a manual steer car.....while increased caster will improve high speed stability.....it also makes turning at slow speeds more difficult.
 
HemiDenny said:
x2...

from your other post it appears to be a manual steer car.....while increased caster will improve high speed stability.....it also makes turning at slow speeds more difficult.
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True, but I don't think the additional effort is very noticeable, compared to the effect of adding wide tires in the first place. For comparison, I have 3.5º positive caster and 215/70-14 tires, with standard-ratio manual steering.
 
http://www.allpar.com/history/mopar/front-end-alignment.html

attachment.php
 
An alignment is like $60. There is no need to use wood, strings, paper clips, turnbuckles, tissue paper or spit. You spent a lot of money on the front end and tires. Get it properly aligned. Most shops understand you have a car that is not their usual and will let you watch or even drive it in. We do.
 
Mopar to ya said:
An alignment is like $60. There is no need to use wood, strings, paper clips, turnbuckles, tissue paper or spit. You spent a lot of money on the front end and tires. Get it properly aligned. Most shops understand you have a car that is not their usual and will let you watch or even drive it in. We do.
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??WHUT??

I'm not sure I heard anybody mention spit and toilet paper. I'd be happy to take it to a "shop" if I KNEW if I had a GUARANTEE that the guy behind the curtain knew WTF he is doing. In many cases they do not. There's been many posts from guys on HERE who got screwed "at a shop," and who were refused the special attention and specs these old girls require.
 
younggun2.0 said:
Thanks man. That's the one I need. I agree about the shops not knowing **** about the old cars. I live about 80 miles north of firm feel. I may just drag it down there and have them align it.
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Must be pretty damn handy, LOL to be so close to the big boys. Been a long time since I visited that part of the world.
 
Then you are going to the wrong shop. And I can guarantee even a junior tech with a modern alignment machine can do a better alignment than a couple pieces of scrap wood and a nail. A tenth of a degree can be a difference in an alignment. $60 is worth it to protect your investment. We put in a Hunter camera technology alignment machine in 2004. It is so simple to use. It walks you through everything and has pictures and videos of all the adjustments. You can't screw up. This is common technology today.

View attachment alignment.jpg
 
Mopar to ya said:
Then you are going to the wrong shop.
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THANK you for making my point. I don't have the money to start my own independent research organization to start going to all the shops in this area to fine the one, the two, or the maybe several out of the many who do a good job and are honest.

and I'm getting tired of repeating myself. .............Nobody here advocated using spit, string, toilet paper, or as you put it, "scrap wood."

I can easily set toe on these things AS ACCURATE AS THE FRONT END EVER WAS so there is no need of splitting RCH and then watching the (brand new) ball joints move 10 times as far.

Last what "you" and your shop do has no relevance whatsoever because you aren't in driving distance of either me or the OP
 
The problem with those nice new machines is the specs they have programmed into them for our old junk. And then on top of that the RANGE of those specs is retarded. Most of those guys just hook up that machine and adjust until everything is in the green, tighten everything back up and move to the next car. Give them the specs YOU want and request a printout when done or go somewhere else.
 
You can program in whatever specs you want. It has the factory specs of course, but you can type in whatever you want.

67dart273, I have seen intelligent posts from you quite often. I respect your opinion, but if you say to use scrap wood, nails and a tape measure to do an alignment, that is just silly. You can't throw out a general statement that most shops don't know what they are doing because that is bullshit. And I said more than tissue paper and spit. Stop obsessing about two words and look at the whole post. I wasn't picking on you, I was pointing out that while you can do all kinds of things, there is one proper way to do it. When you spend the money on RMS suspension, wheels and tires, you should be protecting your investment. I'm sorry you took offense, but I stand by my statement.
 
You can do an alignment with what has been mentioned here with the addition of a calculator to make the math easy. Simple trigonometry will get the job done.

I didn't see a level mentioned... you need one of those or a plumbob
 
................I've done my share of oldschool alignments, but now I use a john bean aligner..........I can put in any specs u want, but u have to remember time is money, especially when u have to pull off the control arm to adjust it............kim..............
 
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