REDRX3RX8

Highway8 already hit this, but you say you like how the bars work, but you didn't TELL US HOW they work. We have to know what the camber is set at now, and does the car understeer or oversteer at the limit.

You've got to know and test with what you have now or you're guessing which leads to not getting it right.

When you know the handling we can give recommendation, and then you can go see what the actual camber is at same time its adjusted.

So do it logically a step at a time and you'll like what you get better.

Also, you're not really stock with different sway bars, but after alignment you can loosen the front bar if you don't like the alignment you got, and or stiffen the rear.

Scientific testing should be one change and test, not several.

Nopstnz8

iTrader: (6)

Ok guys well I got the alignment a few weeks ago, and the guy told me that close to stock would be the best for the type of driving I do (mainly spirited canyon runs, otherwise daily driven with no track days, but occasional auto-x.) So what he did was put the stock settings for the sport suspension and add a little negative camber within factory spec. Now my car feels really good, but that's probably mostly due to the Advan AD08's I have.

My friends are saying that I'm rubbing in the front due to my tires being too positive camber, -0.8 in the front, which with my last set of tires being the same size, and I never rubbed with 245/35/19 square.

So my settings are -0.8 camber in the front, and -.1.8 in the rear. My friend and I did a very aggressive drive through the canyons tonight, and he said, after looking at my tires, I'm getting a lot of outside tire wear, which seems abnormal.

I think I'm going to go to another shop and get them realigned, but was this guy I talked to full of himself saying -1.8 in the front and -1.6 in the rear would do nothing for the canyon run driving I do (meaning I've have less response than I do now), and I'd just be getting excessive tire wear since these tires are daily driven.

REDRX3RX8

Yes, he's full of it! Of course you're burning the front sides off with that alignment. My tech guy could only turn the rear down to -1.65 camber which would help you some, but you need to get the front's up to about that or slightly more. Guys with sticky rubber know to run more neg camber, and the alignment you have is for people that buy Camrys and don't how to correct a spin. Look at cars wheels when you're on the freeway. You can tell the rears have lots more neg camber than the fronts as a safety margin for uninformed drivers.

Highway8

iTrader: (11)

He says the car feels good and his concern is the tire wear on the outside edge of the tires. So I wouldnt tough the rear camber.

The problem is that no matter what you will have to compromise somewhere. If you increase the front neg camber to -1.8 your will then have increase tire wear on the inside when you daily drive the car. You will also have a car that may want to oversteer more then your used to.

My recommendation is to bump up the front Negative camber to about -1.2. This will increase front grip a little, reduce the tire wear on the outside edge but the car should still be neutral or a understeer a little at the extreme which keeps you safe (not oversteering). The other thing you can do to reduce tire wear is play with tire pressures. If you are getting a lot of tire wear on the edges, you can bump up your tire pressure for DDing which will round out the tire contact patch and even out your tire wear. When you drive the car hard the tire will heat up a lot and pressures will get high, so you will want to drop it back down to normal pressures.

Again its a compromise. Rotate your tires often and if tire wear is uneven you may need to flip the tires on the wheels (if possible) half way through the tire life.

REDRX3RX8

My rear tires were loosing grip and wearing twice as fast as the fronts at the alignment he has so turning down to the minimum of -1.65 actually fixed that.

Now all the tires are wearing almost the same, will easily get 20k miles, and yes, the most wear is on the inside fronts, but not excessive, and I couldn't get -1.8 on the front anyway; maybe -1.6 or -1.7.

I just ran at H2R San Marcos on HaNKOOK Ventus V12's 225/40r18 with 47 psi hot front and 44 psi hot rear, and they wore right to the tip of arrows.

Tire rack talks about running tires at 45 + psi so someone else thinks it works, and I still don't have any oversteer.

TeamRX8

iTrader: (25)

Excessive outside wear can be too low of tire air pressure as well. There is a distinct relationship between camber and air pressure. The more camber you have the less air pressure is needed to prevent excessive tire corner rollover and vice versa.

REDRX3RX8

And there is a distinct relationship between stickier rubber that he has, and needing more neg camber.

Yeah, I'd always get the pressures fixed first, but do you run -1 deg more camber in the rear in Auto X?

dannobre

iTrader: (3)

There are so many variables that you haven't talked about here...

Front Camber without caster and toe measurements means squat really.

You will get more bad tire wear from incorrect toe than you ever will from camber.....

Caster is like dynamic camber...so if you have big caster you can get away from needing as much camber, because when you turn the wheel in you get lots of camber. You will have to balance the camber and caster in the front because when you increase one you decrease the other. Too much camber usually decreases grip in a straight line...so too much makes the tires wear and decreases grip when braking....not a good thing

This car seems to like more front camber than rear.....depending on setup usually .5 to one degree less in the rear....depending on tires and a lot of other stuff. This is not a BMW that runs less front than rear

Here's my latest numbers so you can see

-2,5 camber front 6,8 caster zero toe
-1.8 rear camber with zero toe

The ride height will play a big difference in this car as well. If you lower it too much it will screw up the handling. I have mine set with the body seam at 4 1/8 inch from the ground and it seems to work well there

This is for r-comp tires.....and it is unlikely you can get that much camber in the front stock without offset bushings like I have. For a track only alignment I would go with some toe out in the front 1/16" or so

For a street alignment I would go with -1.5 and as much caster as I could get at that ( about 6? )...with about -1 or so in the rear. Zero toe in the front and maybe 1/16 toe in in the rear to calm down the rear end.

Then you have spring rates, bar rates, damping and tires/pressure to play with as well

Hopefully when you are done you will end up with something that handles predictably and mostly does what you want.

Highway8

iTrader: (11)

Well he said stock sport alignment with just a little more front negative camber. So you can infer some of the variables.

coneninja

iTrader: (1)

Ok, so I had an alignment about 3 years ago. I had a guy from Cali who lived in Knoxville at the time and was working at Mazda do the service. I asked for him to give me a very aggressive setup because I was auto crossing.. Well eventually I got an aggressive wheel firmer as well.. 245x40r18's +15 offset. It worked out really well! Problem is now, I need to re align and I don't know what he spec'ed it to. All I know is that there was a lot of camber. I would really like to come up with the same set up.. Especially since the season has already started! I appreciate any help! I work two jobs so it's hard for me to keep browsing through the thread...
Thanks!!!

dannobre

iTrader: (3)

You will be able to tell what thing were close to by looking at the before numbers. Likely the toe could be out a bit...and even up the camber..the tech should be able to tell you what to do unless he is a total idiot...just don't let them put it back to "stock"

sblethen

iTrader: (3)

If you don't mind me jumping in... where did you get them? How much "extra" camber did you get?

Thanks,
Stephen

Orthonormal

I'm sad to report that doing the above made no difference in my left front camber, which is maxed out at -1.0.

It looks like both the upper and lower control arm mounts are part of the front crossmember, so shifting the crossmember over won't change the alignment range.

I'm getting frustrated here, because many stock class autocrossers have reported anywhere from -1.6 to -1.8 front camber. Is that with Koni twin tubes? What's typical with stock shocks?

I have a 2010, although that really shouldn't matter.

What's next? Parts bin diving for upper and lower control arms? Or more likely, order several of each ($$$)? Frame shop to check that the suspension pickups are within spec?

Boyd

Need some feed back on my corner exit oversteer issue. I'm feeling the issue on sweepers and fast off set transitions. Entry and mid corner are very neutral and tight turn around corners are painless.

Here's the set up:
Springs: F455 R285
Front bar: 615lbs
rear bar: stock

Front camber -2.6
Rear camber -1.5
0 toe all around

Surface was Toledo Express's Concrete. I'm thinking adding in more rear camber will be the remedy but I worry about hurting straight line speed (we have been running some pretty fast autox's this year. Got to use 3rd gear this past Sunday!) I have also been thinking about taking out some front camber too, maybe dialling it back to -2.0

Any advice would be appreciated.

JCrane82

iTrader: (3)

You have a very large delta between front and rear camber there. Is this to offset a staggered tire setup? Please list your tire setup as it would help.

I run a square setup (265's front and rear) and find that an equal amount of camber front to rear is perfect for a balanced feel. I also run about 4 mm toe out in the front, and 2 mm of toe in at the rear.

My current settings:

Front
Caster: 6.5 degrees
Camber: -1.5 degrees
Toe: -4 mm (toe out)

Rear
Camber: -1.5 degrees
Toe: +2 mm (toe in)

GeorgeH

iTrader: (2)

One thing I noticed about Boyd's setup was some front bias in the roll couple, which does ask more of the front tires, and may explain the camber stagger.

Since the car handles well in steady state, but oversteers on corner exit, I'd suggest adding a bit of toe-in in the rear, as toe can have a significant affect on putting power down on corner exit.

TeamRX8

iTrader: (25)

Since he didn't say what tires he has you can't be sure. Toledo concrete has less grip than a lot of asphalt lots. The bias would equate to less front roll so less front camber might be a consideration if he's on street type tires. If they are R tires maybe more rear camber. Some rear toe will help. The rear pressures could be off, the rear shock valving off, the rear tires off, maybe even the front shock valving masked by several of those variables.

Boyd

It's on a square 255 set up on street tires. I had a local event this past week on a concrete surface that is notorious for understeer issues and the car didn't show any behavior problems. Next week I'm running at a more typical asphalt surface and will try more rear camber and some rear toe. If it doesn't work well then it's going back to my previous set up that felt good: Front at -2, rear -1.5 and stock bars until I can test out a few different sets.

Olli_H

My new setup is:

Front
6.36/6.36
-2.00/-2.00
0.03/0.03

Rear:
-1.54/-1.54
0.00/0.00

Dan507

I'm looking at a new set up for my 8 i currently have this



I've only been on one track since the engine blew but noticed that grip was pretty poor - Mainly due to shitty budget tyres but i have some Advan AD08's now. It was a balancing act with understeer and oversteer around the corners. the oversteer was stronger out of the two, the out sides of the rear tyres had perished. i was running 30psi in all tyres.

I'm thinking of having. -1.8 on the front and -2.0 and the same on caster.

What do you guys think?

Edit: Sorry for the Large picture. i was hoping it would resize.

40w8

So your right front camber won't go as high as your left front, -1.53 deg?

Is that maybe because of your right hand steering, since I have trouble getting higher on the left.

Anyway, I'm still running about -1.7 camber all around, and about 40 psi hot on Hankook V12's which are halfway sticky between budget tires and AD 08's.

If you can get -1.8 camber up front do it, but I would put the rears the same.

My car would understeer badly when at -2.0 rear, and a car of this weight should have about 35 psi at 60 deg f to run nearly anywhere.

I've never run AD 08's so someone else can jump in, but 30 psi was way too low for average tires.

autoxgt

So I'm a little stuck on what settings to go with for my car.

I'm going in for an alignment tomorrow to try and reduce the amount of under-steer I have to deal with at the local autocross. At the last event, I was running 10-12 psi difference front to rear (24f-36r) just to get a little over-steer back in it.
We run on asphalt that seems fairly grippy but I don't have enough experience other places to compare.

My car is stock suspension 2006 GT sport suspension. Tires are stock size Sumimoto HTR3 (300 tread wear) and only have 5k mi. I'm getting coilovers and wheels/tires in February so I'm just trying to tame it now and will tighten it up once the coilovers are in.

I don't know what the current settings are now but it appears to be within factory specs. Just looking at the car I can easily see that there is a good amount of rear camber and the front have almost 0*.

From what I gather from reading this thread and the other alignment thread is to have the tech dial in as much front negative camber as he can while still maintaining a decent amount of caster (6.5+?). Then have him match the rear camber to the front or go -0.3* to -0.5* less. Run 0 toe front and 0 to slight "in" on the rears.

My wife drives the car daily and I think I want to keep it fairly neutral then I can play with tire pressure to get a little more over-steer when I want it at the track.

Am I wrong?

I see a lot of variances listed between cars in the amount of front negative camber that is attainable with the stock suspension. -1.3* to -1.8*. So, whatever I can get in the front would be my starting point for the rest of the settings, correct?
From there, the closer the rear camber is to the front, the more neutral the grip will be correct?
If I decide to go .3-.5 less camber in the rear (-1.3* to -1.5*) than a little toe "in" will calm the rear down at the limit, correct?

The tech at the shop are supposed to be pretty good for tire shop and comes from good a recommendation so he may have some input once the car is on the rack, but I just wanted to make sure I have an idea of what I'm looking for when we set it up.

Dan507

It's set up like that because the road in the UK are cambered so any standing water can drain to the sides of the road. if you have equal camber either side the car pulls to the left. (i thought he was talking bull **** but i noticed how much better it was to drive like this.

I also forgot to mention that the car is for track use only. It's never seeing a public road again.

thanks for your advice.

40w8

autoxgt,

Wow, 12 psi less in the rear tires? That's so low you might unbead the tire and flip under cornering stress.

You said it yourself that the rear camber looks like a lot. No wonder you can't get rid of understeer.

I had to align twice and test on track to get it right for me.

I got a shop that let me help and sit in car while he lowered the rear camber to -1.65 which was the lowest one would go so I put both rears there with the slightest toe in he could get since it's touchy to set.

The front right got -1.7 camber but the left didn't want to get there so the caster got lessened to 5 deg on the left, and -1.6 deg. Slight toe out.

The car drives like a dream on track or off, and actually has a slight pull to left that makes it go straight on crowned road.

When the Hankook V12 were new and soft, I ran 46 hot front and 43 hot rear on the track, and never lowered the pressure for ride home. After the tires have hardened, I like 40 psi hot front and rear.

The alignment 1.5 years later is still the same and the way I like it with the tires having very even wear.

I ran this setup on a drizzly day on H2R, and no fast cars like Corvette, or Bmw could catch me, so I'd say it's safe in rain. I was one of few that didn't go off.

40w8

Yeah, I think the Mazda guys designed the suspension well, and made the reverse front camber design pending on right or left hand drive. Makes sense.