Newbie asks:
Will I need a camber kit if I lower my car? Some guy at a shop said I will or the car can't be aligned at all.
Will I need a camber kit if I lower my car? Some guy at a shop said I will or the car can't be aligned at all.
First of all, although it is quite rare, it's true, you may not be able to get the car back to within the factory alignment specs without some additional parts. Before we get into buying more parts, let's see what it means to have the factory spec alignment.
The factory alignment spec was selected as a tradeoff based on a number of factors. One factor is tire wear, another is stability (the car's tendency to 'wander' on the road), handling, etc. The factory spec is best for long tire life and not suited for aggressive driving. With the factory alignment and an aggressive driver (someone who really enjoys high-g turns), the outsides of the tire tread will wear out faster than the inner edge and center of the tire. More negative camber will cure this type of uneven tire wear. If you've gone to the trouble of installing aftermarket springs (and struts) in your car, odds are you're the type of aggressive driver mentioned above. A little extra negative camber beyond the factory spec will probably help your tires last longer and also improve handling. I won't even get into the dynamic camber change of the McPherson strut suspension suffice to say that a little extra neg. camber will improve cornering grip.
So you had your lowering springs installed and you've gone to get an alignment. Try as he might, the tech can't get the car even close to spec. Here's what you may need - up to four (4) eccentric bolts. Cost? Under $10 each. Use up to one per corner (you may not need one at every corner). They're commonly called crash bolts. The idea is that after a car is damaged in an accident, the suspension pickup points may move slightly even after straightening. These eccentric bolts allow you to set the camber properly on the messed up car to bring it back to factory alignment. I believe the bolts are good for +/- 1 degree of camber beyond the stock adjustment. (I have Moog part numbers at home. I hope to edit this post to include the part numbers later. My home internet service is currently offline and will be for a few more days.)
Can someone post the Ford and/or Mazda crash bolt part number?
Crash bolts are a favorite of autocrossers because they allow us to very cheaply and easily adjust the camber out of factory spec for improved handling and therefore faster lap times.
Camber plates are nice if you need to be able to quickly and repeatably adjust your camber. Outside of that, they are almost totally unnecessary and just for show. I compete with a well tuned BMW 325i with camber plates. The driver will do a run, decide he needs more or less camber, and then adjust it while in grid in the 15 minutes before his next run. If you do not need this level of adjustment, you do not need camber plates.
*exception* Camber plates allow a greater range of adjustment than crash bolts. In rare cases, a crash bolt won't provide a large enough correction. This is likely because the chassis has something else wrong with it (like bad manufacturing tolerances from the factory or even hidden crash damage) beyond your lowering springs.
For Hondas, with their double wishbone suspension (a far superior geometry to the MacPherson setup on the Probe/MX-6), it's a whole different ballgame.
Phew. Long post. I hope this clears things up.
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