Ideas for poor man's alignment?

[v8s_are_slow]

I jacked up my car when I hit a new median that was put up in a construction zone and didn't see it (otherwise I wouldn't have hit it) on my way home one night. Replaced my ball joints but the alignment is outta whack. Need to adjust the toe but I'm pretty freakin broke and wanna do it myself. My only concern is that without turn tables, the tires aren't gonna move freely when I do the adjustments. Both of the front wheels are pointing outwards.

I use to do some alignments the old way with the stick and just use some spray paint and a scribe to mark the tires. Sure I could just scribe up the tires and use some measuring tape but wondering how I'd let my tires move freely since I don't have turn tables. Also wondering what I can use for keeping the steering wheel in place. Any ideas??? Thanks....

[propeine]

Get some floor tiles. Put some grease on the top of one. Place the other one upside down on the first. Jack your car up and put the tiles under the tires. Its even better if you've got a few concrete blocks laying around so you can get the whole car up in the air. This way you shouldn't have to roll the car back and forth.

Find the centerline of the front and rear of the car. Measure a specific distance out from either side and set up a string that is parallel to the centerline. Tie the string to say two jackstands. Make sure the measurement on either edge of the rim to the string is the same for 0 degrees of toe. You have to do this with the weight on the suspension obviously.

Look up string alignment on google if you need more detailed information.

[1992awdlaser]

One way to do the toe is:

You are going to need an extra person for this.
Make sure the wheel is straight and loosen the outer tie rod jam nuts before doing anything else.
Get two pieces of something flat like plywood or cardboard.
Place them against each wheel. The part the plywood would be resting on if it was on the ground against the entire wheel up and down.
Use a tape measure and measure the distance between the two pieces of plywood. You need to measure at the front and at the back.
Adjust until these two measurements are equal.

Don't worry too much about not having turn plates. I have done this type and real alignments without turn plates before. Also, just keep checking the position of the steering wheel after making some adjustment. This works pretty good for toe and is what I will be doing in a couple of days with my car.

[Defiant]

Put a section of newspaper under each front wheel.

[v8s_are_slow]

Thanks for the tips. I'm gonna be trying to do it tomorrow sometime hopefully.

[1992awdlaser]

Do you understand the way I'm saying? If I didn't explain it good I can take a picture to show you what I mean.

[wret]

I use a laser level.

[v8s_are_slow]

Originally Posted by 1992awdlaser

Do you understand the way I'm saying? If I didn't explain it good I can take a picture to show you what I mean.

Yeah, I understand. When I use to do the ole stick alignments, we use to use a dark color spray paint to mark the tires. We'd lift the tire up (lifting under the ball joint so that the suspension is still loaded) and spin it while spraying the paint on the tread so that it's all the way around and then put a tool that has a point and spin it again so the the point makes a line on the wet paint all the way around the tire. That line is what we'd use for the reference point, front and back. Gonna try and maybe do something similar cause I have some spray paint, but will see which idea I'll try for the tires to spin cause I'll be doing it in my yard....no concrete I'll let ya know how it goes. Thanks for all the ideas though.

[Ludachris]

I love the lifetime alignment offered by the local Firestone shops around here. I've taken my car at least 4 times and only had to pay for the first alignment.

It was expensive for that first one ($150) but it's nice to know that I can throw on some new parts and just take it down there again for free. And they have a guy who can do custom race settings. Hopefully he never leaves.

[jwcardy]

Exactly! It's the best thing ever. If you didn't want to go that route, i would at least shell out the $50 to have it done the 1st time, that way it is done correctly.

-wes

[turboglenn]

We align all of our track cars with 4 jack stands, 2 aluminum pieces of box tubing wider than the car, a roll of twine and a tape measure and camber tool.

You build a box around the car by using 2 jack stands in front with a aluminum bar across them and the same setup in the back. You have to notch them evenly from each end to where you know the string is going to be in the same position front and back. Square the string up from the rear tires or a body line that works well for you and then measure the distance from the string to the wheel lip on the front rims... Measure at the front along the center/axle line and measure in the rear. The front should end up about 1/8th inch further from the string (equally on both sides) to have toe in, to get toe out make the rear lip measure 1/8th more than the front. If it doesn't make sense i'll draw a pic.

It's best to lift the car and set a piece of sheet metal plate under each front tire then let it back down on teh sheet, this is to make them turn easier while aligning them so you don't have to move the car at all.

[Zmann42087]

I bought SPC Performance's FasTrax alignment tool at the beginning of the summer and its paid for itself already. So far I've used it to align the DSM and my E30 BMW. Really helps take any guess work out of the equation.