alignment

[zach12281984]

i have a 95 eclipse rs. i lowered her 3in. with skunk2 coilovers. my question is, i took it to a garage to get it alligned, but they said it couldnt be done. what do i do, do i buy a camber kit and tell them to use it or what? i thought they would know to use a camber kit.

 

[x camaro owner]

you have to buy a camber for them to put on and bring it on for the alignment

 

[EclpzLvr97]

The car may need more than alignment. Like said....get a camber kit and have them put that on. Being dropped that much, it definately needs the kit and soon before your tires are toast....front and back.

 

[cuttheduck]

Why exactly couldn't they do it?
Yes you will need a camber kit but it seems like theres another reason they couldnt do it since most shops will still align toe.
Are you too low for their lifts or have rustwelded bolts?

 

[Defiant]

Some shops won't (or can't, depending on their lawyers) work on lowered cars because they're illegal.

Some shops won't do it because their equipment doesn't have enough adjustment range. Some won't because the mechanic doesn't know enough about it, and hates comebacks. Some mechanics are lazy, some are fussy.

Did they give a real reason?

At any rate, shop around. Another shop will be delighted to take your money.

 

[Doug99RS]

The mechanic probably can't get the car on to the alignment rack. Most racks are NOT flat on the ground. They will have at least an inch and a half bump to get on just the ramps alone. I'm not talking about driving over a 2x4 either. That's easy. Once you're on it... that's the end. But the front fascia on your car is so low to the ground that he'd be pealing your front end under the car until he got the rear tires up on the ramps. On top of that the alignment heads won't be able to see under the front fascia in order to be calibrated with each other.

The alignment itself will be much more involved as well. When you have to make adjustments to a car like this, the amount of labor goes up because the car is no longer stock. Meaning... stock 2g's have only front and rear toe adjustments from the factory. As such a four wheel alignment only covers toe adjustment. Now you've dropped the car by using coil-overs. A good alignment technician is going to tell you he doesn't want to touch the car because without weighing each corner as well as taking ride height measurements, there's no way to know if the alignment readings he is getting are because of adjustments that are out of whack or if it's because you've lowered the car unevenly. Coil-overs are not for newbs and just because a company will sell them to you that doesn't mean that it is what's right for the car.

 

[ldstang50]

Aside fromt the fact of getting the car on the lift a lot of alignment shops won't align an altered car because by lowering the car you have taken away the factory settings of camber and maybe toe. As Doug said, 2gs only have adjustable toe. The reason they wont' align a modified car is they cant' the car back into factory specs and do not want to be held reliable for adjusting your car and possible brakign something or worse having you wreck car and then come back and say it was their fault cause they aligned it wrong.