my alignment (page attached)

[97talondsm]

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i was told that forged control arms (SP 72170) would do me good with this, but those are 400 dollars for the cheapest ive found yet. anyone got any ideas as to what i can do to correct my camber and my little toe?? i dont feel like buying tires every 6 months to a year...

thanks =]

 

[mschlanglv]

I'm not familiar with the 2g cars, but isn't toe adjustable with the factory parts?

 

[dustinmp3]

alright on the sheet you have camber caster and toe
toe is what eats tires that is adjustable with factory from the outter tierods and the others can be changed by slotting the struts we do this at work and will save you alot of money
anyplace that does alignment can do this just ask them to slot the struts and they can fix it
hope this helps

 

[yangtech]

Can't believe they didn't even adjust your front toe. If they were doing it.

 

[evileclipse909]

On a 2g you can slot the lower control arm a bit or shim the back of the upper control arm in the rear to fix camber. As far as the front you'll need the adjustable upper control arm balljoints from I believe engles. They sell them fairly cheap on ebay.

 

[luv2rallye]

Dustinmp3 is correct when he says incorrect toe is what eats tires, not camber (unless it's way, way off which yours isn't). And toe is adjustable on both front and back on a 2g.

But you have a serious problem with your rear toe. The LR is toed way out and the RR way in (which causes the trust angle to be -0.29") which makes the car go down the road crooked. The rear of the car is way farther over to the left than the front because of this. This must be corrected and done before front toe is adjusted. You can do both yourself and save yourself $ with a little patience and some work. [Toe specs: Front toe-in should be 0 +/- 0.12", rear toe-in should be 0.12" +/- 0.12.].

There is an eccentric cam bolt on the rear toe control arm where it meets the chassis used to adjust rear toe.
[This bolt sometimes is rusted to the sleeve inside which prevents turning. The only way then is to cut it out and replace the arm which is why many shops refuse to do it (like yours). If this is the case here is how it's done: http://www.dsmtuners.com/forums/art...3-replacing-seized-rear-toe-control-arms.html. It is some work but will save you a lot of $.]
Each wheel needs to be adjusted against a parallel line to the car. The rears can be done as shown here using strings: Do It Yourself Alignment Tips.

Front toe adjustment:
(Note: If doing 4 wheel alignment, rears should be done first.) For the front, the tie rod ends are used to adjust toe (remember to adjust both equally except when trying to center steering wheel). After each adjustment, if you had the wheels off the ground to do so, roll the car back and forth 6' and bounce the fender up/down a couple times to allow suspension to settle to its new position. For toe measurement you can use the string method again or what's easier is to make your own simple toe gauge as shown in the attached pictures (all parts at Home Depot). Only the total toe is crucial on the front as the steering wheel will compensate for straight ahead position. This may initially make your steering wheel be not in the center but with a little practice (and because the toe gauge is 100 times faster to use than the string method), you can easily re-adjust to get it in the center. You will get the hang of it very quickly (or if you don't care just leave the steering wheel where it ends up). For toe measurement just mark where the 90 degree angle iron (toe gauge 2) meets the bottom bar with the setup first on the rear wheel lip and then on the front lip. The distance between is the toe (rear being out farther is positive toe).
Note: Remember this method cannot be used for the rear toe as the rears must be parallel with the car so a different method like the string method or an alignment shop must be used.

Camber measurement (all wheels):
For camber checking see "Checking Camber" at Do It Yourself Alignment Tips

 

[PieEyedPiper]

^^ A very detailed and informative post.

My thoughts are these:
1) the shop never aligned anything at all, they only took readings.
2) the shop should easily be able to adjust your front and rear toe into spec, barring the disastrous seizing of the eccentric cam/bolt in the rear that plagues many 2gs.
3) only toe is adjustable on 2g's, so it is up to you to adjust your front and rear camber by other means. I prefer 0.0* toe up front and a little toe-in in the rear for stability under braking.
4) you have a considerable amount of negative camber up front, but it is nothing outrageous and I would have no problem running with those specs.
5) your rear camber is excessive, and you need a camber kit to correct it. I like the DIY washer method. My suggestion to you is to aim for about half of the negative camber in the rear as you are running up front. So for you, that means -1 to -0.5* of negative camber in the rear.
6) you can fix your alignment for the cost of some string (as mentioned above) or pay the alignment shop to correct the toe, and finally, make use of a rear camber kit to correct the negative camber.

Around my place, an alignment is $75, and the washers/bolts for the DIY rear kit are $20 or less. I don't buy a lot of string.. so you're on your own for that one

 

[luv2rallye]

Here is the DIY rear camber washer method mentioned (I used this on mine): 1997 Mitsubishi Eclipse GS-T Homepage

 

[PIMking]

dont feel bad the shop that did my alignment messed up on the rear and didn't tighten the essentric bolt on the drivers side with the camber kit in it and I had a TON of camber a couple of miles down the road. not only that they broke two rachets on my toe adjusters so now I have my rears pointing inward a bit. So I sprayed them down with camel piss and hopefully it can be strait.

 

[dustinmp3]

try to heat it and that might get yours loose with a torch.
as for the shop that isn't something that they sould have done sent you on your way it sounds like they do have a clue on what they are doing and it is a good thing that they didn't do the alignment for you.
if you take it to a chrysler shop to get it aligned then they can get the shims and everything to make it right at our shop it is normally 140-200 depending on how long it takes, we are at 70.50 an hour so it could be more or less depending on the shop rate.

 

[luv2rallye]

Be forewarned - (From http://www.dsmtuners.com/forums/art...3-replacing-seized-rear-toe-control-arms.html):

"If you live in the north, or wherever salt is used on the roads in winter, sooner or later your mechanic will tell you that your rear toe cannot be adjusted because the bolts are seized. When the bolts become rust-welded inside the bushings, you will not have much luck blasting it with your favorite release agent (PB Blaster, et al). Looking at the bushing from under the car, you will notice a lot of rust. Drenching this part of the bushing will not help. The problem is on the inside where the bolt passes through and it's not likely that you can get any spray lube in there. You will not be able to remove and replace just the bolt. The entire control arm assembly will need to be replaced."

You can't heat the sleeve bushing (that the bolt goes through) up because that will destroy the rubber bushing attached between it and the toe control arm (even when I later deliberately melted the rubber bushing completely and heated the sleeve bushing, it still wouldn't budge). I've also tryed heating the bolt red hot on both ends and it made no difference (and of course also used PB Plast, hammers, etc). The only solution was to cut it out and replace the entire arm - and this must be done very carefully as it's tricky to get in there (see Toe_Arm1.jpg in referenced article). And remember you will be doing both sides. The time it takes to do this and the risk is why many alignment shops may refuse to do it (like his did - I'm sure they figured this out or already knew from other 2g's and said no thanks).

So definately try heating the bolt first to see if you can turn it inside the sleeve bushing. If you can great.
If not, you will have to cut the arm out per the referenced article as I did. Plan on an entire afternoon or even day but have the new arms there before you start.