Please look at my alignment settings
 

I'm a car guy, I promise (installed the Swifts myself).

But I have no idea how to read an alignment sheet. Could somebody take a look at this and tell me what adjustment kits I need, if any or what I should tell the alignment people.

I'm on Swifts and stock dampers if that helps any.

http://imagizer.imageshack.us/v2/xq90/824/ewe6.jpg

Generally you want more front camber than rear, yours seem to be the opposite. I would go for like -2.0 front and -1.5 rear instead of vice versa.

Toe, I am not the guy to ask but generally 0.0 for starters, and then a little toe in the front for FR cars so yours is fine.
Not sure on the rear but I guess I would expect 0.0 or a little negative.

Caster, seems a little low but is fine.

Ride heights -good news they are nice and even, bad news is that they are nice and even. This means your corner weights are going to be off, but no biggy there.


All in all it's not a bad alignment for regular street use, could be better if the camber angles were flip flopped.

Your rear camber are pretty high and will wear out your tires fast. I'm on Swifts/Stock Shocks combo. I got the SPL rear camber kit and SPC toe bolts to get my alignment back to factory specs. As for the front, just try to get it back factory spec as close as you can, from what I read, most can get within range of factory spec or just simply ignore it. As for camber kits, you have a ton of choices out there, but most go with SPC (cheap) or SPL ($$$ but its the best you can get). Short version, get a rear camber kit and toe bolts if you don't want to wear out your tires FAST! Good luck!

Thanks guys. I will get a rear camber kit then.

Do I need fronts too?

not too bad. id just drive it as is if the car feels good.

I'm only confused on toe -- too much toe in the rear can make the car handle unpredictably; but if "thrust angle" is the effective toe, the rest looks okay.

My settings on koni yellows and swift springs are -1.65*camber in front, -2.38* in rear (thanks, in part, to SPC adjustable rear camber arms), and +.1* toe all around, so we actually have very similar settings and my car handles great!

The car feels fine to me after feeling real squirrely the first few days post-install. I think the rubber might have settled a bit and so that is when I took it in for alignment.

My Z is a garage queen so slightly aggressive tire wear settings would be fine. Should I just keep it as is and observe the wear for a few months?

yah. my G's setup more aggressive than yours and she's also a garage queen. tires usually last 8-10K depending on how spiritedly i drive.

considering tires's life is like 5-6yrs and i only put like 3k miles on the car per season, aggressive alignment and fun to drive > tire life.

Why does the rear toe confuse you? His numbers or what it means?

Why in the world are you running that much rear camber? You saying SPC is maxed out and you can't go lower?



I just got mine done. Everything factory in the front but swift spec-r springs and the rear is SPL traction links, camber arms and mid links with my lockout toe and camber bolt kit and 65mm by 6" 10k linear swift springs lowered to about 26.18" each side. If I do a corner balance I'll probably have to raise or lower a side then get another alignment.

I don't know how yours feels with so much rear camber and so little front but mine feels great on the street. I still need front arms to even caster out and get more camber. I shot for a little toe-out in the front and a little toe-in in the rear. I love it.

http://i39.photobucket.com/albums/e1...ps32153586.jpg

you wanted toe out on the front then for faster turn-in? thats my setup too on my G. slight toe-out on the front.

my Z is stock.

How much caster is good caster?

From everything I read yes. I no idea what -0.05* is in length or 0.04* and 0.06*, but I went for it.

thats good stuff. it's very subtle, but a noticable difference.

Go toe in on the front(dynamically stable but slower turn in)

and add more caster - +6-7 to start.

The caster will balance out the turn in sharpness and the toe in at the front is more dynamically stable. This is debatable on street setup, but for race setup it is the norm. For street the toe out in front is kind of a gimmick but it works and is safe at speed less than say 70 mph. At high speeds toe out in front is not stable-a wind gust can basically **** your steering up. Hard to explain, but basically picture a 40 mph gust of wind hitting the right side of your car-it will instantly add toe out, if you are already toed out, then for a split second your left wheel is pointed left and your right wheel is pointed way right. This will push you into a bad understeer situation.

Compare that to having toe in, on the wind blast side you will just get closer to 0, it will slow you, but it won't spin you.

At low speeds and not in a hurricane, butt dyno tells you toe out is fast, and yes it is responsive and fun. At 100 + mph and a large rock or blast of wind, it's a spin out since your car will not hold a straight line and will steer one way or the other and cause an over correction. That's the idea anyway.

I'm running in the front. Camber at -2, caster at +6, toe zero. In the rear, camber at -1.7 and toe at zero. With the SPL arms up front. I bet I could see +7 caster, -3 camber easy.

I'll have to play with it. -0.05 seems pretty low. Might as well call it zero. He started at 0.11 and it looked like with just a little movement of the tie rod end he got -0.05. Not even a full or half turn. I'll just see what happens. This seems interesting to test.

Front toe-out will introduce a bit of oversteer (looser)
Front toe-in will produce the opposite - understeer (tighter)
Steering response will be improved with front toe-out
Straight-line stability will be improved with front toe-in

I was confused on the meaning of toe vs thrust angle.

Turn in grip is excellent -- I was under the impression that more rear camber was desirable relative to front since you can turn the front wheels in, but not the rear.

Notwithstanding my limited comprehension of these matters, the car handles very well and very neutrally.

I was under the impression that caster was rarely tweaked on cars relative to motorbikes -- maybe I'm wrong here?

It all depends on what your goal is. Different alignments meet different goals.

For street and daily you want one thing for track you want something else.

Caster is most definitely adjusted more commonly on track setups. Since you normally will do a bit of toe in on a track setup, the added caster will add a little bit of the turn in sharpness back. Think about how a shopping cart steers-it has a ton of front caster(hence the name of the wheels on the shopping cart).

Again it's all a little subjective, but just like you don't need racing slicks to drive to work, nor would you want to go to the track with a set of $50.00 UTQG 800 Tire Guy Specials, most track cars tend to do a little toe in on the front for high speed stability, then compensate for that by adding caster. The SPL front camber arms can dial in I think up to -8 or -9 caster for this exact reason.

I can definitely see why at speeds <45MPH toe out in the front and little extra rear camber would work well, would really make the car turn on a dime(and easy to fit into small parking spots lol). It would definitely make the car turn in sharper. But I sure as hell wouldn't want to run that at a track on a windy day going 120 MPH+.

Sorry for the hijacking but it's on the same subject, i just didn't want to open a new thread yet:

My car is a stock 2010 with 19 inch wheels and original alignment.
I don't wish to change suspension currently but i do want to improve handling.
amount of grip is no problem - the car has tons of it. it's the delivery that annoys me.

1. i'd like better turn-in, but i understand there is not much to do in the front with original suspension. what numbers should i aim for?
2. i'd like some more playfulness in the back but without eating the tires too much in regular driving. is that possible?
3. is there a recommended aftermarket improvement that won't dry my pocket but give me good value for money handling-wise? (don't say tires ;-) )

Thanks

Roni

I'm the OP. This has become a very informative thread. Since I only do mild tracking, I never knew there was so much to alignments, but it makes complete sense once you think about it.

For now I am just monitoring my tires for wear.

1. Zero toe in the front.
2. Rear, Camber -1.75, Toe- Min spec on toe in. Shoot for close to zero.
3. Hotchkis sway bars. Around $400 for a pair.

Excellent! short and to the point.

Regarding sway bars. saw this vid (even has same color as mine :-) )
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ugztIcdW2ms
looks very impressive.
Question is: how much more uncomfortable does it make the car? Where i live the roads are terrible and i would not like the car to be worse than it already is...

Thanks

Roni

Not much more. I have them. Have the rear set to soft. The Z stays flat around turns. The Z likes a big front bar. With good tires. You'll have a lot of grip.

OK, i'll think about it.
Actually the Z is quite flat stock, and i'm a not a fan of the "flat is always better" movement (in more than one respect :rofl2:). too flat gives directness but takes away progressiveness. Plus, I already have quite a lot of grip. what i lack is tail playfulness (currently all i get is very late understeer) and some directness in the turn-in. I know it's not a good comparison because the Z i a heavy car, but when i drove a GT86 on the same track, it was much more pointy.

I miss light cars...

Roni