I just had an alignment done last week the day before my Honda Challenge Race, the alignment I ended up with was
LF -1.2 camber, 5.9 Caster, 0 Toe
RF -1.4 camber, 6 caster 0 Toe
LR -3 Camber, -.1 Toe
RR -2.8 Camber,-.1 Toe

Car Felt Great the next day and I knocked a full second off my lap time's in the morning. But as the day went on my car was going slower and slower, It just didnt have the grip it had in the morning, I know this can be contributed to many things, but just for the hell of it I manually checked my camber a few minutes ago with a ruler and some string, here is what I came up with.
LF -1.45 Camber
RF -0.9 Camber
LR -3.8 Camber
RR -2.5 Camber

Looks like the camber has changed A LOT. Has anyone else experienced this when tracking their car? or did the shop just not tighten things down enough. Either way Im doing all alignments by myself from now on, just wondering if this much of a change has happened to anyone else, if so looks like I'll be aligning the car a few times every month.. doh

Mike

 

Considering surface irregularity and measurement error, I don't think these figures can be compared.

 

Any good race shop will use an impact gun to "torque" the alignment bolts. If it moved they didn't toque them nearly hard enuf.

But gernby is right too.

 

Is a ruler and string not likely to vary somewhat with the instrumentation used when you had the alignment done previously? The alignment can change with big hits like curbs or offs; I would expect that you'd want to perform an alignment (using consistent measuring tools and techniques) before and probably after each race.

Could be stuff was loose too...

 

I should have been more clear. If you were measuring your camber by using concrete as your perpendicular reference point, then you have to assume that there will be significant error. All concrete will have some waves that will skew your readings. I wouldn't be surprised if my seamingly perfect garage floor had enough wavyness (word?) to give a .5 degree error.

Try turning the car around 180 degrees in the same spot and measure them again. I bet the numbers will be completely different.

 

your right, it has to have some sort of impact.. I'll go try right now, I have nothing better to do heh

 

What are you using as your reference? If you are using a level, then any slant to the surface will cause a similar error. Actually looking at your numbers, it looks like that would make since. Both of your left wheels went more negative, while both right wheels went more positive. It sounds like your surface is causing the whole car to lean to the right.

 

Ok Im an idiot Gernby you are right.. I guess my garage floor is more unlevel then I realized.
I moved the car and came up with this.
LF -1.2
RF -1.34
RL -3.35
RR -3.13

Now Im ordering myself a real camber gauge
Thanks for the help..

BTW this thread is now useless

Mike

 

Also check your front upper a-arm brackets... Our car was terminally losing front camber on a professional rack, and we finally tracked it down to the ripped upper a-arm brackets. Your car is new enough that's probably not it, but you may as well check. And get some leveling pads for crying out loud!

 

[QUOTE]Originally posted by krazik
[B]Any good race shop will use an impact gun to "torque" the alignment bolts.