I've been reading everyone's comments for autocross/street alignments and have settled on what I'll go for later this week. The car will see 2-4 autocrosses per month and about 200-300 street miles per week. Street tire wear is a concern (thus, 0 toe all the way around), but I'll be flipping tires for longevity at their half-way point anyways (street tires are RE750s, so they have a longer life than S-02s).

Setup:
2003
Saner FSB (lowest stiffness for now, need more time with it)
Toyo RA-1s (205/245 F/R)

Alignment Specs:
Front
-------------
Camber -1.0*
Caster 5.5*
Toe 0"

Rear
-------------
Camber -2.0*
Toe 0"

Comments or criticisms for these settings? Thanks.

 

RA1s will like to have more camber than that.

 

So I should bump the camber to around 1.5F/2.5R?

 

Probably, but I can't say for sure because of two things:

1) I don't autoX
2) I have a stock swaybar

But I was running 1.5/3.0 all last year on the track (RA1s), and my rear tire wear was just perfect while my front tires definitely wore more on the outside edges.

On my street tires (S-03s), the front tire wear was nice and even while the rear tires wore more on the inside.

Oh, and the car understeered, but not too badly.

 

I'm sure it will turn into a trial-and-error process, but I'm hoping to get near the mark from the beginning (the budget won't allow multiple $100 alignments). I'm also changing a crapload of factors at once: tires, FSB, and alignment. I haven't seen anyone running the same setup mention their alignment specs, but maybe someone is and will chime in. Thanks for the input Mike.

 

I'd quickly change that rear toe to at least 1/8" total toe IN - many folks run 1/4" total toe in. 0 in the rear will likely lead to spins, especially with the front bar set on soft. I'd immediately change that to at least a medium stiffness, also.

 

I agree with adding slight toe-in for the rear. This will address the rear bump steer issue. The other solution is to get the BSK (Bump Steer Kit), which will allow you to run nearly zero toe-in without problems.

 

Many people, including me, also prefer a much higher caster, 6+

 

OK, these settings are taking into the feedback I've received. The camber is still a bit of a compromise, but I may just have to see how it works out; the added caster should help a bit too. As for the FSB, I'm installing it tonight and will set it at medium stiffness; I'm a little leary of that though since I'm running 205 instead 225 up front, but I'll see how it works out.

Front
-------------
Camber -1.2*
Caster 6.0*
Toe 0"

Rear
-------------
Camber -2.2*
Toe 0.125" in (0.0625"/side)

 

If you have not already bought the RA-1s, get 225 fronts. Either way, you may want to run more front camber (-1.5). Don't worry too much about camber wear, it's toe that kills tires. I like:


-1.5 camber
6 camber
0 toe

-2.5 camber
.50 degrees toe in

My FSB is set in the middle setting (225/245). With your 205 front, you probably should set the swaybar to full soft.