Tire rub and alignment report

[JDExSquid]

I just got my car aligned by a knowledgable shop and figured I'd share the experience. Check out the printout. Mind you, take notice of the CASTER specs. They are not stock and have been altered. Here's the reason: I cut the front springs by 3/4 spring and then heated and bent the metal down so the spring would sit correctly in the perch. I am running Sumitomo 185-60/13 tires and they did not rub at all, before the spring chop or after. Then I got the alignment done. I wound up putting a set of camber bolts on the front and the back. By the way, O' Reilly's Auto Parts had the camber bolt kit (2) locally at a warehouse for $28.00 .Best price so far. Anyway, this shop made adjustments for toe, camber, and caster. Everything was perfect, except now the front tires rubbed badly on the turns, enough so that I had to remove the fender liners. Good thing I did. I found the beginnings of some rot that could otherwise NOT be seen. Anyway, tires still rubbed a bit, so I took it back to the shop and had the caster reset to what it was before I took it to them. Absolutely no rubbing and steering doesn't seem to be affected. I don't think tirewear will be an issue as that is mainly affected by toe and camber, but please correct me if I'm wrong.

I hope this helps. I've seen a few posts as of late about tires rubbing and was thinking that caster could be a possible cause to these troubles.

Jim in Atlanta

Remember, the caster in the lower picture shows green 6.2 and 5.9 degrees. This is a modified value, not the factory value in the Hunter alignment computer.

 

[bbrown]

Good info Jim

Thanks for sharing this info and I'm glad you were able to work through yours successfully.

I had mine aligned at a shop with similar equipment, or at least with a similar printout.
In the end, my alignment is correct, but I think I should have gotten a smaller tire size.
My tire rub is no longer an issue but I had to add the Plaia strut tower plates to cure it.

 

[///Mike]

Great info

Thanks for posting this Jim.

Out of curiosity, where were your tires rubbing and what was the caster setting before you had it readjusted?

Also, where did you find rot in the front wheel wells? I recently removed my front liners and found some rot in a very strange place-- up high on the inside of the wheel well towards the very back. There's a small box section there that had apparently been getting water inside of it, but there was no drain for it to escape. Very strange-- only on one side of the car and the rest of the car is virtually rust free.

Thanks again for the post. Looking forward to hearing more.

///Mike

 

[JDExSquid]

The front outside edge of the tire

was rubbing the fender quite a bit after the first alignment attempt. Before I had anything done, caster was 6.2 drivers and 5.9 deg passenger. Washers are used to make the adjustment. Three on one side, two on the other where the support rod attaches to the big rubber bushing in the front. To bring it into "factory" specs, we removed all of the washers and realigned. Bad move. The steering felt great and it tracked perfectly down the road, but that rubbing wasn't going to cut it.

On the chart, 7.1 and 6.6 degrees was close to what the factory specs called for. I don't know who's writing the specs, but drugs may be involved. I imagine clearance would be tight even with the original tires, much less with the 60 series tires which were stock on the 87's.

I found rust (so far) only at the front lower edge of the fender where the splash guard attached. I figure it's pretty easy for water and crud to become trapped behind the lip and dissolve the steel. I plan on leaving the liners out and treating the metal, then spray some rubberized undercoating or similar product to seal the area.

Mike, I'll take a look at the box in mine to check for rust. Thanks for the tip!

Jim in Atlanta

 

[///Mike]

Thanks Jim

I noticed that my '85 has three washers on each radius rod and I was considering removing a couple to increase caster. Sounds like that might not be such a good idea.

I found a bit of rust at the lower front of the right front wheelwell, for the exact same reason. I was suprised at the amount of garbage stuck between the liner and the lip.

I used a Dremel to cut away the rusted edge and blend that area back into the inner lip. The coated the entire area with two coats of Wurth Rust Guard to arrest the rust and stop it from recurring. Scuffed that, coated it with some paintable undercoat, then top coated it with some Dupli-color that was roughly similar in color to the factory paint.

I highly recommend using the Wurth stuff (some folks like Por15) to coat the rusted areas before you topcoat. That'll keep the rust from continuing under the new paint.

Thanks again for the info,

///Mike