View Full Version : Pulling to the left - help me Decipher this wheel alignment!
gzeus
12-09-2005, 09:23 PM
Hi guys,
It's been a while. Anyway, My TS was pulling a bit to the left and the front tyres were wearing more on the outside edges (mainly on the left front wheel and a bit less on the right front). I did a front wheel alignment and the damn thing still pulls left (not too crazy though) and I have noticed from the printout that the guy put now a -1.0mm of toe on both front wheels insted of the previous -0.3mm on the left front and -0.1mm on the right front. The camber was also changed from 0.10 degrees on front left to 0.05 degrees and from -0.14 degrees on the front right to -0.11 degrees. I am afraid that because it is still pulling to the left it will still be chewing the now newly fitted brand new tyres on the outside edges (or even inside edges cos it's got so much negative toe on them). I am basically double checking if the guy did it right by asking this if any of you have any experience with wheel alignments. Should I go back to the shop and have them redo it cos it's still pulling or can a car pull to the side even if everything is aligned properly?
Thanks for the help :)
Cheers,
Bo
Magnette
13-09-2005, 08:52 AM
What th..?!
Not sure about the specs for 2nd gen... but Shouldn't they all be equal? :nuts:
And did the alignment mechanic put a 50kg weight in the car as usually required?
gzeus
13-09-2005, 09:48 AM
Hey Magnette,
By weight you mean simulating the same situation when the driver is in the car? I don't know the shop they did it in I could not watch inside what they were doing. Yeah I thought that toe should be 0.0mm not -1.0mm on both. I don't know anyone alse has experience with alignment and can tell me if I should go back and make them redo it or Did they do it right?
Magnette
13-09-2005, 10:35 AM
Toe doesn't necessarily need to be zero, but it should be same for both sides...
otherwise it means your steering wheel ain't pointing straight!! :confused:
Dunno what the factory specs are for 2nd gen.
I assume that your suspension is 100% stock.
Running more toe Out (the "-" means different things to different people)
will make your car more responsive on turn-in at corners, good fun if you know how.
My old TN ran more toe Out with less castor and the tail could get loose.
(nb you can't adjust castor without serious subframe surgery)
A good alignment place should be able to adjust to whatever settings you ask them to.
(some guys get 'custom' settings done just before they go for track days)
Re weight, it depends on the factory specs.
Quite often they ask to put certain weights on the car floor
before doing any alignment measurements.
Madmagna
13-09-2005, 06:31 PM
I have done thousands of wheel allignements and have never heard of putting 50kg on the drivers floor. Quite often there are 2 people in the car so this would negate the whole idea. Some cars have a slightly higher drivers side strut, Mazda being an example with a small spacer under the strut top.
- is in
+ is out
The factory spec for toe is 0 + or - 3mm Ideal is of course 0
In will wear the outside edges
Out will wear the inside edges
Magna sedans have a very common fault of the rear axle not being 100% true, to get a real straight drive you need to get the front wheels aligned with the rear as refrence points.
Also make sure that you are using a level road to gain this assumption as a cambered road will give you a false sense the car is pulling
As for camber, unless your wheel allignment was way out before or you have camber bolts it should not have changed any where near that much.
veradagirl
13-09-2005, 09:17 PM
Hi guys,
It's been a while. Anyway, My TS was pulling a bit to the left and the front tyres were wearing more on the outside edges (mainly on the left front wheel and a bit less on the right front). I did a front wheel alignment and the damn thing still pulls left (not too crazy though) and I have noticed from the printout that the guy put now a -1.0mm of toe on both front wheels insted of the previous -0.3mm on the left front and -0.1mm on the right front. The camber was also changed from 0.10 degrees on front left to 0.05 degrees and from -0.14 degrees on the front right to -0.11 degrees. I am afraid that because it is still pulling to the left it will still be chewing the now newly fitted brand new tyres on the outside edges (or even inside edges cos it's got so much negative toe on them). I am basically double checking if the guy did it right by asking this if any of you have any experience with wheel alignments. Should I go back to the shop and have them redo it cos it's still pulling or can a car pull to the side even if everything is aligned properly?
Thanks for the help :)
Cheers,
Bo
Hi all, i'm verada girls boyfreind.
After reading this post i would recomend taking the car back to wherever you had the allign. done and have them reset the toe to 0mm. With the toe set to -2.00mm your front tyres will scrub the inside edge very quickly (sorry madmagna quoted wrong way around). As for the cambers I am asuming that the left is running positive camber as most do but even if it is negative it will drift left due to the fact that the difrence is reverse staggered. This means that there is more negative camber on the right than on the left. If you wish to correct this than you will require a camber bolt installing in the left strut. Also you havn't mentioned the caster or king pin angles witch also have significant bearings on the drivability. Casters should be more positive on the left than on the right, these are not adjustable unless you have offset caster bushes installed by someone (non standard). This is all on the basis that you car is just used for driving around in not for race track as the figure would have to be very different again.
If you have any further questions or if you would like me to set the car up for you than please forward any remarks to verada girl.
P.S. I have been wheel aligning for near on 6 years for a highly recognised company.
gzeus
13-09-2005, 10:43 PM
Hey mate,
Thanks for that. Yes I forgot to mention the caster was left the same as before: 2.64 degrees on left and 2.89 degrees on right which yes it would make it turn left then I guess from what you are saying. Unfortunately I cannot fix that if it is not easily set as toe is. I don't want to spend too much on the car as petrol prices are enough of a burden as it is. Yes I thought that now the inside edges will be suffering cos the guy put more negative toe on them. But even with the toe it was on before (-0.3mm on the left and -0.1mm on the right) it was chewing up the outside edge of both front tyres (left one more than the right one though). I guess the guy just did whatever was the easiest for him to get rid of me. The Steer ahead angle front is 0 degrees 00.
It's weird that the camber changed after this "alignment" as he said that on these cars you cannot change camber. The back end has the following numbers: left rear: camber -0.7 degrees, toe 0.7mm. Right rear: camber -1.02 degrees, toe 0.0mm. The thrust angle is 0 degrees.02
It was tough to see if it is only the road that is making it turn to the left, but I found a road that slopes down to the right and after a couple of meters of not holding the wheel it doesn't go right but just holds the line for a while and then starts to slowly go to the left, so yes it is still pulling left.
Where are you located? I am on the Gold Coast and yes I would be interested in your inspection of the iron lady and a proper alignment. PM me for details if you are on the GC.
Bo
teK--
13-09-2005, 11:02 PM
I run 0.0 toe on the front, as on FWDs when you accelerate the wheels will have a natural tendency to have dynamic toe-out. Mal's right about the rear wheels on 2nd gens, it's really a matter of pot luck how good yours is, as it's not adjustable (by any normal means, I'll let you interpret it however you want ;) ). Mine just happened to be right on perfect at the rear.
Re 50kg weight in driver's seat, this is only for people who drive around by themselves for most of the time (like me) and/or are wanting optimal handling or have non-road-camber-related drifting issues. In this case I actually sat in the car to get my own weight as a reference for the aligner, who then compensated the negative camber on the RHS by 15min less.
For a lot of Opel product such as the Vectra, we actually specify in the workshop manual that you need to align the wheels with a 50kg ballast in the driver's footwell. This is because the suspension geometry was set up with caster compensation for RHS cambered roads (European), but when the car was converted to RHD the suspension was not changed to suit Australian roads and so is much more sensitive to poor wheel alignment.
Also check your tyre pressures are even.
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