Alignment / Tracking results

peter212693

peter212693

peter212693

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Hi all,

My civic had new tyres about 3 months ago and I have noticed the inner edge on the fronts are wearing faster than the rest of the tyre. Now I went for a alignment / tracking check this morning and was told "Yea, the fronts where out". Now the system the garage used was a "Supertracker" and I got a print out as below:

28koeqa.jpg


Can anyone translate this to English for me ;)? I presume this was a before result? Now they said the rears where fine so no adjustments where made so I only payed for the 2 front adjustments.

Does this look like what was causing my tyre wear problem? I also presume adjustments where made but no final print out is given?

Cheers!
 
Looks like the small numbers must be before results and the big numbers the after results. You had some crazy toe-out before - that -4.3 degrees (total toe between both wheels -4.8 degrees) which has been corrected to around 0. That could certainly have been the cause of inner edge tyre wear, so hopefully it'll be better. Rear hasn't been touched but I wouldn't say totally fine - more like borderline OK with that 1.9 degrees toe in on the rear. Don't know what the spec is but seems a lot. Even though the individual toe angles of the rear wheels are in green, suggesting within spec, the combined toe between the rear wheels of 2.2 has gone red suggesting just out of spec. Car must crab slightly with the rear like that. Ideally that right rear toe would be reduced a bit, but possibly it isn't adjustable - not sure. How does it drive now?
 
Thanks for your reply mate. Hope this does solve the wear problem, seems like it! As for the rear im not sure about it not being adjustable. As for how it drives, the front seems to under steer a little less maybe? As for the crabbing I can say it does but could say it doesnt. Is it worth taking back and asking them about the rear adjustment?

EDIT: Quick check on the civinfo boards the rear is fixed! Adjustment is only possible with the addition of shims?
 
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The Running Man said:
Hm looking at that, has your car been crashed? or using odd shaped wheels or something?

Im seeing very little symmetry here,
Click to expand...

To be honest ive had it a year now and hit a fair few pot holes! As for a crash, the HPI was clear but you never know! I very much doubt its ever been checked and its a 56 plate.
 
That is still all over the shop, however the front toe is a million times better than it was, no wonder you were wearing tyres out.

How could you not notice 4 freaking degrees of toe out on the front left !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Taking it on face value I'd say it can't have been that far out so that brings me to the worry that the whole graph is nothing but toilet paper.


That is also a rather comical (and worrying) 1.9 degrees of toe in on the O/S/R

I think your car has been in a ditch. :p
 
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That is also a rather comical (and worrying) 1.9 degrees of toe in on the O/S/R

I think your car has been in a ditch. :p
Click to expand...

Is it worth going back with or taking it on the chin? If im honest the handling isn't too bad but if its wrong its wrong. Although the rear is quite off is it worth the shims / adjustment cost?

A bit shocking they didn't even mention it but what do I know.

On the point of a ditching / crash is this worth taking up? HPI was clear when I bought it but hey ho?
 
As said, it's a fixed beam so you will have to talk to them about cost of doing the shim work. (it's a faff)
(but then they should have known this being a wheel alignment centre :confused: so why they didn't inform you of the costs to start with I have no idea.
Either way, that rear tyre is going to wear out fairly quickly with that much toe in, so you'll need to weigh up the costs associated with leaving it like it is and paying for tyres more often or putting the fault right. ;)

The way I would approach it is.

1. Check the wheels aren't buckled. Waste of time trying to wheel align a car with wheels that aren't true unless the alignment machine has "run out compensation"
2. Get a second opinion on the alignment from a different garage.
3. Fix the faults that appear to be true
 
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Toe can easily be knocked out that much on a 30mph pothole, I woudn't worry about it. Control arms seem almost consumable on some cars now.
 
It's a beam axle so there are no control arms and no that is way beyond what a pothole would do.
 
I think dodgy equipment/operator error is more likely than it being genuinely broken? It would take a hefty whack to bend the rear beam.

The factory alignment on these cars is never brilliant from what ive seen, the front subframes are not always put on as straight as you'd get with some cars, tolerances are quite large apparently for a modern car. I had my old FN2 type r set up after changing suspension, with camber bokts etc, and the guys at a line in dudley (known for being a good alignment place) said the swindon hondas can be a bit wonky and need more fiddling than you might expect.
 
4'80 lol. I only managed to bend mine 3deg when another car hit the wheel on lock. At that, the car was extremely unstable and unsafe to drive. That must have been a shambles, doubly so with the rear messed up half as bad too. That rear right needs sorting, left ain't so good either.
 
Fuzz said:
That is still all over the shop, however the front toe is a million times better than it was, no wonder you were wearing tyres out.

How could you not notice 4 freaking degrees of toe out on the front left !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Taking it on face value I'd say it can't have been that far out so that brings me to the worry that the whole graph is nothing but toilet paper.


That is also a rather comical (and worrying) 1.9 degrees of toe in on the O/S/R

I think your car has been in a ditch. :p
Click to expand...

Whilst the numbers are fairly extreme toe in on the rear helps stability and toe out on the front of a FWD car is normal (opposite of RWD) as when accelerating the wheels take up the flex in the suspension bushes and pull to toe in/straight ahead.

As a general rule, FWD toe out pulls to toe in when driving and a RWD car, front toe in pulls to toe out when driving due to drag (depending on how much camber you run). If you polybush you can reduce the amounts of each, giving increased consistency.

Too much front toe out and the car can feel very unsettled at the front under braking as braking increases toe out.
 
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Dr Who said:
Whilst the numbers are fairly extreme toe in on the rear helps stability and toe out on a FWD car is normal (opposite of RWD) as when accelerating the wheels take up the flex in the suspension bushes and pull to toe in/straight ahead.

As a general rule, FWD toe out pulls to tow in when driving and RWD toe in pulls to toe out when driving (depending on how much camber you run). If you polybush you can reduce the amounts of each, giving increased consistency.

Too much front toe out and the car can feel very unsettled at the front under braking as braking increases toe out.
Click to expand...

All of that has to do with the configuration of the arms/rack and nothing to do with the driven wheels though really and certainly nothing to do with camber. Those general rules are wrong too. Most cars have a rear mounted rack hence will toe out as the wheel moves forward away from it. Any rear drive worth it's salt will toe in under accel/squat.
 
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No thanks.

You are the one here that has really demonstrated not having a clue. That links explains each individual aspect but nothing about how they interact as a system. This is specific to a chassis and depends on the geometry of the arm lengths, pickup points and knuckle geometry.
 
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Dr Who said:
Whilst the numbers are fairly extreme toe in on the rear helps stability and toe out on a FWD car is normal (opposite of RWD) as when accelerating the wheels take up the flex in the suspension bushes and pull to toe in/straight ahead.

As a general rule, FWD toe out pulls to tow in when driving and RWD toe in pulls to toe out when driving (depending on how much camber you run). If you polybush you can reduce the amounts of each, giving increased consistency.

Too much front toe out and the car can feel very unsettled at the front under braking as braking increases toe out.
Click to expand...

And?

Fairly extreme! I've set drift cars with less toe out than that. :p

and as Clarkey says, you've got your toe in/out mixed up on the rear of a RWD car. It will pull toe IN on acceleration and cruise and reduce or toe OUT on deceleration "usually".

Either way the car is not anywhere near close to being a sensible or an "OK" setup and it needs looking at.
 
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Clarkey said:
No thanks.

You are the one here that has really demonstrated not having a clue. That links explains each individual aspect but nothing about how they interact as a system. This is specific to a chassis and depends on the geometry of the arm lengths, pickup points and knuckle geometry.
Click to expand...

As you didn't read it you must have missed this bit....

When a wheel is set up to have some camber angle, the interaction between the tire and road surface causes the wheel to tend to want to roll in a curve, as if it were part of a conical surface (camber thrust). This tendency to turn increases the rolling resistance as well as increasing tire wear. A small degree of toe (toe-out for negative camber, toe-in for positive camber) will cancel this turning tendency
Click to expand...

Camber also affects the tendancy to bump steer along with the height of the connection to the rack (toe change during suspension compression).

I have not got anything mixed up, you generally use toe out on the front drive wheels and toe in at the other end.

I was only mentioning toe on the front wheels for both and toe in at the rear on the car in question as specifically replied to in my post (the post I quoted).

Yes of course there is different levels of interaction based on arm lengths, suspension type (ie macpherson vs double wishbone).

But whatever you do you cannot change the tendancy of drive wheels to convert toe out to toe in under load without some very fancy geometry.

Remember also that toe will change slightly from a static situation to a dynamic one. This is is most noticeable on a front-wheel-drive car or independently-suspended rear-drive car. When driving torque is applied to the wheels, they pull themselves forward and try to create toe-in. This is another reason why many front-drivers are set up with toe-out in the front. Likewise, when pushed down the road, a non-driven wheel will tend to toe itself out. This is most noticeable in rear-drive cars.
Click to expand...

You would not use toe out on the front of a rwd car and you wouldn't use toe in on the front of a fwd car as both would make the car squirelly under acceleration.

Now I am talking about road cars only not drift cars as they run specific setups with way more castor angle to promote a lot of self centring.
 
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Dr Who said:
Camber also affects the tendancy to bump steer along with the height of the connection to the rack (toe change during suspension compression).

I have not got anything mixed up, you generally use toe out on the drive wheels and toe in at the other end.

I was only mentioning toe on the front wheels for both and toe in at the rear on the car in question as specifically replied to in my post.

Yes of course there is different levels of interaction based on arm lengths, suspension type (ie macpherson vs double wishbone).

But whatever you do you cannot change the tendancy of drive wheels to convert toe out to toe in under load without some very fancy geometry.

You would not use toe out on the front of a rwd car and you wouldn't use toe in on the front of a fwd car as both would make the car squirelly under acceleration.

Now I am talking about road cars only not drift cars as they run specific setups with way more castor angle to promote a lot of self centring.
Click to expand...
Oh god, what you wrote is just so wrong it's on another planet.
 
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