Day at the tire shop prepping my car

[VictorH]

Just spent the day at my friend's tire shop mounting dismounting and mounting 6 tires and doing an alignment.

1) If you pay extra at your shop for "alloy wheel mounting" I understand now why they charge more. First working a tire machine is hard work, but high performance tires in particular are a real bear. The side-walls are so stiff it's just a beast to get the top bead to go over the rim. Mounted 4 RE-71Rs and two Michelin Pilot Sport 4s tires. The Michelins are much easier to mount and have the bead seat, the Bridgestones are rough. But, got them all mounted up and balanced.

2) Camber plates- I have Vorshlag camber plates, after replacing my slightly worn (not too bad) Ground Control plates, but after about 80K miles the were clunking a bit. The range of adjustment is pretty large. On the "street setting" with the top of the struts all the way out, I'm at -1.6 degrees negative, amazingly the same on both sides (running the strut as far as it goes). On the "how far negative will it go side" I can get nearly -4 on the right wheel and -3.8 on the left. I know this is too much ( didn't measure until later), particularly if you don't adjust the toe as I corded a front set of RE-71s that should have had another 2 weekends in them (well, I didn't cord them a retired race driver did, but that's another story). I'm going to try -3.0 degrees negative as I've found for my set up and tires, -2.5 is not quite enough.

3) Toe change- some people have reported that you don't need to worry about toe change when switching from a street to track camber setting. That may be as the toe change is dependent in a few factors, however in my case the toe change is large. When changing from -3.0 negative camber with approx 1/16" toe out, when you move the camber to -1.6.degrees I suddenly have right around 1/2" of toe in. So, for me, I'll be adjusting my toe from now on. I used to just run one setting but now that I've cranked up the camber it's just a bit too much for the street.

I'll post up another thread about brake pads as I'm trying something new and different too. This is all in prep for a weekend at Barber early June followed by 3 days at WGI (first time), same month.

['ringmeister]

[QUOTE=VictorH;23234159]Just spent the day at my friend's tire shop mounting dismounting and mounting 6 tires and doing an alignment.

1) If you pay extra at your shop for "alloy wheel mounting" I understand now why they charge more. First working a tire machine is hard work, but high performance tires in particular are a real bear. The side-walls are so stiff it's just a beast to get the top bead to go over the rim. Mounted 4 RE-71Rs and two Michelin Pilot Sport 4s tires. The Michelins are much easier to mount and have the bead seat, the Bridgestones are rough. But, got them all mounted up and balanced.

2) Camber plates- I have Vorshlag camber plates, after replacing my slightly worn (not too bad) Ground Control plates, but after about 80K miles the were clunking a bit. The range of adjustment is pretty large. On the "street setting" with the top of the struts all the way out, I'm at -1.6 degrees negative, amazingly the same on both sides (running the strut as far as it goes). On the "how far negative will it go side" I can get nearly -4 on the right wheel and -3.8 on the left. I know this is too much ( didn't measure until later), particularly if you don't adjust the toe as I corded a front set of RE-71s that should have had another 2 weekends in them (well, I didn't cord them a retired race driver did, but that's another story). I'm going to try -3.0 degrees negative as I've found for my set up and tires, -2.5 is not quite enough.

What is your rider height relative to stock? I'm about to install Vorschlag camber plates and was curious about the min and max camber adjustment...thanks!

[VictorH]

[QUOTE='ringmeister;23236880]

Originally Posted by VictorH

J

What is your rider height relative to stock? I'm about to install Vorschlag camber plates and was curious about the min and max camber adjustment...thanks!

I don't know for sure but I'm at least one inch lower than stock, but not crazy low. Rear tire is just at the lower lip of the fender, i.e. no gap at all, front wheels have a gap. The adjustment range is pretty large and much more than the Ground Control plates I had before, with the same suspension.

[z3papa]

I'm surprised toe changed that much but I'm not starting an argument. With my prior dedicated competition car (Z3) and Vorshlags, I also could get adjustment from -2 out to -4.2 in. I had my alignment guy align with 1/16 total toe out and -3.5 camber, and pulled out the toe only went to 1/16 total in but admittedly they have different lower strut design (sleeve vs. no sleeve).

[VictorH]

Yeah, I think it might have to do with ride height, and maybe the struts and hats (where they are located). I'm on a JRZ system. For whatever reason my toe changes enough that it mandates a toe arm adjustment.

[SYT_Shadow]

Whoever said that was wrong

I personally like doing this:

Have your alignment shop align you to -3 camber and 1/8" total toe out. Mark the camber plate. This is your track setting
Now have them remove camber until you get to 3/32" total toe in. Mark your camber plate at that point. This is your street setting

This has worked very very well all these years

[VictorH]

That's certainly simpler. What do you end up with for the "street camber" setting?

[SYT_Shadow]

Originally Posted by VictorH

That's certainly simpler. What do you end up with for the "street camber" setting?

It depends on ride height, etc. But usually around -2.

-2 is just fine for the street.

In reality I am equally interested in the toe change. A tiny bit of toe in is great for typical street driving, whereas at the track you do what the toe out as it makes it 'turnier'.

Some prefer a single alignment at -2.5 camber with 0 toe, but they miss out on that wonderful toe out for the track