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Originally posted by Auto-X Fil:
Okay, I was thinking that the easiest thing would be to drill a hole into the strut tower and through the camber plate when it's aligned properly. Make it the same size as a cylinder of some sort - a big nail or small bolt or something. Drill one or two holes for each alignment setting, and then you can just stick the alignment tool (nail/bolt) into the hole to be sure you get it right. Do it at the alignment shop to get accurate street/auto-x specs. I'd do two holes for each setting, 180* apart, for the same reason I do more than one marker line.
My other idea was a bit more involved: put screws in the camber kit, and make stops that bolt to the tower. It has the advantage of being adjustable, but really you don't need that for the Contour unless you're messing with adjustable coilovers.
It's really not that hard. You can feel a relatively small amount of caster mis-match in the wheel, and I never have, so I must be pretty close with my marker.
Actually, I pulled the "dust covers" off the strut towers tonight, and it looks pretty easy. You don't have unlimited movement under there. All you can do is rotate it. I made marks for where they currently are, and I'll go for max static camber at the event tomorrow. Should be pretty easy to get it back to where it is, now.
Thanks for the tip.
Function before fashion.
'96 Contour SE
"Toss the Contour into a corner, and it's as easy to catch as a softball thrown by a preschooler." -Edmunds, 1998
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My testing showed I was faster if I didn't trade so much caster for camber. You'll note that if you turn the adjuster back towards the firewall 1/8 of a turn from max negative camber, you'll lose very litte camber, but gain a lot of caster. That's where I'd go with it. Also, make two or three marks - it may only rotate, but it's rubber and doesn't fit that precisely in the tower. Two or three marks will make sure you get it a bit strighter.
I also just remembered that your softer springs won't be completely unweighted when you jack the car up like my coilovers, so adjusting it might take a little more arm strength. OTOH, it might help keep the rubber centered in the tower better. Most of my problems came when I went too high with the jack and the camber kit dropped down into the tower.
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Joined: Oct 2000
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Originally posted by Auto-X Fil:
My testing showed I was faster if I didn't trade so much caster for camber. You'll note that if you turn the adjuster back towards the firewall 1/8 of a turn from max negative camber, you'll lose very litte camber, but gain a lot of caster. That's where I'd go with it. Also, make two or three marks - it may only rotate, but it's rubber and doesn't fit that precisely in the tower. Two or three marks will make sure you get it a bit strighter.
I also just remembered that your softer springs won't be completely unweighted when you jack the car up like my coilovers, so adjusting it might take a little more arm strength. OTOH, it might help keep the rubber centered in the tower better. Most of my problems came when I went too high with the jack and the camber kit dropped down into the tower.
Well, the deed is done, and I know what you mean about slop. It was a little trickier getting it back to street-aligned than I thought it would be.
I also found that to turn the adjusters, I had to step lightly on the wheel for a bit to "unstick" the mount. Then it still took firm pressure.
Going to max camber also meant gaining caster. I'm not sure what your experience is with that.
Anyway, it wasn't enough. Funny how you can walk a course a million times, but when you actually get out there, you realize you might have been walking like a go-cart, but that doesn't mean your car will drive like one. The camber adjustment probably helped, but I have too many other handicaps against me for camber to solve--chief among them my poverty of seat time.
The fun part was when I finished my work assignment and needed to drive about 5 miles up the road to get lunch before my heat. Whhooo-eee! That is not an alignment I'd want to drive very far on.
Function before fashion.
'96 Contour SE
"Toss the Contour into a corner, and it's as easy to catch as a softball thrown by a preschooler." -Edmunds, 1998
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Hmmmm.
http://www.cse.psu.edu/~maynard/post/alignment.bmp
Here's your camber plate. C is max positive camber, D is max negative camber. A is minimum caster, B is maximum caster. Note that E gives you a pretty good camber gain from B without much caster sacrifice. E is about where you want to be. You certainly want to be between B and D - between those two it's a tradeoff, caster for camber. Outside of that quadrant you're losing at least one unnecessarily!
On the street, you go for the camber numbers you want, and see where the caster ends up. If caster isn't the same side to size you then adjust them until they (almost) are, giving up camber equality for caster equality. You'll note that there are two possible caster setting for each camber setting - one red, one green. Don't use the red ones! You want more caster, not less. There's no reason to use the red area on a Contour.
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Hey JEDsContour,
Please email me. What do you want to sell it for?
Rob
surethought AT hotmail dot com
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Originally posted by Auto-X Fil:
Hmmmm.
http://www.cse.psu.edu/~maynard/post/alignment.bmp
Here's your camber plate. C is max positive camber, D is max negative camber. A is minimum caster, B is maximum caster. Note that E gives you a pretty good camber gain from B without much caster sacrifice. E is about where you want to be. You certainly want to be between B and D - between those two it's a tradeoff, caster for camber. Outside of that quadrant you're losing at least one unnecessarily!
On the street, you go for the camber numbers you want, and see where the caster ends up. If caster isn't the same side to size you then adjust them until they (almost) are, giving up camber equality for caster equality. You'll note that there are two possible caster setting for each camber setting - one red, one green. Don't use the red ones! You want more caster, not less. There's no reason to use the red area on a Contour.
"In theory, practice should follow theory, but in practice, this is not always the case."
In your diagram, my street alignment is at A. The car feels pretty stable there. I moved it to D for yesterday's Solo event. Car felt twitchy, which was fine for autocross. I thought more caster would feel more stable, though, so I'm a little confused.
I gave the alignment shop specific numbers to shoot for on camber, and then told them to even up the caster as close to x as possible. I can't remember what x was, but it was a positive number (about 1.25 degree positive, IIRC)
Function before fashion.
'96 Contour SE
"Toss the Contour into a corner, and it's as easy to catch as a softball thrown by a preschooler." -Edmunds, 1998
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The car felt twitchy because of all the camber. If you went to B you'd have a better-cornering, more stable car. A performance strut suspension has more like 10* of caster. IIRC, E30 M3s have 15* or so. Try E next time for the autocross, and whenever you visit the shop have them go for max caster for your camber.
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Originally posted by Auto-X Fil:
The car felt twitchy because of all the camber. If you went to B you'd have a better-cornering, more stable car. A performance strut suspension has more like 10* of caster. IIRC, E30 M3s have 15* or so. Try E next time for the autocross, and whenever you visit the shop have them go for max caster for your camber.
Actually, it was more like 2.25* of caster I was shooting for at the shop. 10-15 sounds extreme, and of course unachievable in this car. I believe you about the E30 M3, though. What range of adjustment is there, actually? If I went from the front to the rear position, about how much caster would I have?
Everyone is different. FWIW, the guy who stomps everybody locally in an SVT runs kit very similar to mine, except he has an SVT front bar with an Aussie on the rear. Otherwise, Koni yellows with Roc springs--again similar to my Roush but maybe a bit stiffer. Roush, I believe, very similar to BAT springs except linear rate on the front. Alignment settings--well, we both took our advice from the same people: One of whom tracks and autocrosses his car regularly (with modest success), and the other an automotive engineer of some distinction.
There are two major differences I see between this local SVT driver and I: 1) Ability, and 2) Aussie bar.
That said, I may just have to bite the bullet and get the dang rear bar upgraded.
Now, please don't take any of this as argumentative. I value your advice, because I know it is based on real experience.
Function before fashion.
'96 Contour SE
"Toss the Contour into a corner, and it's as easy to catch as a softball thrown by a preschooler." -Edmunds, 1998
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