sbyrne

After my first 2 autocrosses on my new RA-1's, it's clear from the wear on the outside of the fronts that I need more negative camber. Search results seem to indicate that between 1 and 1 1/2 degrees (maybe 2, max) is available from the factory adjustments. Camber plates, and the coilovers that go with them, are out of the question, financially. Back in my front drive days, I could grind out some extra wiggle room on the lower strut mounting point, at the clevis bolts. Anybody tried that trick, or have any other low buck ideas? I'd like to get at least 2 1/2 degrees negative. Car is an '84, BTW.

RedlineMan

Well...

Why don't you see how much you can get? I think it should be all that your suspension can handle anyway. If I recall correctly, I was getting plenty before I had anything fancy.

luckett

You don't need to change struts to use camber plates. Stiffer springs will allow less camber gain by limiting suspension travel.

J Silverman

You could slot the balljoint mounting holes. I know a lot of VW guys use crash bolts on the struts (basically an eccentric bolt like we already have) that supposedly give up to -3 deg camber. This car uses rabbit struts and control arms so thats a good start and its cheap. Another thing you can try is to loosen the ball joint and pull it away from the car and then tighten it down.

pjburges

I can go to -2.5 on my factory eccentrics because I welded more meat onto the eccentric bolts. I dont ever run them out at -2.5 though! My tires are too crappy and my suspension is too soft anyways.

Really lots of cars can get almost -2 with the stock adjustments.

Litespeeds

I was able to get -3 degrees of camber on my fronts without camber plates and -2.5 on the rears.

Calmchaos

When I changed my struts (with new stock struts) I just kind of eye-balled it until I got it aligned.
The printout said I had the driver side was set to -2.7° .

Z-man

There are some optimal settings for the Toyo Proxes RA-1's. Two of these settings are:
1. Optimal pressure: 40 psi hot.
2. Optimal camber: around -2 degrees.

You should be able to get close to -2 degress of camber with your stock suspension. Anything more than that on a street driven 944, and you will be wearing out the inside edges of the tire quickly.

Something that I've done with the Toyos to extend their life is to swap them "inside out" on the rims. If you do this as you get down to where there is very little tread left on the tire, you will double the life of the rubber. Just make sure you haven't worn the outside edge down too far.

And as stated before -- a stiffer suspension will help with tire wear.

Just my $0.42,
-Zoltan.

xsboost90

early cars have issues when trying to reach 2 degrees or more camber due to the offset of the arms. Late cars have it easy. My 86t is running 2 degrees neg in the front and we had to used special accentric bolts to move the struts that far.

knfeparty

I'm pretty sure I'm running -0.1* on my 89 according to my setup sheet...which sounds nuts, but with enough caster (I think I'm running 5* or so) I have gotten hardly any outside wear on my bfg gforce r1s autocrossing.

Of course I'm also eating up ball joints so maybe something is major screwy with my car that I haven't figured out yet...

pjburges

Forget to say my car is the early offset suspension. If you want more -camber just weld a higher bump onto your eccentric, and then file it round. This probably isnt as tough as the original material in the bolt, but Ive been going with it for a year now with no visible wear.

M758

You sould be able to get -2 from the stock adjusters. In fact I'd bet a little bit more, but the issues is that you need to the same camber on each side. In most cases that mean you are limited by the camber you can get from the worst side.

Ie left max = 2.4 & right max = 2.1 You need to set to 2.1 on both sides.

With camber plates I run -3.5 front and like it.

M758

You need to run more negative camber. -2 is not enough given your need to flip the tire. I run RA-1 and use -3.5 front and -2.5 rear. I also rotate the tires from corner to corner and in my 8-9 sets of tires I have never worn down the outside or inside edges. I get very even wear over the entire face of the tire. This even wear is a big reason to run the same tire/wheel at each corner of the car. I am not sure how much street use the car sees anymore, but for track i would got way more than -2. Plus the car handles better as I could feel the difference in front end grip using -3.0 vs -3.5. On day I tried to stand up the tire a bit to improve braking, but it just added understeer. So I went back to -3.5 and the car was better.

I love porsche

i just got my car aligned for AX and i have -2.6 degrees of camber with bone stock suspension, they said that was the max they can get from it

RMills944

My brother pulled -3.0 on my stock suspension on the front of my 84. You may not even need the camber plates.

I had him dial it back to about -1.5 since I still street the car now and then with 0 toe. The backs are cambered in slightly, but not that much. The car is a mainly autoX car, and some street and this setup works great for me.