till_that_day

Mabye you guys can help me figure whats going on here. Recently I installed 225/50/15s on my car and an issue I tried to ignore just appeared much worse with wider tires on. The car is an '86 944 NA, front suspension is original code 456 sport shocks and stabilizers with bilsteins on rear.

The front of the body appears to be sitting about 1 inch to the right. all the measurements I've taken say the body and frame is straight and this is a suspension issue. The car apparently was in an accident before I owned it (not sure of specifics, this is a "stories" car). She drives straight down the road, but tracks a little and likes to go left better than right. I have never had the car aligned. Replaced the steering rack just after purchase but eyeballed the tie-rods and they worked fine.

Both a-arms hang equal, but the left strut appears to have a bunch more camber and is almost touching the top of the sway bar mount (pics below). Do I have 2 different offset a-arms on there? And both a-arms are 951 part numbers, is this standard?

Any ideas?

pontifex4

Are both wheels the same width and offset? I had a single early offset wheel on my late car... Also, can you take a photo of your upper strut mounts?

till_that_day

I have not physically measured the rims offset but they look identical and are the stock rims from my option codes. Pics of upper mounts below. Dont know how well you can see it but the drivers side is kicked to the outside of the car a bit.

tblofsky

i would check to make sure the part numbers match between the struts, lower control arms, and spindles. I would most likey suspect it is diff. wheels though. everything looks ok from the pictures.

Yarf

Does the ball joint have play in it or is it bent ?
What part numbers are the control arms and the steering knuckles on each side ?

CPR

Gotta be a wrong offset wheel. You cannot get that much camber adjustment out of the stock set-up.

Pull the wheels and look for the offsets....they are stamped onto the rim. I would bet one has 23et on it (passenger) and the other 45et~55et (driver side).

V2Rocket

might just be the picture but the passenger side spindle looks way too far angled over

Cass944

the fenders are pretty easy to pull out. if you stick your hand under the lip of the fender and pull it outward it will move and it will make the wheel look like its sunk in like that.

thats what happened to me at least. I just applied some even spread out steady pressure to the ouside of the fender and it pushed back in to match up with the other side.

Van

Could also be manufacturing tolerances... my car exhibits some of that (but not that bad).

Edit: manufacturing on the body/sheet metal - not the control arms/spindles/wheels

M758

factory fuchs come in 7 and 8 by 15. The 8 has a different offset. My guess is you have 8" on one side and 7" on the other.

ideola

It appears to me that the passenger side is ~1" further out than the driver side. It's not inconceivable that one of the control arms was damaged / broken in the past (the car does have stories, right?!), and that it was replaced with the wrong control arm. The late offset control arms are almost exactly 1" longer than the early offset arms, and this would explain why the camber adjustment is so much more radical on the passenger side than the driver side. None of the other suggestions would explain this without the wheel exhibiting dramatic camber (which it doesn't appear to be from your photos).

Alu control arms can have 951 part numbers for both early and late offset (remember, the '86 951 was early offset, while all later 951 were late offset), so the easiest thing to do would be to make a note of the part numbers stamped on the casting, and post back. While you're under there, grab a tape measure, and measure the distance across the front of the control arm, from the front bushing to the ball joint. See if one of the arms is longer than the other.

till_that_day

I'll be lifting the car up tonight, taking measurements and part #'s. I'll post them

Is it just the ball joint placement that is different btw early and late or overall length?

What is the standard difference btw left and right part #'s for control arms?

ideola

There are five different part numbers listed in PET:
1985.5 thru 1986: 951.341.027/8.00 (L/R)
1987-onward: 944.341.027/8.02 (L/R)
1987-onward: A944.341.027/8.02 (L/R)
1987-on, M030: 944.341.927/8.31 (L/R)
1987-on, M030: A944.341.927/8.31 (L/R)

UNFORTUNATELY, the part numbers stamped on the control arms are a casting number only, not the number listed in PET, which is for a fully assembled arm. So those numbers aren't going to do you much good. You'll need to post which numbers are stamped on your arms and then maybe we can sort it out from there.

RE: this question, the entire casting for the late offset arms are physically longer by ~1", so the ball joint is an add'l 1" further out.

StoogeMoe

It looks to me like excessive camber on the driver's side. From your pictures of your struts I can see that the one has maximum camber set. Since it was in an accident, the strut with the heavy camber may be bent and they didn't replace it.

ideola

Except the side with the heavier camber is the passenger side, while it's the driver sider that is further tucked into the wheel well...