Another possibility that just occurred to me: Are you sure the camber values on your sheet are in fact decimal, i.e. -1.22 and -1.08 as you say, and not 1°22" and 1°08"? That would be closer to stock specs, especially on the left, albeit still not within range.

 

Actually the values are 1°22" and 1°08".

I'm taking the car to the dealer next week so they can get it done properly. Now I'm only asking to get it to standard specifications, and I'll see what I'll do from there.

 

The rear toe numbers are strange. A lot on the right and almost none on the left.

 

Yes, somewhat frustrating. If we fiddled enough with both toe and camber adjustments we could get the toe close, but we could only get about -1.2ish camber.

Tried two different manufactures of computerized racks. I'm going to track tomorrow, see how it feels, and get it back onto a Hunter next week. If we still can't get it, maybe a trip to dealer or mods are in order.

 

Dealer called me back today. They contacted Porsche Canada and according to them (presumably an engineer, I'm hoping) it is possible that it can be difficult to get spec camber values in new cars (I ask myself if the suspension gets more compliant with time) and the use of shims may be necessary even to get to base spec.

I'm taking the car back next week to get it done, all covered under warranty, parts and job.

 

That's true. You actually should probably drive it 1000 miles or wait a month for the suspension to settle before getting it aligned. But at that point if you'll track it you may as well buy the necessary aftermarket parts to get a proper alignment.

 

Our camber plates add about -1.1 deg of camber compared to both the GT4 and standard 981 plates. This is accomplished by shifting the strut location relative to the three mounting studs.

We are finishing up a new build that now includes additional caster as well, close to what the GT4 plates have but with added camber too. Adding the casted required reducing the camber increase slightly to about -1 deg over the OEM plates. The overall camber and caster increases are similar to what Porsche Motorsport did on their RSR plates.

Ira

 

Your basic alignment specs will depend on the :

Ride Height
Amount of Fuel
Weight of the Driver
Tire Preasure
How leveled the Alignmet Rack

From my experience the RT side on Porsche always has more camber adjustment vs LT side.

 

Ira what is the Max camber you can achieve with your plates before adding shims?

 

Nice to see you guys knock this out so quickly after the feedback.

This is exactly what most DE guys need....

 

i am not a chassis guy. but my suspension tech is really good. the issues i hear over and over, rake, not enough camber achieved, camber plates, caster.... if your alignment tech is indeed good, he will get the parts needed and get it right. its' not just camber, toe etc etc. it's all tied together and depends on the driver too.

 

So this means that the extra camber comes from moving the top of the wheel farther inboard, correct? If so, wouldn't we be back to the discussion of the ideal way to achieve camber being to push the bottom of the wheel more outboard instead, as is accomplished with shims, since that both increases camber and track width? I remember reading a post somewhere I think from BGB that this is why you want to start by de-cambering the top mount, then shim as much as is feasible, and only then add camber via the top mount. I understand that shims can only be taken so far and camber plates would allow extra camber even on a car that's shimmed out, but what is your opinion on which strategy is best to achieve a modest camber increase?

 

Here's a dumb question (and most of mine are). Say, I go to a Porsche-centric shop, and need shims in order to get the camber that I want. Is that something that they're bound to have on their shelves? How do I get the right thickness shim if it's variable car to car?


Cheers
Rich B.

 

Call the shop. Some will some may not. Mine did, S-Car-Go Racing, in San Raphael, CA.

 

Many Porsche-centric race shops stock an assortment, and if not, RSS sells a shim set that includes 2 each of a variety of widths for $100, much less than buying them individually. One set should probably cover a car since there's usually more than one shim combination to reach a desired total thickness, and the car may already have some small shims in there that can be shuffled around to other corners. I went to a shop that stocked them so they just charged me for what they installed.