Camber adjustment thread.

[sleeps]

For those guys who have cut or lowering springs: Let us know, with pics if you can, how and where you adjusted your front end to keep the wheels straight after lowering them. Ill be putting on some cut springs here real soon, and will need some assistance getting the front end in good shape.

[DroppedMitsu]

Took it to an alignment shop and had them align it lol

[bobbyk]

your camber adjustment is on your upper contol arm where it mounts to the frame. to get to the correct camber you will remove some of the shims to bring the arm out farther. but when i cut 1 coil and did my alignment i was still within the specs, although it was towards the negative side. you also have to adjust the toe. i'd suggest having a shop align it for you if you don't have access to a alignment rack because you'll eat through tires.

[sleeps]

Took it to an alignment shop and had them align it lol

Thats what I thought as well.


your camber adjustment is on your upper contol arm where it mounts to the frame. to get to the correct camber you will remove some of the shims to bring the arm out farther. but when i cut 1 coil and did my alignment i was still within the specs, although it was towards the negative side. you also have to adjust the toe. i'd suggest having a shop align it for you if you don't have access to a alignment rack because you'll eat through tires.

I give some background to help maybe understand why I was asking. I cut roughly 1 1/2 springs off, drove it around just like that for a while. I only drove around town though, not very far so I never saw much effects. Sold the truck, the new owner started going through front tires quickly. So I knew the cut springs changed the alignment, no biggie told her to take it to a shop and have them align it.

They said they could not beacuse of the suspension. Ok, Ill go with it, found some stock springs and put those back in, told the owner to take it again and have someone do it. (Dont know if it was the same place or not they went the 2nd time) Told them it needed about $400 worth of new steering/and suspension parts before they could even try it. I deceided to take a looksy at it, sure I agree the ball joints were old and could use a fresh set but nothing looked worn out or bad to the point that a new one alone would fix this issue.

I told the owner to take it to a place I knew personally and tell them to due the best they can to slow down the inner tire wear. The owner never did, and now that I have it back I am going to be putting new ball joints, and some new bushings in aslong with the cut springs. When it was at my shop here while I did the clutch replacement we did notice the upper controll arm had shims, and we assumed pulling those out would push the top of the tire out and maybe be useable.

So that is where I am at now, just wanted to see what all I may need or not need to do to get my wheels straight as I could. Thanks folks.

[pennyman1]

The upper control arms adjust in 2 ways - shims for +/- camber, and the nuts on each end of the shaft for caster along with the strut rod. this is the same for all 2wd trucks to 95. For severe drops, modification of the ball joint mount on the upper and lower arms may be necessary to restore camber.

[sleeps]

Would it be to much to ask for pics of both those parts onthe truck, so anyone reading this know what and where we are talking about. I may be doing some work on it this weekend, so Ill get some pics while im there also.

[pennyman1]

I am on vacation this week, so I can't get you pics until next week. If anyone else can get them for you, please post them.

[BradMph]

Your suppose to align the truck after cutting springs? Well, this is probably true in the sense, but not always required..at least mine never needed it. I had a single round of coil cut lowering in front and 2 inch blocks in the rear. My alignment has been so perfect since..well forever...and I never had a problem with it. Now, I can not say that the lower shop didn't adjust it when they did the work, but I personally never taken the truck to an alignment shop to be aligned. I also have installed zerk fittings on all the suspension parts and maintain everything up front as best as possible. The only issue I have had was the idler arm. I blew out 2 of them and lost the bushings somewhere on the road from hauling our boat, but switched to the heavy duty moog part and it fixed that issue. I have never removed any leaf springs either. I really don't think removing any of these is a great idea to lower the truck, but I guess some do it.

I know if your going to cut coil springs, you want to cut them correctly. A full round cut will place the end of the coil back correctly into the slot where it fits the base. If you cut 1 1/2 rounds out, that spring is not going to fit into the indentation in the base of the spring mount. So, everytime you jack up the truck and it leaves the coil dangling, your going to have to center it back into the slot before lowering the vehicle off the jack.

[sleeps]

Yeah I cut 1.5 I think, and the wheels were visually turned out, they needed to be adjusted. Ill be posting pics hopefully soon when I go in and do the swap.

[t8erbug]

I may be able to post some pics for this thread. I just dropped my 87' MM with the belltech springs (or however you spell it) 2" or so I cannot remember. Anyways I finished with the install. I haven't driven it yet because of a couple minor engine issues but after rolling it out of the shop there is clearly some positive camber now on the front end. It looks like hell in a handbasket. Well, it looks good from the side with the drop but once you look at it from the front it makes me cringe. I replaced the struts while I was in there and those lower strut mounts are the biggest joke I've ever seen haha. I had to laugh. Anyways as far as I know the upper control arms have shims that can be added to increase positive camber or taken out to increase negative camber. I'm really hoping my truck has some shims in it to take out otherwise I don't know how I'm going to get rid of the positive camber. SO, as I am in the process of working this issue out I will try to post some pics and keep you all updated on how it all works on my truck. Wish me luck!

[sleeps]

Luck wished.


Also, mine was the same, Im still in the process of waiting to put my cut coils back on. lol.

[t8erbug]

http://i1178.photobucket.com/albums/x365/t83rbug/WP_20140216_004_zps973a3a44.jpg (http://s1178.photobucket.com/user/t83rbug/media/WP_20140216_004_zps973a3a44.jpg.html)

Not the best angle but you can see from the pics the front has some positive camber. I'm going to cut the bumps and drive it around for a couple weeks to let the coils settle.. Then, off to the alignment shop! Now that I have the truck sitting at a decent ride height I can get a good idea of how I'll want to stance it with a set of wheels. As you can tell this is a total shop truck but the dirtier the better haha. It runs like a gem and looks a ton better with the little drop.

[DroppedMitsu]

I may be able to post some pics for this thread. I just dropped my 87' MM with the belltech springs (or however you spell it) 2" or so I cannot remember. Anyways I finished with the install. I haven't driven it yet because of a couple minor engine issues but after rolling it out of the shop there is clearly some positive camber now on the front end. It looks like hell in a handbasket. Well, it looks good from the side with the drop but once you look at it from the front it makes me cringe. I replaced the struts while I was in there and those lower strut mounts are the biggest joke I've ever seen haha. I had to laugh. Anyways as far as I know the upper control arms have shims that can be added to increase positive camber or taken out to increase negative camber. I'm really hoping my truck has some shims in it to take out otherwise I don't know how I'm going to get rid of the positive camber. SO, as I am in the process of working this issue out I will try to post some pics and keep you all updated on how it all works on my truck. Wish me luck!

You have that backwards. You add shims between the control arm and it's mount to add negative camber, take out to add positive camber as the control arm shaft mounts behind its mount on the engine side.