TransAm9585

I know you should have an alignment done after you lower a vehical and after new shocks/strust, the only things is im being told by Midas and Tuffy like places that they wont touch the car since its been lowered cause it wont ever go aligned. Im not going by these people cause i know they are full of it, but my question is whats a good place to take it and anything that i might need to know to get it done? THanks for the help guys.

revtime

I don,t know where your located but there should be someone in your town who works with modified cars and can take care of you.
Check around and make some phone calls and you should find someone.
I tried the local shop where I live and those morons could not get my car on their alignment rack cause of the headers, they just stood around with their thumbs up there butts till I got pissed and left, I went down the road a piece to a guy that works on a fair amount of modded cars and he fixed me up in no time.

TransAm9585

Since the car is lowered, is aligning it back to specs going to help or are there any special issues that i need to worry about when getting it done. Any information is helpfull. thanks.
ttt

revtime

You might want to post about that problem with the heading need alignment specs for lowered car.
I don,t have any expierence with lowering but I believe you will need different specs to get it right, then again if its not lowered to drastically you might get by with stock specs.

ZPaul2Fresh8

Hi Brad, it's me Paul
I was just looking through some of your posts and thought I'd post a reply to this one.

When ever you put those springs on, come and see me @ Tireman next to the Woodville Mall. I'm the alignment tech and could teach you everything you wanna know about this thing. Trust me, I had my Z lowered 2" with Intrax springs. Been there

Do you still need info on this subject? Well gather 'round children...

Alignment deals with 3 angles. Alignment problems consist of premature uneven tire wear present in the shoulders of your tires. Possible pulling or drifting while driving. Lowering your car effects ALL ANGLES.

Camber - Camber is the measurement of the angle made by inclination/declination of your wheel compare to a HORIZONTALLY perfect line. Ever noticed how your wheels are tilted inwards after lower the car? This is the effect of excessive NEGATIVE CAMBER, normally an LT1 would have about -0.3 to -0.8 Camber reading. After lowering it, it probly was around -1.5 t0 -2.0

Caster - Caster is the measurement of the angle made inclination/declination of your wheel compared to a VERTICALLY perfect line. Although Caster is not a Tire wearing angle, it can cause the car to pull or drift. Caster is also responsible for turning radius' and ease of steering. For example, stock suspension on a 4th Gen F-body's should have 5.25 degrees of positive caster. Now after lowering it 2" that bumped it up to 6.50! Steering radius has change about a degree and turning your wheel will seem 'easier'. This all goes back to the ANGLE . Performance cars will have alot of positive caster, this increases control but sacrifices stabililty in 'high speed' turns...

Toe - Bascially this angle is what most people are concerned about, just because they didn't know the other 2 existed! This is the measurement of the direction the wheels are pointed. This angle of measurement is found by an imaginary line created by comparing the front wheel sensors to the rear wheels sensors. This line is called the Thrust Angle.

Adjustments? Camber and Caster are adjusted in the lower control arms. Two nuts are involved in the process.

Toe is adjusted with the tie rod ends. Just loosen the jamnut, adjust the inner tie rod with a 1/2 wrench the tighten.

Now that's just a front end alignment. I get to do these all day long, but on most vehicles that have all 4 wheels adjustable instead of just the fronts on F-Bodies