I was wondering if the car was to be lowered to 1.5" in the front and 1.3" in the rear, would camber be needed???

 

you mean like a camber adjustment or the addition of camber plates?

 

camber adjustments

 

you probably want alignment/camber after you change a very large part of your suspension like that. just recomended to keep everything working properly

 

Sxn is right, you always want an alignment done after a drop, but with a drop that light you won't need camber bolts or plates.

 

same with new tires or rims too...simple rule. really hardcore drops need the aftermarket camber plates only.

 

Anything 2" and over NEEDS camber adjustment...

 

thanks for the clarification

 

That's what I'm here for. That and making nOObs cry...

 

it is an averege or .75 of camber change for every inch of drop and the back don't need no camber adjustment cause its a solid beam axle.

 

boo hoo hoo , would you recomend a camber or alignment for guys getting new springs and struts, even if the drop is less than 2 inches?

 

there is camber kits that would fix camber at even a 3 inch drop, like the stillen camber plates and that camber bolts, stillen camber plates change up to 2.00 degress and the bolts change i think 1 or around there. yes i woulld recomend camber kits to anything over 1 degree, it would wear your tires down alot more in the long run.

 

I guess I'm slow but is that a yes or a no

 

that would be a yes, i had my car droped to 1.75 and i noticed some tire wear in a short period of time.

 

I keep seeing camber discussed (obviously, since it's the topic of this thread... ) but I too have lowered my 1996 Maxima with a set of Eibach Pro Kit springs, and the front tires are wearing terribly on the inside.

I don't believe this has been caused by the very slight camber adjustment that resulted. I measured the camber and it's just barely negative.

I believe that the wear comes from the extreme TOE change that takes place. I gave mine a rough measurement and it's sitting at over 3/8" (.375", or +9.525mm) TOE-OUT!... Factory spec calls for a maximum of +3mm (0.1181099") IN... with +1mm being Minimum and +2 Nominal...

Having this much extreme toe-out will wear them down very quickly on the inside edge. I'm suspecting it may be affecting my gas mileage as well, but we'll see.

I have an appointment to get an alignment done today, so we'll track mileage and wear after that.

Having a slight amount of negative camber on an aggressively driven car doesn't hurt. -0.25 to -0.50 seems reasonable.

 

When lowering your max, you need an alignment always, you change a front strut (no drop) you need an alignment. Any time the two struts bolts are loosened and the knuckle is moved at all in the strut, you need an alignment. And yes Darin, any drop in the front will cause a toe out. You can drive to the alignment shop with the toe out, anywhere else your asking for trouble. The first time I dropped my max more than 3 inches in the front, I wore 2 new tires to the belts in 4 days with the extreme toe out. The handling is terrible because each wheel wants to go opposite of one another. And back on topic, you don't need any camber plates, when installing the strut to the knuckle, pull the top to your self (top of the tire out) if you need a little more than you can grind the strut holes a little for more adjustment. If you want it done by the book you can buy camber bolts, but you really shouldn't need them.

 

OK guys... Got the alignment done yesterday afternoon. I was correct in my assertion that it was the TOE-IN adjustment that was out. Extremely out. Camber was very acceptable for a "sporty" street driven car.

Here are the complete specs before and after:

FRONT LEFT
BEFORE AFTER RANGE
Camber -0.6 deg -0.7 deg -1.0 to 0.5 deg
Caster 2.9 deg 2.9 deg 2.0 to 3.5 deg
Toe -0.52 deg 0.08 deg 0.05 to 0.14 deg
SAI 14.8 deg 14.8 deg 13.5 to 15.0 deg
Included Angle 14.2 deg 14.2 deg 12.5 to 15.5 deg

FRONT RIGHT
BEFORE AFTER RANGE
Camber -0.8 deg -0.8 deg -1.0 to 0.5 deg
Caster 2.8 deg 2.8 deg 2.0 to 3.5 deg
Toe -0.59 deg 0.09 deg 0.05 to 0.14 deg
SAI 15.2 deg 15.2 deg 13.5 to 15.0 deg
Included Angle 14.4 deg 14.4 deg 12.5 to 15.5 deg


FRONT BEFORE AFTER RANGE
Cross Camber 0.2 deg 0.2 deg -0.8 to 0.8 deg
Cross Caster 0.1 deg 0.1 deg -0.8 to 0.8 deg
Cross SAI -0.3 deg -0.4 deg
Total Toe -1.11 deg 0.17 deg 0.09 to 0.28 deg