Topic: Did my own front end alignment today

[Main One]

I've gotten very tired of the insides of my front tires wearing so badly.  I've been getting an alignment done every spring for years, and the tires have kept wearing.  Last year I got parts to give extra camber adjustment because my mechanic said he was maxxed out on camber and couldn't get to the maximum camber limit.  Still poor tire wear.

This year, before mounting the summer wheels and tires, I maxxed out the camber adjustment, with the aforementioned parts that were installed last year.  Could definitely see that the bottom of the front tires were tucked in.  Looked screwed up.

Today I decided to back it off some.  Made a plumb bob with a large washer and string.  Holding the string against the top of the outside lip of the wheel, before jacking up the truck, noted that the bottom outside lip of both front wheels was tucked in compared to the top by over a half inch.  After jacking the truck up, each side was now around an inch tucked in.  I figured on average with weight on the suspension it took about 3/8" out of the tuck.  Figuring that with my 18" wheels each 1/16" represented about 0.2 degrees of camber, I decided to adjust the camber with the weight off of the front wheels at about 1/2".

After doing this, and then doing some driving and remeasuring, it looks like I've got between 1/16" and 1/8" for each of the front wheels.  Looking at the truck, I can see the bottoms tucked in a little bit, but it isn't obvious like before at the full adjustment (with the extra adjustment parts).  Hopefully I'll get better tire wear now.  I've never seen the bottoms tucked in that I could notice after getting the truck aligned by the mechanic.  I'm guessing he aligned it with the weight off of the truck, and slop in the ball joints or elsewhere had the bottoms of the front tires pushed out a bit, causing the extra wear on the insides of the front tires.

[oHIobellboy]

Well it certainly sounds like a good approach to me. You gonna measure tread depth and check it every so often to see how well you did? I'm only asking as I don't know of any other way to check it.

[Main One]

I'm hoping that it will be obvious enough that measurement will not be neccessary.

[Zora Arkus-Duntov]

  I've been getting an alignment done every spring for years, and the tires have kept wearing. 

 

Yep.....when you carry "your" front wheels 75' off the line, ....."things happen!

[bluedevil]

Whys is that?  Did you added inches to the front end? Leveled out? Raked?

[Main One]

Whys is that?  Did you added inches to the front end? Leveled out? Raked?

My suspension, other than KYB shocks, is completely stock.  The tires were wearing like this long before the shocks went on.