So I took a set of wheels off today and threw on another set for the car to sit on as I have new tires mounted/balanced. When I sat the car down, I noticed an extreme amount of positive camber and even some toe in it LOOKED like on the passenger rear. Before, I noticed some positive camber, but not as bad as this, I tightened the lugs down some more just to make sure (didn't torque them as it's not going anywhere) and then jacked it up again thinking maybe something settled back down wrong or something, it looked a little less drastic after that but doesn't match the driver rear completely.

I also noticed some play in the struts, is that normal? I can "jiggle" the bottom of the strut, not a lot, but it's not rock solid. ?

I took some pictures of my camber issue:






Ideas? This all goes back in my head to having a vibration on track around 75mph and above, I'm getting tires mounted/balanced to see if that fixes it first, but keep that in mind.

 

the rear is a solid axle, so unless its bent camber is fixed @0. if there is play, you might have a bad bearing or something

 

I know it's tough to sell but looking at the pics does it look like 0 to you or +? I always thought 1st gens looked a little odd in the back (I guess if it's set at 0 it would compared to other track cars) so maybe I'm just being paranoid.

By bad bearing you mean on the strut mount?

 

That does look negative but hopefully just an illusion. Maybe take a level to verify?

 

Yeah I could borrow my friends camber gauge to see for sure, I thought it always seemed a little + or at least completely zero, but it was definitely + earlier after I swapped wheels, then after jacking it back up and tightening the wheels down tight a little less, not sure if that was really it or not, I don't know what could have happened between now and last time it was driven. It handled perfectly fine.

 

correction...
If u've got access to camber gauge, even better but u could easily use a regular home depot level on a pinch.

 

I doubt that you have drum brakes back there, but if so make sure that the wheel is not sitting on the screw that holds the drum in place (should be recessed, but sometimes they get swapped out for a button head).



.

 

Every drum setup I've seen used a button-head. Only the disks had recessed screws. I've only seen S1 and S2 though.

That said, every 1st-gen rear axle I've measured had .3-.5 degrees of negative camber, and usually a little toe-in. That is just from street driving. The axle housings are flimsy sheetmetal, and they bend and twist rather easily.


(those pics look negative to me...)

 

This could be an illusion from the watts linkage binding a bit after being up on stands or jacked
up on one side while messing with a wheel. To me the passenger side looks like its sitting bit
higher that the drivers side and that may be why your seeing the camber change. Try bouncing
it up and down or rolling it around some to see if settles down.

I'm confused when you say the struts are loose, these are in the front, not the rear. Are you
saying your rear shocks are loose or the front struts are loose?

 

Rear shocks, sorry. Not loose, just very very little play if I grab it towards the bottom and shake it back and forth.

Yeah I'm starting to think it may just need to be moved around after having been jacked up, I have no clue why it would have changed from just that, it didn't sit weird with the Panasports.

 

Nature of the beast. Mine always sits a bit funny after being on stands because the
watts links get stretchout out and when you lower it, they bind just a bit until
moved making the car sit funny.