In tracking my car i have been tweaking suspension setup for about 3 years now.

One of the worst things about FCs for track days is that stock you cannot adjust camber apreciably at all.

My first step to gain some negative camber was camber plates via a full coilover upgrade. This was probably the best money i have ever spent on my car as it turned it into a whole different animal in the corners and under braking. Coilovers are an absolute must for road racing or track/auto-x days.

Once the coilovers were in i was able to dial about 2deg negative. With the struts tilted fully inwards on the plates the max was between 2.1 and 2.2 neg camber.

I was still having tire wear problems. I would basically chew up the outside of the tires and would have to run rediculous tire pressures to lessen the effect. Not ideal.

I decided to give the old ingalls cam bolts a try. I had heard the typical problem was slipping of the bolts over time.

Basically what i did was install them at home and eyeball set them to maximize thier effect on negative camber with LOTS of red loctite.

I then had the car alligned using the camber plates to set camber. I had teh camber set to 2.8 neg static on both sides. They had the potential for 3deg neg with where i had the cam bolts. But, i could tell i had not maximized what they could achive if adjusted while on the rack. But at that point the red loctite was dry and i didnt want to break the hold. I would guess that nearly 3.5 neg would be possible if maximizing both the plates and the cam bolts.

I did a whole track weekend with the cam bolts in and they did not budge once. I run R-comps and have a few years under my belt so brake and turn loading was pretty high on these. No slippage whatsoever.

Tire wear at 2.8 was perfect no uneven wear , no tread block angles just perfect contact patch.

 

Whose camber plates were you running? I have the Cusco plates and seem to be able to get about -2.6 degrees of camber with them.

-bill

 

If you're using coilovers and have dropped the car significantly, wouldn't that give you TOO MUCH negative camber, if anything?

 

Stance coilovers with thier camber plates. I have only dropped the car about 1 inch from stock ride height.

-2.8 is nearly ideal for the car in the configuration it is in. Tire wear was outstanding.

 

I have racing beat springs, and kyb adjustables. What would be the best solution for bolt on camber adjustment?

 

depends on the tire.

 

If the springs are a lot stiffer than stock, you're probably getting much less than normal dynamic camber (camber change due to wheel deflection), so you are needing to make up for that with static camber (what you're adjusting now). Softer springs (but with the same front-rear ratio) would probably help you out a bit in this regard, as well as ultimate grip on the track/auto-x if its not glass-smooth. The downside to this would be more weight xfer, and possibly the need to run stiffer anti-roll bars (which further increases the split in weight distribution from inside to outside wheel)

j9fd3s is right, the amount of camber you want to run is dependant on the tire as well as the car

 

The rear end is where that problem happens, but it can be fixed with the center camber link and the individual camber links (dogbone replacements)

 

Yep, the front does not add dynamic camber.

Being that the rear camber is dynamic, the rear is not an issue as far as grip goes in my application and you dont run as much camber typically in the rear anyway, especially with dynamic camber.

I have about 1.7-1.9 neg static on both rear tires just from the 1" drop. This seems to be perfect as tire wear is excellent in the rear also.

 

Its not really that dependent on the tire as far as how much camber you want to run. Use is obviously the highest factor. Street and auto-x cars don't do as much g-loading as all out track cars. And of course for drag cars you want as little as possible under full squat in the rear and full dive in the front.

The 2nd highest factor for the front is ride height. Which affects how much the car rolls via center of gravity.

The 2nd highest factor for the rear is spring rate followed closely by ride height.

The only real difference with tires is that with street tires you can add a little air pressure and usually have much more impact on contact patch for a particular activity than with R-comps. It depends on sidewall stiffness.

But all else being equal on a road course and running various different r-comp tires the ideal camber settings will be VERY similar if not identical. Thus, it's missleading to say it depends on tires...

If anything it depends far more on the grip of the tire and its effect on g-loading capability where different tires would benefit from different camber in the front.

 

I had the exact same setup.

Best solution?.....start with full coilover setup with camber plates.

Easiest Cheapest solution?......cam bolts work just fine to add about 1-1.5 neg. Which would likely be plenty for auto-x of any kind.