Sandcar Front End Alignment - School Me Please

[Dockmaster]

What are the ins and outs of properly aligning a front end? 

What is the best way to measure and set toe-in? Do you all just measure with your sand tires on? Do you use street/trailer tires and measure? Suspension loaded or just sitting unloaded when you measure ?Or do you make a plywood wheel or something like that? Do you prefer a small amount of toe-in or do you try to get it dead nuts straight?

What about Camber? How are you measuring that and is it even adjustable or can be shimmed?

Or can you just take it Les Schwab or similar and have them put it on an alignment rack and shoot it in for you?

 

[Bobalos]

not sure if this will help @ all, but..........  I asked this question PC & got quite a few suggestions.  It sure seems to me like there are a number of different idea's on what is "right" & Im guessing it they are all starting points & where you end up will depend on quite a few factors. 

My problem is trying to get the car to turn when we are in the smaller dunes with no passengers in the car.  ESPECIALLY if Im leaning into the throttle & have taken some weight off of the front end.  before this last weekend I put 1/2 a turn in on the caster & brought the tops of the tires in towards the car & 1/2 a turn in on the rear upper A-Arm & brought the caster in a bit & the camber back a bit.  This affected the Toe, so I cranked on it a 1/2 a turn & brought it back in to where it was.  Doing that made the car turn better during the light front end/higher ride height scenario, but not great. 

We took the cars over to the Gecko road area where the dunes are much faster & less tall than over in the wash area, where they are smaller & more technical.  The changes I made did not adversely affect the car in the much faster dunes. 



This was a test I did in my garage.  This was in my garage with no bodies in the car.  just measuring Toe & changing ride height with a jack.  Seems like a pretty big change to me..............  the reason its blue & black is because this is not one continuous set of data.  I took the blue data on one day & the Black data on another day.  I need to do it over again, but in the end.............  I think just screwing with it, is the way to go. 

 

[Kansas T]

I set my buggy alignment with a tape measure and digital angle gauge in my garage.  I made several trips to the dunes and played with the alignment until I was happy with the way it drove and handled.  Because I have easy access to one, I put it on an alignment rack after I was happy with things to see what the numbers really were.  I'm running .10 degrees of total toe in on the front.  The caster it set to 5.0 degrees.  The camber is set to -1.3 degrees. 

 

[Sandkist]

Caster and Camber

 

[L.R.S.]

It helps of the car builder can give you some numbers to start with- caster, camber, toe. You want to do it right pull the coilovers off and let the nitrogen out of the bypasses.

Make the front end square. Find a center point on the chassis and measure both sides from there. I pull a string under the chassis to fine the center. That single or double tube running front to back may not be straight. The string will be.

Once square set the camber and caster according to the car builder specs. If you don't have these start at +9° caster and zero camber. These are just starting points and may change. Don't Locktite or torque hardware yet. 

Cycle the front end full droop to full bump and measure. If yoy don't have "Toe plates" use the front tires. Mark them so you measure in the same spot each time.

 

[J Alper]

What some are forgetting also is the rear,  check the rear the car can track straight or not by the rear having tow out, tow out in the rear can make the car dance around, i like a little tow-in with the rear also