I'll cut to the chase and post a pic first:
Woof Woof by
Wong0ne, on Flickr
Beans' suspension updates reminded me about my alignment I had.
Back in August, I took the car in to Precision to get it aligned. When I booked the appointment, they said Hank was on vacation, but Ivan was still good. Hank had trained all the guys, so Ivan should be good. I went ahead and booked it.
At the shop, Ivan brought me to the car and showed me that there was a lot of vertical play in the front driver wheel. Instantly, I'm like, shoot. Wheel bearing is toast.
"Your struts are on their way out"
Wut?
"I can't tell because you have them covered up" (with neoprene sleeves).
Anyway, he's the professional, so I took him at his word. Disheartened, I went home with my tail between my legs, parked the car, and went on with my life. A few weeks later, I jacked the car up and took a look at the struts. Wiggled the wheels. Yup there was play. Looked at the struts. I didn't know what I was looking for. Oil leaks? Anyway, looked fine. Put the wheels back on. Gave them some hard tugs.
No play.
Eh?
So, I'm not sure what's up. There was play for a reason. Best thing I can think of the lugs weren't torqued, BUT, they were. I'm pretty sure I would've noticed if the wheel was moving while the rest of the brakes and hub remained stationary, but I can't say for certain. However, I have driven a car with loose lugs before and the wheel complained with loud clicks on each rotation. Mine weren't doing that, and even if they were, it would have been in stereo with both front wheels clicking away. And I can say for certain that I had to break each lug when I took the wheels off.
So, I don't know. Maybe the bearings or ball joints are still on their way out. I'll keep a closer eye on them moving forward.
Moving forward then, I went ahead and rebooked to try the alignment again. This time I went with a local shop right next to my work. They had a clean shop and took pride in their work, so I wanted to give them a chance, despite the advice of my friends. But I had to know... If they ended up being great, it would've been awesome to have a shop just a walk away from my work.
I told them, as much negative camber in the front as possible, 0 camber in the rear and 0 toe all around. I don't have camber bolts, but I do have adjustable top plates that came with the Feals. I figure I could get something closer to -2.
Negative ghost rider. They called and said they can only get -1.3 in the front and 0 in the rear. Really? That's virtually max camber settings on stock suspension. They ask, do I want to try camber bolts? Well... Ok, screw it. Do the bolts.
So, picked up the car at the end of the day. Looked at the alignment sheet. -1.3/-1.2 in the front. -2.5 in the rear.
W in all T F. You put the camber bolts in the rear? FML. RIP oversteer. Going to plow this pig into every corner.
Thought about telling them to do it over, but I also thought, I'm hella noob at suspension tuning. I should try it out and experience it anyway. So I walked out and am waiting eagerly for the next Autox.