Advice requested from those of you who have successfully checked camber at home

I've done it at home and on the side of the road. I've also done it hundreds of times with professional equipment.

My advice is YOU will not measure it accurately enough, and camber isn't the only angle you need to check, and the other angles are more difficult to measure - with caster being virtually impossible for you to measure without proper equipment.

And a fairly accurate response.

And I've told you

It depends a whole lot on the mobile device, on the application you are using, and how you apply it.

"design it in autocad, lay it out with a string, mark it with a crayon, and cut it with an axe"

That about describes the accuracy of your approach. Is it POSSIBLE to be accurate in that scenario?? Of course, if you try often enough - but your repeatability is not going to be very good.

This is good advice that a string won't be accurate nor repeatable enough for toe measurements.

This home-alignment howto shows camber in degrees and toe in both degrees and in inches:

The really good news is that the author suggests 0 degrees of camber, which, it seems to me on initial thought, should be the easiest of all angles to measure.

That same article shows how to get the individual wheel toe:

Since this thread is all about practical advice, the great news is that the article offered the following pragmatic recommendation of: a. Zero degrees of camber for a street car b. Zero toe (or a smidge of toe of about 1/16" on each side for a total toe of 1/32")

Both those zeroes should be relatively easy to measure with shop tools, are they not?

I have multiple vehicles.

My japanese vehicle never breaks. My bimmer always breaks.

I work on both of them just the same.

My vehicle has never been in an accident but that's not really the point because nobody will disagree with you that caster is part of an alignment equation, and, that caster comes before camber which comes before toe.

This article shows that if you can measure camber, you can measure caster:

Since my bimmer has no direct way to adjust caster, I'm skipping the non-adjustable caster (for now) to concentrate on camber.

I think that's an unfair statement that I don't understand why an alignment measurement needs to be correct but certainly I am confused about how to convert a toe specification that is given in degrees to a toe measurement which will be made in inches.

What matters to an alignment check is simply that the manufacturer's stated accuracy is achieved.

That accuracy, for my bimmer, is stated here:

The bimmer insult isn't really needed here since this is a technical question, but it's fair to say that what you're saying is that "alignment can be felt" but I would clarify that by adding "sometimes".

I'm not sure if you can feel the difference, for example, between 2 degrees of negative camber in the rear wheels and 1 degree.

Over time, your tires will tell you; but waiting the 5K miles for the tires to inform you of that difference is not a quick check by any means. :)

buy another

sell it or give it away

This is the first indication of what's possible out of a mobile device in this thread, so I thank you for figuring out that your level app has an accuracy of plus or minus 7 degrees (if I understood you correctly).

How did you find that out though?

I agree that the jig attached to the wheel has to be exactly on target (within the stated accuracies, all of which add up).

Here's an example of a camber jig for home use:

Here's an even better camber jig setup for home use:

This is good practical advice that you need to both roll the car back and forth to let it settle on the suspension, and you need to add slip plates under the wheels so that they slip nicely when adjusted.

This is also good advice to bounce the car and to use slip plates for measuring and adjusting toe so that the wheels move freely.

The really good news is that, like in your case, a simple bubble level might suffice simply because a decent rear camber spec is zero degrees anyway, which is the easiest angle to measure.

In summary, what I've learned in the past day are a few things:

1. A practical value for rear camber is 0 degrees to a smidge negative
2. A practical value for toe-in is 0 inches to a smidge positive (inward)

Both those are so close to zero that I can check that they are zero, and then I can tweak them to a "smidge" inward.

But that is a different problem from checking them, which seems to be easily doable using a few common tools based on my googling today:

This article states that you can get as accurate at home as you need to:

Here's how they measured toe-in, for example: Notice they measured toe in linear measurements.

Ah! My bad. Thank you for that correction.

Until you admonished me, I had previously thought total toe was just the toe of both wheels to the centerline added up.

I stand corrected.

So "total toe" is the difference between the tracking of the front of the tire and the rear of the tire (measured to centerline of the vehicle).

Yes.

Thank you for this pragmatic advice that the toe per wheel is given so that we can keep the steering wheel centered while doing the job.

Thank you because, when I read the next sentence, for the first time, I understood why toe is specified as an angle!

Ah. Yes. This is true that the *angle* is the angle of the wheel to the centerline of the vehicle.

It's a tiny angle which is very close to zero; but it's an angle for sure!

Is this diagram I just made modified correct for that angle?

Ah. I see what you're talking about. Thanks for that pragmatic advice!

Is this diagram that I just made showing what you just said?

I don't understand that statement. I was trying to draw what you said but I don't know which way to extend.

In which direction do I extend the line? In front of the car? Or to the side?

Thank you for your pragmatic advice.

Is this diagram I just made correct for total toe?

The japanese vehicle you can drive and drive without doing any maintenance and it won't break until all of a sudden everything fails. The BMW requires a lot of very specific maintenance, and you need to keep on top of that maintenance, and if you do not do it, it will break. But, you can drive it for a long, long time before everything fails.

Maintenance is better than repairs any day, though.

--scott

I appreciate your advice. Here are the diagrams I made for toe based on your pragmatic advice.

1. This shows why toe is specified as an angle to the centerline:
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2. This shows why an *angle* is better than a distance specification:
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3. This shows that Total Toe is a distance while toe is an angle:
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   If that is correct, the only problem I have understanding in the spec is why the total toe is specified in angles when it should be the difference in the distance between the front and rear tracks to the centerline:
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My japanese vehicle is sort of like Android; it just works. The bimmer is more like my iPad; it constantly can't do basic stuff.

:)

I understand your reply (which was that I sounded arrogant to you when I asked people who wouldn't be adding any value not to respond).

And you must understand mine, which is that I was trying to prevent a huge waste of time becuase *most* people wouldn't dare contemplate checking their camber (or toe) at home.

The problems with doing alignment at home stem first from *understanding* the specs, which it is clear, I'm still grasping.

After the specs are understood, then the next problem is measuring the camber and toe.

And the third problem is adjusting them.

This thread is only about measuring them, but I agree, my confusion on toe angles slowed things down.

To put the difference more honestly, I've had both vehicles for more than

15 years each so I know their personalities well.

The Toyota almost never breaks down, but when it does, the fix is generally simple and easy to do where parts are easy to find and relatively inexpensive. Yet, it doesn't handle as well (although it's a different type of vehicle altogehter).

But here are the "problems" I've had with the Toyta:

1. The transmission shift lever uses idiotic plastic bushings (replaced 2x)
2. The sway bar used buna rubber bushings (replaced with poly bushings)
3. The electrical antenna keeps breaking (I finally gave up on it)
4. The torsion clutch pedal spring is stupid (replaced with linear spring)
5. The digital clock digits go out (gave up after fixing it twice)
6. The oil filter housing gasket leaks (fixed by replacing it)
7. The door opening mechanism failed (replaced with OEM)
8. The front shocks were toast within five years (replaced w Bilsteins)
9. The rear brakelight stopped working (sanded a few times & is now fixed) Plus assorted standard maintenance (belts, clutch, fluids, brakes, etc.).

The bimmer constantly breaks down, but its handling is nice. However, it's important to know that the bimmer I have is the E39 which has about 20 items made like crap, where *everything* else is rock solid.

So the twenty items made like crap on the E39 are, offhand:

1. The cooling system (mostly the idiotic plastic expansion tank)
2. The DISA valve (mostly an idiotic plastic flap pin)
3. The window regulators (two idiotic plastic rollers)
4. The Bosch ABS control module (an idiotic internal wire badly mounted)
5. The seats twist (idiotic sleeves on the many motor control cables)
6. Instrument cluster pixels die (idiotic pink stickytape connectors)
7. The headlight adjustment (idiotic plastic adjustment pins break)
8. AC control (idiotic FSU/FSR blows its mosfets time and time again)
9. CCV (aka PCV) (idiotic design creates mayonaise in cold weather locales)
10. Doors leak water (idiotic lack of glue in the vapor barrier adhesive)
11. Trunk wiring (utterly idiotic design has no concept of opening flex!)
12. Temperature (idiotic placement of the ambient temperature sensor)
13. Windshiled washer system (the entire design is idiotic)
14. Jack pads (idiotic lack of a center pin was replaced under TSB)
15. AC odors (idiotic lack of a way to vent collected water)
16. The cupholders (idiotic design can't be fixed - just throw it away)
17. Wood trim (idiodic material was never tested for lifespan)
18. Windshield molding (idiotic use of recycled rubber was a disaster)
19. Power steering leaks (idiotic design of the I6 hoses & V8 brackets)
20. The front shocks were toast within its first year (warranty fix) Plus assorted standard maintenance (belts, clutch, fluids, brakes, etc.).

My summary, after owning both from new for over fifteen years each is that the BMW is a pain in the ass to repair whenever something does go wrong, and things go wrong a lot because BMW doesn't know how to design a complete car but the handling is phenominal and the engine is bulletproof.

Meanwhile, the Toyota is a dream child to repair when something does go wrong (which is almost never) simply because Toyota knows something BMW doesn't know, which is how to design a complete vehicle.

But all this is OT.

only because you're too stupid to figure out how, particularly after people repeatedly explain to you exactly how.

Ya, I am to. But first let me say this, The first spec you posted,

0* 14' plus or minus 10', seems this isn't as critical as some posters are making it. For toe, it is still a trig problem, but the problem is defining, side b (a reference point).

I don't know this, is it a single adjustment that moves both wheels or do you adjust both wheels separately? (makes a reference even more important) Sorry just thinking on the keypad.

You have a trig problem and a measurement problem. The measurement problem is more difficult.

It is not be hard to convert the 14 minutes to inches using the wheel diameter as one line. The angle is how much more is the front of the wheel turned in more than the rear of the wheel. I'll call the wheel 16" from front to rear. (just realized this almost the same trig problem for camber, just rotated 90*)

I'm using the trig calculator above, this time the orientation is correct. Put the following numbers in, (side c) = 16, (angle A) = .233. The angle is .233 because 14min/60min = .233. Your answer is (side a) which is 0.065". So, you want the rear of a 16" wheel stick out 0.065" more than the front. Not real easy to measure, But, if you could extend the 16" to 12 ft (192") with a laser pointer, then (side a) is 0.781". The laser must be perfectly square with the wheel. Just some thinking. Hope it makes some sense. Mikek

Now that I've done some more research, I have a better handle on 'toe' so I'm going to agree with you that getting toe precise to 2 minutes isn't all that important, in all likelihood.

For *setting* toe, especially in the rear, it could easily be that 0 toe (degrees or inches) would be just fine, or, maybe, to take up some suspension slop, a "smidgeon" of toe (maybe 1/16th of an inch or less in linear dimension no matter what the wheel/tire diameter).

This is to take up the slop in the suspension (perhaps slightly more in the front if it's a typical RWD like all my vehicles are).

I'm still confused how to convert toe from degrees to inches, but luckily, there are web sites that will do it for us.

Interesting you mention that, because the reason for the *far away* wall is simply that the angle is small, right?

If you are talking about toe, I'm no expert, but the way I understand it is that you lock the steering wheel in the center position first (which has nothing, per se, to do with alignment but with esthetics) - and then - you pick a side, and twist a tie-rod ever so slightly - which - depending on the direction of twist, moves the front of the wheel in toward the centerline of the vehicle - or outward.

So it's one wheel at a time, measured to the centerline. Of course, you can assume all sorts of symmetries and do both wheels at the same time, but conceptually I think of toe as a wheel-to-centerline thing, to be done one at a time.

That's an interesting observation that the measurement problem is more difficult, but I think only if we try to measure degrees of toe.

If we measure inches of toe, the measurement problem is conceptually trivially simple.

I'm trying to find the triangle in the equation of toe in order to figure out how to convert the distance measurement to an angle.

Here I just drew what is my first pass guess at where that triangle lies:

Is *this* the trigonometric angle everyone is talking about?

You make a good point here in that we really have a 3-dimensional X, Y, and Z axis, each of which is rotated by 90 degrees (caster, camber, and toe).

Just to ask to get me more firmly grounded, is *this* the triangle everyone is talking about?

So don't measure in inches. If you have tools to measure camber in degrees, you can surely repurpose them to measure toe-in in degrees also, no? HTH.

Cheers, -- tlvp

The problem is obviously not the hardware; it is the user.

*SCNR*

Am 09.12.16 um 20:46 schrieb nospam:

*FACK*