Setback????

 

Jag,

Sorry 'bout that. Set back is when one front wheel is set further back than the other wheel.

JMC

 

JMC,

You know what.. Im not even sure???

 

Info ,
I just put on my 02L a set of NITTO 555 295/45 ZR-18'S, had my front end set up with 0 camber, 0 caster and 0 toe in as recommended by Nitto on their website www.nittotire.com
check it out.
Now, as far as centering your steering wheel on alignment. The technician must absorb the neutral play from the left to the right and then center the steering wheel. This allows equal play on both sides.
Good luck
Ole Man

 

I had an independant shop do my alignment, they installed the cam bolts to get it right. Anyway, it doesn't pull and the wheel is straight.

But, I still have some wander. Seems like you can never take your eyes off the road. Sometimes I feel like a bumper car bouncing from one edge of my lane to the other.

Couple of months ago, I towed a small 5x8 enclosed trailer. I noticed that I had absolutely NO wander while pulling it. I figure the drag of the trailer was enough to help hold the truck straight.

Any thoughts? Could this be translated into knowing what could be done to fix the wander?

I'm going to try a lower air pressure in the rear tires. I usually don't have that much in the bed, so I don't need to run the max.

 

As I just posted in another thread, one of my friend's felt having the alignment shop dial in the maximum allowable amount of caster helped reduce wander on his F150. Mine has always felt fine to me.

 

Check your idler arm!

 

When you tow a trailer the increased tongue weight of the trailer will shift the weight off the front causing the suspension to extend and that changes the toe, caster and camber. If I did my geometry properly Toe in will increase, both Caster and Camber will become more positive. Here is the logic behind the geometry. Becasue the inner connecting rod pivot point is higher than the pivot point of the lower A arm the arc created by the outer tie rod joint is closer to the frame on suspension extension than the arc created by the lower ball joint. This will pull the outer tie rod joint towards the center of the frame. Becasue the steering linkage is in front of the axle this pulls the front of the wheels closer together increasing toe in. Becasue the caster on these trucks is positive when you rotate the frame downwards in the rear the caster line moves even further in front of the tire contact patch. These trucks are designed to increase negative camber on suspension compression they will decrease negative, or increase positive, caster on extension. I may be wrong but I think I got it right. Take this to your alignment shop and see what they think.

JMC

 

As I was trying to figure out my previous post DBD and green crew posted.
DBD makes reference to the increased camber and that is one of the factors that changed. I would start with that one.

greencrew makes another point about the idler arm. If it is worn it will cause problems. I hope that the shops you guys take these trucks to do a thorough inspection of the steering components. Looking at them is not enough. you have to test them. If all they do is look; walk, no run, away.

Nothing pisses me off than to take my truck for front end work and to be told after it is done that something is wearing out. It is like being pregnant! You are or you are not. In essence the A hole is telling me I wasted my money on the alignment because it will have to be done over again because a part is worn and needs to be changed. Sorry for the rant.

JMC

 

Here is my take on alignment. Do not mess with it unless you know it needs adjustment. I have a 2000 f150 2wd with over 130,000 miles. I just changed the original tires a couple thousand miles ago. 128,000 miles on the tires with one rotation at 20,000 miles. I still have not aligned my truck.

Josh

 

Josh,

You are right on that one. But if you ever need one it is nice to know a place that does good work.

JMC

 

Josh,

I agree with you to, however I still have a crooked steering wheel. I may take it to one last shop to see whats up. I also have a few guys over at FTW willing to take a look at my rig as well.

Like I have said before, wish I had never had the dealer touch my rig!

 

Well, I'm in the same boat as everyone else. My truck drove off the lot pulling to the right, had the dealership realign, and now it pulls to the left a bit and the wheel is seems a little off...

I plan on doing the cam bolt install, and having it aligned at a shop I've been to before with other vehicles. They seem to do good work, plus I can browse wheels while I'm there...

Anybody know of a good how-to on changing out the bolts. I'm sure there's one here somewhere, I've just overlooked it. I can probably figure it out, but it's always nice to see what "should" be done first. I'll probably go with the ones JMC linked to on ebay... anyone else used them?

 

I could hear the pads scraping on the rotor on the right side, and the steering wheel jumped like a tire was out of ballance. I had all four tires ballanced, the the problem was still there.

A friend of mine mentioned that it may be possible that a pice of dirt go stuck behind the rotor and it wasn't straight. Today I pulled the front wheel and wiggled the rotor until I was happy that all the metal chips fell out.

After I put the tire back on an drove it the noise was gone, the tire bounce was gone and the truck seems to go straight. What seemed to be a tire bouncing was the brake pad hitting the rotor. This started right after the dealer replaced the lower ball joints, so I think the work resulted in a metal flake from the rotor getting cought behind the rotor, and it was no longer straight.

I don't understand why it pulled to the other side, as I would expect it to pull to the same side.

 

I have to say that aligning any vehicle is not just a job...it is an ART. And no doubt about it. I say that from experience because i am the alignment man at our shop. I also have to say that getting a steering wheel "perfectly" straight is near impossible. But my standards are VERY high. Out of my short career on the alignment rack i have had two vehicles that i have had a perfect wheel on. Very dissapointing i know. (Almost all of them are very acceptable to customers though). But like i said it is an art. Many factors to take into consideration and a very complicated ordeal to adjust every angle perfectly. You also have to take into consideration the tires on the vehicles as well as weight in the car or truck (there should be absolutely none....but we all know thats almost impossible). But all that said it is "possible" to get a straight wheel. Another thing to take into consideration is the dated machines alot of us use. Trust me....the newer the machine the better. And unfortunately at the dealerships alot of the time we have dated equipment. Because of the price of a machine is the reason for that. Another great factor that some of u found out is experience under the belt of the man using the machine. Its obvious.......the more the better. I know myself it is very difficult to find a good alignment man. Its even harder to find a good alignment man that has good equipment. So when u do find one.....make sure to remember him. Anyway let me get back to the key focus here. At 29k i replaced my stock tires with 265/60/18 kuhmo's. My old tires were wearing poorly so i had my truck aligned by the alignment man at our shop at that time(the guy before me). Steering wheel was straight and was no real way to tell if alignment was in spec until the tire wear factor came in to affect. And it did and I found the insides wearing fairly heavy on my new tires. In the meantime I became the alignment man. So when i aligned my truck i found camber to be within spec but on the negative side of the spectrum. Here is where i am kinda confused with some of your experiences.. On my 99 i have camber/caster adjustments capable from factory....no kits or bolts to install. So i adjusted my camber to slightly positive and set toe accordingly. The damage was already done to my tires so its hard to tell if the positve camber setting was the cure for my tire wear but time will tell after a new set. Now i have 55k on my truck......no worn parts yet. However at one time i repacked my wheel bearings....had some play there. Nothing a repack didnt cure. But that is only the case on us guys running the 2x4's. I hope i kinda explained why its hard to get a perfect alignment the first time. Just remember....its not an easy job. Thats why not every shop has an alignment rack. Good luck to u guys in getting your perfect alignment.