Alignment help please!

Grumpy Bear · January 21, 2019

Does it bother you at all that as there are about 171,000 members on this list only two offered any help? Why do you think that might be?

According to your "current specs" this alignment is about as screwed up as it can be. Making it less worse isn't making it even close to right and your banging on the help you are getting? Have a beer and think about that.

Your not listening....so I'm not going to keep talking. Wish you all the best. Seriously. All the best. I know how aggravating this sort of thing can be.

arkenzo · January 22, 2019

Grumpy is hella grumpy this morning lol, try him tomorrow? Lol[emoji16][emoji16][emoji16]

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Cheech2017 · January 23, 2019

On 2019-01-20 at 11:30 PM, Grumpy Bear said:

Does it bother you at all that as there are about 171,000 members on this list only two offered any help? Why do you think that might be?

According to your "current specs" this alignment is about as screwed up as it can be. Making it less worse isn't making it even close to right and your banging on the help you are getting? Have a beer and think about that.

Your not listening....so I'm not going to keep talking. Wish you all the best. Seriously. All the best. I know how aggravating this sort of thing can be.

I’ve never been anything but appreciative for your help. I’ve said so several times. It appears that you have misunderstood some of my perspectives and become offended by them. If I say I need clarification you say I don’t pay attention. If I say I am confused you say I’m banging on the help. I’m trying to learn from those who have more experience and if I seem dumb or not knowledgeable well you’re right! But I’m definitely not unappreciative.

So here’s what I’ve learned so far:

negative camber is good for me bc I’m running more offset that stock

lower caster or elimination of caster is good for me bc of the offset

my toe specs are fine however taking out a lil more toe may help with scrub.

that would be correct yes?

Now that said I’ve noticed MORE wear on the outside tires than before so I became confused as to why when going in the direction you advised it wasn’t helping. That was based on my alignment being at and STAYING at those specs. This morning I had my truck on the rack and it turns out it is NOT at the specs I posted any longer. The truck keeps coming out of spec during NORMAL driving unknown to me until I get it up on a rack. So after 3-4 weeks I’ve noticed more wear bc I just learned the truck will not stay at the settings the techs put on it. They are either not torquing bolts proper or there is a bigger problem yet to be determined.

This does not seem to be uncommon with these trucks constantly going out of spec for no reason other than normal driving once leveled or lifted. So the problem is not me not listening but the truck doing something it’s not supposed too ultimately skewing positive results I would or should get with your advice. That being said the unknown variable has been detected and now needs to be isolated before I make anymore adjustments to alignment.

My biggest problem now is how or what do you do to get these trucks to stay locked into thier alignment? Are there aftermarket kits that you can use? Shops are telling me they are torquing caster and camber bolts to specs, should they put more torque on them?

If the alignment constantly lets loose no wonder alignments aren’t helping to solve my problem and why you thought I was being difficult.

1SLOW1500 · January 23, 2019

I would check the spec. If it is a stock bolt and is reusable and it should be. Then I would invest in a paint or wax pen. And index mark the heads and nuts on everything. Sounds crazy but any good shop or tech would do the same. And just to check when you say up.on the rack, this is a drive on 4 post lift? All specs are checked at ride height?
Also what alignment tools or methods are you or they using?
I would also.have tires rebalance, hars to believe all this wear and alignment issues and they are riding fine.
My buddy's truck is huge lift and offset tires. He drives the hell out of it for work. And no issues. Different brand truck but just saying.
So I say reduce caster, low as possible negative camber toe is fine. And just check the steering rack. Not saying it is worn out but big tires, offset, wear, coming out of spec. Somewhere something isn't good.
All kits say retorque after 500mile. This it there bolts sonyou can imagine the stock bolts.

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Grumpy Bear · January 23, 2019

8 hours ago, Cheech2017 said:

an This morning I had my truck on the rack and it turns out it is NOT at the specs I posted any longer. The truck keeps coming out of spec during NORMAL driving unknown to me until I get it up on a rack.

If the alignment constantly lets loose no wonder alignments aren’t helping to solve my problem and why you thought I was being difficult.

That is indeed a different kettle of fish. As 1SLOW1500 advised I would as well. Time to inspect parts, checking welds and start marking bolts. Until you can get a consistent alignment we can't hunt anything down. All is good once more.

Cheech2017 · January 24, 2019

9 hours ago, 1SLOW1500 said:

I would check the spec. If it is a stock bolt and is reusable and it should be. Then I would invest in a paint or wax pen. And index mark the heads and nuts on everything. Sounds crazy but any good shop or tech would do the same. And just to check when you say up.on the rack, this is a drive on 4 post lift? All specs are checked at ride height?
Also what alignment tools or methods are you or they using?
I would also.have tires rebalance, hars to believe all this wear and alignment issues and they are riding fine.
My buddy's truck is huge lift and offset tires. He drives the hell out of it for work. And no issues. Different brand truck but just saying.
So I say reduce caster, low as possible negative camber toe is fine. And just check the steering rack. Not saying it is worn out but big tires, offset, wear, coming out of spec. Somewhere something isn't good.
All kits say retorque after 500mile. This it there bolts sonyou can imagine the stock bolts.

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The dealer is doing the alignment as they had done it 3-4 weeks ago and about 6-7 mos before that. I believe they have drive on lift, at least that’s what another dealer had been using. I asked the service advisor about the equipment but he didn’t seem to know.

I made a deal deal with them to seal/mark the bolts and we would monitor daily for the next week or two as they said they don’t know why it’s always coming out of spec if I’m not hitting curbs or potholes. I also asked them to double check all the torque specs on all the bolts before marking them.

I pick it up tomorrow and asked them to reset to the following specs:

Camber -0.09/-0.07

caster 1.6/1.8

toe 0.03/0.03

Should be significantly better if it stays in spec. May need to tweak caster a tiny bit but the camber and toe should be ok. I opted to ask for a little more neg camber and a lil less neg caster. I debated staying around -0.06 or so camber and low as 1.3 caster but decided against it for now only bc I didn’t want low speed turning to feel too heavy, will have to see what happens next I guess.

Thanks!

Cheech2017 · January 24, 2019

1 hour ago, Grumpy Bear said:

That is indeed a different kettle of fish. As 1SLOW1500 advised I would as well. Time to inspect parts, checking welds and start marking bolts. Until you can get a consistent alignment we can't hunt anything down. All is good once more.

When I started this thread I didn’t expect this kind of irony....grumpy is happy ? lol

thanks grumpy

Grumpy Bear · January 24, 2019

43 minutes ago, Cheech2017 said:

Camber -0.09/-0.07

caster 1.6/1.8

toe 0.03/0.03

Camber drivers side -0.07 passenger -0.09 (less negative is more positive...remember)

Caster drivers side 1.8 passenger 1.6. You are in a right lane driving area, right?

Toe is good.

Remember to assure zero 'thrust angle' as well so it isn't dog walking.

Cheech2017 · January 24, 2019

5 minutes ago, Grumpy Bear said:

Camber drivers side -0.07 passenger -0.09 (less negative is more positive...remember)

Caster drivers side 1.8 passenger 1.6. You are in a right lane driving area, right?

Toe is good.

Remember to assure zero 'thrust angle' as well so it isn't dog walking.

Did I reverse the specs?!? They already aligned it. Im in Canada.

Grumpy Bear · January 24, 2019

11 hours ago, Cheech2017 said:

Did I reverse the specs?!? They already aligned it. Im in Canada.

Yep.

Let's not worry about that right now until we find the source of the movement.

Try this. Going down the highway straight away let loose of the wheel as tell me which way it drifts. Make sure your alone.

Cheech2017 · January 24, 2019

6 hours ago, Grumpy Bear said:

Yep.

Let's not worry about that right now until we find the source of the movement.

Try this. Going down the highway straight away let loose of the wheel as tell me which way it drifts. Make sure your alone.

Ok so bringing the truck back on Monday for them to set it up again. I gave the wrong measurements so the tech was also confused and set it at

camber -0.1/-0.1 (I had told them -0.09 when I meant -0.9)

caster is 1.8/1.8

toe 0.05/0.05

will get them to set it up as

camber driver -0.7/-0.9 pass

caster driver1.8/1.6 pass

Toe 0.03/0.03

I will be taking it on the Hwy tomorrow will report how it drives in current set up then and if I see any bolts move. Hopefully they marked the bolts was in a rush didn’t check when I picked it up.

Grumpy Bear · January 25, 2019

4 hours ago, Cheech2017 said:

Ok so bringing the truck back on Monday for them to set it up again. I gave the wrong measurements so the tech was also confused and set it at

camber -0.1/-0.1 (I had told them -0.09 when I meant -0.9)

caster is 1.8/1.8

toe 0.05/0.05

will get them to set it up as

camber driver -0.7/-0.9 pass

caster driver1.8/1.6 pass

Toe 0.03/0.03

I will be taking it on the Hwy tomorrow will report how it drives in current set up then and if I see any bolts move. Hopefully they marked the bolts was in a rush didn’t check when I picked it up.

Dude, pick a number already.

Lets research before we drive this guy nutty. You and I have different wheelbases thus different alignment targets.

I want you to ask for the factory alignment ranges and print them back to us. Baby steps. Okay? Your moving all over the map.

Cheech2017 · January 25, 2019

11 hours ago, Grumpy Bear said:

Dude, pick a number already.

Lets research before we drive this guy nutty. You and I have different wheelbases thus different alignment targets.

I want you to ask for the factory alignment ranges and print them back to us. Baby steps. Okay? Your moving all over the map.

Lol I picked but I picked wrong! Lol

Driving at around 50mph yesterday on some back roads felt like I was fighting the truck to stay up flat on the crowns, seemed to want to wander back and fourth between them. I’m assuming this is because camber has them tilted in at the bottom and they are scrubbing rather than rolling over crowns. Steering does not feel heavy though.

Here are the factory thresholds for my truck:

caster left min 1.8 max 3.8

caster right min 2.1 max 4.1

camber left min -0.9 max 0.7

camber right min -0.9 max 0.7

toe left min -0.05 max 0.15

toe right min -0.05 max 0.15

total min toe -0.10 max 0.30

i noticed every time the dealer sets up my alignment they always put in 0 cross camber and caster. So always the number is equal both sides. Any reason why they would tdo his instead of compensating about .25 degree side to side like we’ve been discussing?

also they have a drive on lift style of alignment rack they use, I got to talk to the tech directly yesterday and saw him doing his thing. He did not have anyone sitting in the driver seat when doing his alignments. Correct me if I’m wrong but shouldn’t someone roughly the drivers weight be in the drivers seat when aligning a vehicle or is that depending on the type of alignment machine being used?

Grumpy Bear · January 25, 2019

http://www.priertiresupply.com/pdf/hofmannbrochures/fundamentals of alignment.pdf

Give a man a fish vs teach a man to fish, right.

Now aren't you happy we looked? I am! The factory castor spec is indeed different than how I was taught but not inconsistent with the idea of castors purpose of spindle loading to promote steering stability. Given these numbers the engineers, would be my guess, are compensating for something in their design. I'd go with their recommendation then that right side caster be 0.2 more positive than left. GM Engineers designed it, trust them. Yes that is different that I had said previously and it isn't how mine is set up. That said I'd make my starting point the mid point of all specs.

Given your current numbers that should assist you in lessening the 'fight'. Safety first.

I'd like to caution you that as your tires are already worn oddly, that even with a perfect alignment, it will not drive perfectly until they are replaced. They can teach you nothing at this point.

Also, keep in mind crown in a road is not the same on back roads as it is on a major two lane, the surface the specs were chosen for. Got to watch what I say eh? The idea of the exercise was to detect the trucks tendency to 'drift', when released from a stable condition, and find it's tendency to favor either right or left.

To this point you have been trying to find an end point without really having a starting point. A least a stable one. One thing at a time. And be patient. Remember, you chose to alter the factory setup. You called the dance and now you get to pay for it.

Cheech2017 · January 26, 2019

21 hours ago, Grumpy Bear said:

http://www.priertiresupply.com/pdf/hofmannbrochures/fundamentals of alignment.pdf

Give a man a fish vs teach a man to fish, right.

Now aren't you happy we looked? I am! The factory castor spec is indeed different than how I was taught but not inconsistent with the idea of castors purpose of spindle loading to promote steering stability. Given these numbers the engineers, would be my guess, are compensating for something in their design. I'd go with their recommendation then that right side caster be 0.2 more positive than left. GM Engineers designed it, trust them. Yes that is different that I had said previously and it isn't how mine is set up. That said I'd make my starting point the mid point of all specs.

Given your current numbers that should assist you in lessening the 'fight'. Safety first.

I'd like to caution you that as your tires are already worn oddly, that even with a perfect alignment, it will not drive perfectly until they are replaced. They can teach you nothing at this point.

Also, keep in mind crown in a road is not the same on back roads as it is on a major two lane, the surface the specs were chosen for. Got to watch what I say eh? The idea of the exercise was to detect the trucks tendency to 'drift', when released from a stable condition, and find it's tendency to favor either right or left.

To this point you have been trying to find an end point without really having a starting point. A least a stable one. One thing at a time. And be patient. Remember, you chose to alter the factory setup. You called the dance and now you get to pay for it.

So the truck has the tendency to drift to the right st the moment on the Hwy. The steeeeing wheel is also a couple degreee off to the left and should be centred better so I’ll be mentioning that also.

The rear tires have zero wear on the outside, slight inside, only cause I had em rotated and re and re to flip em on the rims. They were on the front before. So I’ll be moving those to the front tomonitor wear better and as you said, hope the truck is less affected compared to the ones upfront now.

Im pretty much mid way now. And had been close in the past also. But the alignment keeps letting go so it doesn’t stay that way which is the biggest battle in all this at the moment. I guess Monday we’ll see if it stayed in spec or broke lose again.

I will ask them to dial in more negative camber than I have now, at -.6 it felt better than it does now at -.1 going down the rd.

sorry just to be certain, I should stick to .2 more positive caster/camber pass side?

Thanks