Rear camber problem! help! please

[bondo]

The rear of my festiva is negative cambered. How do I fix this? I have kyb gr2 struts with ebay honda coilovers. Thanks

[Grey Vw]

I never had rear camber problems with ebay coilovers or my Rokkors. Make sure you put everything back together correctly.

[bondo]

Could something be bent? Im pretty sure I put it back correctly

[Festy46]

Rock auto sells blue washers that are thick on one side and thin on the other for setting the rear axle. I use them to set the toe on our race cars, but you could rotate them around to set camber. You have to remove the 4 bolts that hold the spindle to install them. Rock auto sells several different thicknesses. You will need to know about how much you need to change your alignment.

[bondo]

isnt that for the front tho? Can the rear of festivas even camber?

[lessersivad]

isnt that for the front tho? Can the rear of festivas even camber?

The rear can have camber or toe if something is bent. The blue shim washers mentioned previously can "space" or "shim" the rear spindle to correct the problem.

I had one of these installed on the left rear for toe in from an accident the P.O. apparently had.

Make sure to simply unbolt the spindles from the back side. You DO NOT remove the drum to remove the bolts. Just remove the nuts from the back side of the spindle.

Hope this helps.

[Festy46]

I think the installation instructions for the blue washers (shims) may say to use cutting pliers to cut notches in the washers to match the bolt pattern. I found that a small angle grinder works better. The pliers tend to break the part.

[Bert]

I thought rear spindles are supposed to line up with each other at time of manufacture, irregardless of springs and shocks. Straightening something that probably got bent may be difficult in itself but I'm scratching in trying to figure out how you would confirm how much to move.
I have a 'spare' car with misaligned rear frame. It crabs down the road and prematurely wears rear tires. It's never been hit or bent that I can see. On bare roads it drives fine but on ice it's a bear to hang on to so I no longer drive it in the winter.

[Advancedynamix]

Negative camber in the rear is a good thing. Just make sure it's within .2 degrees side to side. The blue camber adjusting shims mentioned above are made by moog, and you can also find them on ebay. They can be used to adjust camber and/ or toe depending on the way they are mounted.

Most likely, your camber changed when you altered the ride height of the car. With a trailing beam suspension, toe out will turn into negative camber as the beam rotates upward (car gets lower) toe in will result in positive camber as the beam rotates upward. Your beam has rotated upward if you lowered the car. Camber has less affect on tire wear than toe does, especially on the rear of a lightweight front drive car.

[Advancedynamix]

I thought rear spindles are supposed to line up with each other at time of manufacture, irregardless of springs and shocks. Straightening something that probably got bent may be difficult in itself but I'm scratching in trying to figure out how you would confirm how much to move.
I have a 'spare' car with misaligned rear frame. It crabs down the road and prematurely wears rear tires. It's never been hit or bent that I can see. On bare roads it drives fine but on ice it's a bear to hang on to so I no longer drive it in the winter.

You can use the "string technique" to check the alignment of the chassis. This is the do it yourself equivalent to a laser alignment rack and has been used by millions of people for a century or more.

[Movin]

String is an excellent method and will dial you right in. If you have used aspire parts
on one end or the other you should measure the toe from front side of tire to back
side of same tires. You need to have all festy or all aspire to have the same track
( width) to use string for front and rear toe.
One of mine is mis matched that way and I know some of yours are too.

For home grown camber you need an absolutely level floor. Use a square against
the tire and measure to the top and to the bottom of the rim ( no bent rims ).
This will give you a measurement to compare sides and do some aligning. If you
are good with math you can convert inches or mms to degrees and check specs.

As to which adjustment shim to order you will need a selection, or a few of the thinnest.
corrections of this type are an educated guess and a declaration of close enough,
from pro's. You will stop at some point as well and call it good. Do not forget to check
toe after a shim correction. It is very likely you will find both camber and toe off a
little from one side to the other and your corrections will be to both measurements.

Don't get carried away with perfection, Any one of us who do alignments can check
anthers alignment equipment and find things worn that don't give the same measure-
ment every time and adjustments that are close but never perfect. But we know
what is good enough to land us squarely in the specification range we need to be.

Do not jack up a car and let it down on the floor for these kind of measurements.
You want to let it roll naturally forward till it stops where you want it..do not use the
brakes or set the e brake. Get out and replace your weight with something. Be careful
not to bump the car and roll it while doing measurements. Then remember to prevent
rolling the car when working on it as in set the brakes or what ever so nobody gets hurt.
Then back it up when done and roll it forward as before so that the suspension and steering will be back in its natural position before re measuring your adjustments.

Sorry for writing way to much but if anyone is reading this it might be a little more clear
what you are in for! Also, this is safety stuff, make sure everything is properly tightened. Have fun!!

[Advancedynamix]

I've also found digital levels like the "angle cube" to be very helpful when adjusting and checking camber. The angle cube is magnetic, so it will stick to a rotor when making an adjustment to show the degrees that you have adjusted the part. Then (on level ground) it can be used with a straight edge to give a camber or caster reading.

Here I'm using the angle cube to show how many degrees of negative camber i'm adding.

[Bert]

You can use the "string technique" to check the alignment of the chassis. This is the do it yourself equivalent to a laser alignment rack and has been used by millions of people for a century or more.

I appreciate that most folks use string. I use my eye, and tape measure, chalk and a 5 foot piece of aluminum square tubing. It's a bit of an eye-opener to discover that rear wheel tracks are a couple of inches wider than the front after you accomplish an Aspire swap.
The chassis alignment is visibly off on my spare car and I'd have to shim out the trailing arm attachment bracket to the body probably by about 1/4 inch. Can't be bothered at the moment as it's an automatic and therefore destined to become a parts car.
But the little 'red devil' was my first Festy ($50 spur of the moment purchase 8 years ago, just as it was headed for the wrecker). It went to Newfoundland and back with a month's worth of camping gear, 2 passengers and a dog in 06. And 150,000 km later it still refuses to die!

[Advancedynamix]

^ there are drawings of aliens showing this alignment technique to the Egyptians inside the pyramids. Some Egyptians still use this method if alignment to this day. :p But how did it make it's way to Canada?

[Bert]

^ there are drawings of aliens showing this alignment technique to the Egyptians inside the pyramids. Some Egyptians still use this method if alignment to this day. :p But how did it make it's way to Canada?

Another man with a sense of humour. My home-aligned cars travel quite straight and tirewear[free, don't you know. I'm long time licensed as a carpenter and intimately aware of how useful a string line, or chalk line, is.
Canadians didn't learn how to Jerry-rig or fix stuff cheap and easy, from the British. UK made and foisted on us all kinds of automotive junk and ideas until the Japs beat them out. So now we're buying Korean and German, it seems.