Wheel alignment adjustment - Front and Rear

[scooter]

The PO of my car had a wildly wrong wheel alignment and I an in the process of sorting it out. I have done a preliminary check and bold adjustment on the garage floor (using a tape measure - yes it was that far out!) and obtained reasonable, but not good figures on a wheel alignment machine that were suprisingly close to my measured ones.

Rear: I have recently replaced the lower link bushes and since covered about 2000km so they are well settled. Toe I am on top of having made my own radius arm spacers and it should come up to about 1.6mm total toe-in with the latest adjustment. To adjust the camber I'll need some spacers to put in the driveshaft at hte brake disc. It looks like there are currently some in there about 5mm thick, and I need a couple more at this approximate thickness to get about 0.5deg neg camber on each side (currently sitting at 2.5/2.75deg neg). Where can I get these spacers? I can't see them on SJ Sports cars parts list - does anyone know where they may be available from? They're not something you can knock up easily as they need to be machined with a small locating flange to locate the driveshaft centrally.

Front: This is more of a challenge. Caster angle I'm happy with, toe is easy to adjust, but camber is not. I have 0.5 positive camber on one side, so I need to find a degree or so of neg camber to get it even close to right. I have had a brief look at the front end (no measurements) and it appears my options are:

- making special off-set bushes for the upper arm

- bending the stub axle (a bit rough, but I've done this successfully many times on another virtually identical GM set-up, but it's not my preferred option here - it also buggers up the KPI)

- cutting and shutting the upper arm (that won't be happening!)

- finding an off-set ball joint if it exists...?

Has anyone done camber adjustments on the front end? I appreciate any hints and tips.

[f1karting]

Assuming the arms are similar to an S3...

Unless you go for adding adjusters to the arms.. which I wound up doing.. you may be able to relocate the upper outer BJ in its mounts by filling and redrilling the holes in the upper CA to gain camber.. dont know how much room there is to play with for what you need.

Just a thought..J

[scooter]

OK. I have done some fiddling.

Front: I have offset upper ball joints in the car - they were already there and orientated to give as much neg camber as possible. After some consideration and cursing of Lotus Engineers for borrowing the crapiest design they could scrounge for the front end I ended up slotting the upper ball joint holes. I haven't had a wheel alignment yet, but my measurements indicate I might have about a quarter to half a degree neg camber, which is OK for now.

Rear. After some fiddling and more lengthy consideration (consideration is good - you feel like you're doing something, you don't get dirty or skinned knuckles, and can have a beer at the same time, although the dog still thinks you are doing nothing and drops a ball at your feet....) I have decided that perhaps I may have longer lower links than I am supposed to. I have spaced out the front mounts of the trailing arms by about 10-15mm on both sides, and while I already have a 5mm spacer in both driveshafts, I need another 5mm (making 10mm total) on each side to straighten things up. The trailing arms spacing has also moved the tyres back in the rear guards noticably. Rear tyre to guard distances, measured at hub-height, are Front: 65mm left and 55mm right, Rear 25mm left and 35mm right. It may be easier to shorted the lower link by 5 or 10mm and take out some or all of the spacers that are in there.

Before I go any further I want to confirm the lower link length. My lower link pins are 390mm apart, measured centre to center in the car on the ground (note - lower link bushes are about 3000km old). Can someone please confirm the correct measurement?

Any recomendations on adjustable lower links?

As always, any advice appreciated

[scooter]

OK. I've had the lotus on hold for six week while I built up another project and now it's back on the hoist getting some attention. Front end is more or less solved but the rear is still throwing up challenges.

I measured the the lower link length accurately at 385mm (and have another post up here on this). The lower crossmember appears to be standard. I feel certain that the lower link is about 10mm too long. I have spaced up the trailing arm mounts 9 and 12mm, and the drive shafts already have spacers in (S2 - driveshafts are the upper arm) and require more (up to a total of about 10mm) to straighten everything up. Unfortunately, with all the spacers in the trailing arm mounts, it has pushed the rear tyres back in the rear guards noticeably, to the point where one just touches the back of the guard sometimes.

Does anyone make an adjustable lower link?

cheers,