Alignment

[mquam99]

Hello Again

Does anyone happen to have a link to a good procedure for alignment on the 818C? I have the manual but would love to see if anyone has done it and has some pointers I can use.

thanks as always

Mike

[Hindsight]

Hi Mike - I don't think I have seen much in the way of detailed posts from people on how they aligned it here, but your best bet is to google "car string alignment". You should find a lot of links. Youtube as well. There is nothing very special about the 818 from an alignment standpoint. I have an alignment thread you can go to to see what people are running in terms of toe and caster etc.

Most of the caster comes from the rear upper adjustment nut, and camber from the front upper adjustment nut - though both affect camber. To check caster, you'll need a digital angle gauge. You can get them on Amazon. The lower rear lateral links need to be parallel as well, and you can use the digital angle gauge to check those, as well as the camber front and rear.

[mquam99]

thanks for the response, I will do some research on it and see how it goes.

thanks again..

[wleehendrick]

There is nothing very special about the 818 from an alignment standpoint.

The one thing a little 'special' about the 818 is the adjustable rear roll steer (i.e. how toe changes through suspension movement). The FFR provided adjustable links give an extra degree of freedom to the rear suspension many are not familiar with. A few early builders had the car aligned professionally with poor results; even with rear camber, toe and thrust angle set on a rack, if the roll steer is not aligned, the handling can be unpredictable (you don't want the rear wheels to steer unpredictably as the rear suspension squats under throttle).

As you have probably noticed, the lower lateral links adjust toe like on the Subie. The short upper FFR links clearly adjust camber, but the length of the longer upper adjustable links are the tricky ones that adjusts roll steer. To zero out roll steer, make sure to get the two lower lateral links parallel when at ride height. There may be reasons to target something other than zero roll steer, but if that's the case, you know more about it than me!

[Hindsight]

I have some pics of how to set the lower lateral links parallel using a digital angle gauge in my build thread.