Worked on aligning the front this morning. Previously I had set the rear toe and camber.
I purchased some toe plates, a laser level and the Fast Trax 91000 tool with the no lip adapters.
The first issue I had was with the 18" wheels and the fast trax tool at full extension it was just a little short for the adapters to grab the lip of the wheel. I went ahead and made an extension so it would fit out of some spare metal I had. Also to make sure I did not throw off the angle at all I added some shims on the bottom two pieces so everything was equal.
Here is my extension:
My first step was to use the toe plates and get the toe in set. I knew the other adjustments would change this setting but I wanted to get it close. I was shooting for 1/16" toe in.
Once the toe was close I set the camber at - .5 degrees. Again I knew adjusting the others would throw this off but cycling through camber then caster seemed to get me closer each time to the final settings.
Next I worked on caster. This is a little more tricky. The end of the fast trax tool is angled at 15 degrees. Basically you turn the front of the wheel out 15 degrees. Then set the level to 0 and then turn the front of the wheel in 15 degrees and you can adjust the upper control arms until you get your desired caster angle. With power steering I was shooting for 8 degrees. The problem with the tool end is it is about 3/4" long and trying to judge 15 degrees with any measure of accuracy is difficult. I came up with what I believe was a pretty good system.
First I taped some leftover wood trim on the ends so I could get a little better visual indication of where I was at in relation to straight:
Here the tool is attached to the wheel. You can see where I added the extension and shims to accommodate the 18" wheels:
To figure out the 15 degrees I ended up turning the toe plates upside down and placing them along the inside of the wheel. I determined exactly straight by using a fixed point from the frame and measured in both directions. Then I marked that line on the garage floor with a sharpie. Then I got out my angle measuring device and set it up for 15 degrees and marked a line of off the center line 15 degrees in both directions. I marked both of those lines with the sharpie. Then I was able to turn the wheels and measure the resulting distance from the line drawn to the toe plate. I evened it up until the measurement was equal all the way down the line. Here the wheel is turned out. You can see the 3 lines I drew and I am measuring the distance from the toe plate to the 15 degree out line:
I feel this was as accurate as I could get at home with no advanced equipment. Basically I cycled through toe in, camber, and then caster and each rotation it seemed to get closer and closer to what I was looking for. Since one movement affects the others I think this is the only way to go. It was time consuming but ultimately I think the alignment is quite good. I later validated this with the tracking on my go cart ride. Car tracked perfectly straight with no wandering one way or another. That was a short validation though. I may take the car in for professional alignment once I get it done. I will have to see how it feels and the tires are wearing in the future. Really happy I tried this at home.
I did come across one issue during alignment. I appreciate Jeff Kleiner taking the time for a phone call to help me out mid process. Once again the generosity of this community is spectacular.
To get the 8 degrees of caster on the drivers side I was very close to running out of adjustability on the rear upper control arm. When I got over to the passenger side at first I could only achieve about 6 degrees. Jeff has previously mentioned this possibility and the need to trim the adjustment sleeve a little to make it work. I thought I was going to need to do this on the PS. Turns out when I cycled through the other measurements I was able to achieve 8 degrees without modification. I am essentially at full adjustment though and can go no further. Once I get the body on and the ride height changes I will revisit the alignment and may need to make some further modifications.
After the alignment was done I was ready for my first go cart. I went through and checked all the fluids and greased everything up again. I had a pre go cart checklist to make sure I was ready to go. It was quite exciting pulling it out of the garage with intentions of leaving the driveway for the first time. I was nervous about bottoming out coming off the driveway. That was not a problem. I just took it slow. The car drove beautifully and I couldn't be more pleased. Took my wife on a quick ride also. I cant seem to get the smile off of my face. Really proud to reach this milestone. I am very thankful for all the amazing help I have gotten along the way.
Here is a quick video:
https://youtu.be/jcIsIWjaveA
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Originally Posted by dncharo
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