Alignment for the strip

[ForcedInduction]

I finally got my whole car together and will be needing alignment in the next week or so, but I need some input.

First of all heres my suspension setup:

Tein Flex coilovers all around

FRONT:
No front sway bar
Front Ebay strut tower bar
Stock suspension bars and bushings

REAR:
Lipp traction arms with poly bushings
A1 camber arms
A1 toe arms
Unobtainium nylon bushings in the Upper A-arm and knuckle



I plan on using this as a weekend fun car with occasional trips to the local 1/4 mile strip. I drive on 245/275 street tires on 17" rims on the streets and Rx-7 rims with MT Drag radials on the track for the rear.

What kind of alignment settings would you recommend?

From what I heard I should go with 0 toe and 0 camber in the rear for traction. What about front?

[shaeff]

If you haven't read through this thread yet, it's filled with great information!

http://www.supramania.com/forums/showthread.php?t=14479&highlight=drag+racing

[ForcedInduction]

Yea I remember reading that a while back. But my biggest question is how I should set my front suspension up?

[Wiisass]

I wouldn't run 0 rear camber on a car that isn't just a drag strip car.

And if you have Flex's on the car, I doubt it's really a serious drag car.

I would just run a basic street alignment. Around 1* of camber all around. You can run 0 toe and then just make caster equal.

And if those unobtanium bushings are the delrin or nylon ones, I would get rid of them. Especially in the knuckle, especially if you replaced the bearing in the spindle where the lower control arm bolts to.

[ForcedInduction]

I ended up getting 0 toe and camber in the rear today. I know it's not going to handle as well on the streets, but I keep that in mind when I drive.

Why is it a bad idea to have nylon bushings? I have zerk fittings installed and I actually opened the inside of the bushings a bit, so the pins slide freely. Not too much to make them sloppy.

[Wiisass]

The nylon bushings don't allow the suspension to rotate as it was designed. If you look at the stock bushing/bearing for the rear lower control arm, you will see that it's not a normal rubber bushing, but a kind of spherical bearing because the spindle needs to rotate as the wheel moves through it's travel. Without allowing this motion, something is going to have to give and if there's nothing to give, then something will break. Either way, it's a bad idea.

In other spots, it may not be as bad, but I still do not recommend nylon/delrin bushings in any suspension arms. Some places you can get away with it and I'm sure on some cars it works fine. But the only place on the supra that I would think it wouldn't be bad would be the front upper control arm. Other than that, I do not think it's a good idea and would not recommend doing it and would go as far as recommending that you remove the delrin/nylon and replace it with a rubber, poly or spherical bearing.

Tim

[mk3ukr]

The nylon bushings don't allow the suspension to rotate as it was designed. If you look at the stock bushing/bearing for the rear lower control arm, you will see that it's not a normal rubber bushing, but a kind of spherical bearing because the spindle needs to rotate as the wheel moves through it's travel. Without allowing this motion, something is going to have to give and if there's nothing to give, then something will break. Either way, it's a bad idea.

Tim

Very true, I wish I knew this 3 years ago when I installed set of nylon bushings. Check out this:
http://www.mk3ukr-supra.com/Handling,%20Steering.htm

Go to the middle of the page to see pictures of broken arm and wrecked Supra

[shaeff]

^ That's the one (and only, to my knowledge) area that's been known to fail, is that one arm.

[ForcedInduction]

^ That's the one (and only, to my knowledge) area that's been known to fail, is that one arm.


The stock toe and camber arms look flimsy and they are hollow inside. The aftermarket arms I'm using are my stronger.

To my knowledge nobody sells poly bushings for the knuckle and my stock bushings were extremely torn apart and I didnt want to put stock rubber bushings in.