TwinTurbo.NET: Nissan 300ZX forum - I think there is a little confusion here.
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Subject I think there is a little confusion here.
     
Posted by Toso on October 11, 2004 at 1:55 PM
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In Reply To They key word there is "shouldn't" posted by SeedyROM on October 11, 2004 at 01:26 PM
     
Message Even you said that it may be factors other than the camber that are causing tire wear. A small toe change can cause a TON of wear. To see excessive wear due to camber you'd have to be way out. Enough that you could spot it across a parking lot.

I have had this proven to me. I have a friend who tracks his car quite a bit and has tried camber setting from 1 to 5.5 degrees. There was no noticable difference in tire wear. After we dialed that in, we started changing his toe. We forgot to set it back to 0 after a track event and had to change his tires out by the next event. He tends to run a pretty aggressive setup even on the street. He has average tire wear. I've seen this with a lot of different cars.

One thing to keep in mind is that if you only upgrade one suspension part, like upper arms for instance, you are limiting the range to which that part is effective. A normal alignment place can't usually handle all of the 'extra adjustments'. What I think that people don't understand is that suspension is a very complicated thing. Most people just slap on some lower springs and call it a day. Just the way that some people slap on an exhaust and thats it for them. There are just as many things you can do with the suspension as you can with a motor. You wouldn't expect the guy at the corner gas station to be able to rebuild your motor, much less tune it. But people expect the guy at the tire shop to the equivelant with their suspensions.

As far as front wear vs. rear wear, it works about the same. Camber/toe/caster all change your car's 'turn in' characteristics. When you understeer, thats wear on the fronts. Hehe, you should check out the horrible wear I have up front due to understeer at the track. The effect can be HUGE. When you think of understeer, you might be thinking of when your steering locks up and you just plow to the outside. Thats an extreme case. Its not always quite so obvious. Has your steering ever felt a little unresponsive at speed? That could be understeer.

I would guess that in his case, there is something else wrong. Camber is the most commonly talked about spec. on this board. He might not know what is good or bad as far as toe and caster. I'm amazed by what alignment techs have not pointed out to me. Luckily I read the printouts. This is all guess work though. I can only speculate.

     
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