Best Alignment?

[MAGILLA]

I will be putting coilovers on my car in the next week or two. So, I know for a fact that I will need an alignment and possibly corner weighting. The problem is I just moved to greensboro nc.
I don't know of any good tuner shops around here. That means I will have to take it to a nation wide place like pepboys, discount tire, or who ever.

This wouldn't be a problem if the all knew what they were doing and could accommodate a lowered car. I have footwerks tension rods in front and footwerks adjustable toes,traction rods; ruca, in the rear. I will be installing tein flex coilovers with about a 2" drop.

I would like to know if you took your car to one of these bigger shops and how good were they with a lowered car? I am most interested in anyone with coilovers, adjustable arms, and a similar drop. Oh and if anyone is local to Greensboro any suggestions would be a great help.

[MAGILLA]

Man it is stuff like this that makes me miss Atlanta.

[smelly240]

just hand the guy at firestone or sts a peice of paper with ur specific settings and they'll do it... and its free for life or somethin - so u can go back.

or just do it urself.


a 2 inch drop isnt shit - my cars almost ready for the slammed thread and it fits on the racks (without bumper or sides - but those are ziptied so who cares)

[S14DB]

Just get the Firestone unlimited and shop around for the perfect tech. You can redo the Firestone at anytime if you don't like it. Go to the initial app stock so they don't reject the lifetime based on lowered. After that you can BS your way when you mod it.

Stock settings are fine. Just make sure they are close together. If he can't get the camber on one side out as far as it should be just have him dial the other side back. The key one is to get the Caster Angle almost right on. Stock TC rods aren't adjustable so alot of machines say 0.5-1* separation is fine. It's not your car will pull to one side. Try to get both to 7*.

Laser racks may have a hard time with your TC rod brackets. Photo rack is much more accurate and will work no mater how low.


I would just measure the fender heights to be the same around with you in the seat and that should be close enough till you find someone with scales.

[gunluvS14]

dang, lifetime unlimited alignment? must be nice.
I had the hardest time to find a job that will do alignment for me, and few who would accept working on my car would refuse to dial into the spec that I want.

Finally I took it to a Corvette specialist shop and they took care of me. 7 deg of caster is quite a jump from stock, if you run that high of caster, you wouldn't need too much camber up front then.

I have full adjustable arms and links with Stance coilover, the tech guy said it make his life easier compare to doing with eccentrics bolts

[posdrift240]

Originally Posted by smelly240

a 2 inch drop isnt shit - my cars almost ready for the slammed thread and it fits on the racks (without bumper or sides - but those are ziptied so who cares)

Wat a Dumb ass comment!!!

Im sure your car is slammed and prob ready for the junk yard!!

Im sure most any alignment shop around you can do anything you need them to. But you have to be specific with what you want done. With Stock RUCAS your not going to be able to adjust much.

[GSXRJJordan]

Originally Posted by posdrift240

Wat a Dumb ass comment!!!

Im sure your car is slammed and prob ready for the junk yard!!

... because lowered cars are, what, lame? Bad spelling and over-use of emoticons REALLY IS lame. Don't be a dousche.

To the OP, the suggestions here are valid: the Firestone unlimited/etc is nice because you can take it back whenever you want, but a performance shop (any race shop, or a Corvette/Porsche/Ferrari/etc shop) alignment is usually more accurate and you know they won't fuck stuff up (strip bolts/drop your car off the lift/etc).

[MAGILLA]

Originally Posted by posdrift240

Im sure most any alignment shop around you can do anything you need them to. But you have to be specific with what you want done. With Stock RUCAS your not going to be able to adjust much.

All of my suspension arms and links are footwerks and they are all adjustable. The smaller places I have ask about lowered cars they either said they wouldn't do it or would do it for more money but wouldn't guarantee it. which I think is BS because having everything adjustable should make their jobs easier.

[naed240sx]

I have an NTB 3 year plan. It's great but some of their locations have out of adjustment laser racks. I think I've gotten around 20 alignments in 2 years, all under a single price of 160.

How is 7 degrees a big jump in castor from stock? Stock is like 6.5. I run 8.2 and it feels great.

to the OP:
Anyways, there is no need to take the car anywhere special for an alignment unless you want a dynamic alignment done. NTB and firestone and so-on will adjust static settings, but they have no mechanism for adjusting dynamic toe in (IE front and rear bumpsteer) so make sure to set the rear traction rods to equivalent lengths before going in.

Just tell the guy what specs you want, and tell him how the aftermarket control arms work, making sure to mention the reverse threaded part, and making sure they don't set the arms so that the pillowball is binding. Usually alignment techs are happy to work on my car because they prefer aftermarket links to the hard-to-set eccentric bolts. Just be friendly, and stay in the shop while they work on the car to explain how all the links work.

[SUPERSTAR]

I wish you were close to here, where I work they offer lifetime alignments.
At the location I'm at they can help you get personal settings or you can bring your own and they will adjust it as you ask.
Most places should do it as long as your upfront with them. If they decline to do alignment on lowered car??? then you don't want them touching it anyways, cause the will just half ass it most of the time.

[PhilVia]

for $149.00 lifetime alignment compare to $59.00 each visit you can't go wrong ... ask around locally to see which Firestones are better than others, I had to shop around after finding two tiny knicks on the lip of my iforge wheels where they attach those huge alignment clamps
good luck


Firestone Complete Auto Care
510 W Market St
Greensboro, NC 27401

(336) 272-1151

[SoSideways]

I've heard that the "lifetime alignments" are usually really half-assed though, and this is coming from someone that currently works at a local tire chain-store in our local car club.

He said that most of them just check for toe to make sure toe is fine, and then they send you on your way.

If you can ensure them give you a before and after print out, that would probably be the only way for you to be sure that they did check and realign everything, instead of just checking toe.

[Kwonza Says]

Just wonderng if you dont get an alignment after installing your coilovers is there anyhing bad that will happen to the car? Just wondering

[Dousan_PG]

tire wear
terrible handling
tire wear
terrible handling
tire wear
terrible handling
tire wear
and tire wear.
and terrible handling.

[Kwonza Says]

Originally Posted by Dousan_PG

tire wear
terrible handling
tire wear
terrible handling
tire wear
terrible handling
tire wear
and tire wear.
and terrible handling.

Thank
You
Thank
You
: )

[SleepySR]

Send me a pm , i work at a shop in town that can help you out i'm in greensboro

[naed240sx]

Originally Posted by SoSideways

I've heard that the "lifetime alignments" are usually really half-assed though, and this is coming from someone that currently works at a local tire chain-store in our local car club.

He said that most of them just check for toe to make sure toe is fine, and then they send you on your way.

If you can ensure them give you a before and after print out, that would probably be the only way for you to be sure that they did check and realign everything, instead of just checking toe.

It's not that they do a half-ass job on lifetime alignments, its that they do a half-ass job on ALL alignments. Since most cars only have toe adjust, and since nobody cares about anything but toe on your normal passenger car, that is all they will do.

The only way to get it done right is to go back to the shop and talk to the tech personally. Most of the techs I talk to are pretty easy going and a lot of times I just end up doing the alignment myself.

The print outs are a good thing to have as well.

[MAGILLA]

Originally Posted by Dousan_PG

tire wear
terrible handling
tire wear
terrible handling
tire wear
terrible handling
tire wear
and tire wear.
and terrible handling.

yep, I am a prime example of that. Right now I wear out the inside edge of my tires every 4-6 months because my stock suspension is shot and it sags. Plus I never got an alignment after I installed the after market arms and rods. I have gone through 2 sets of used tires.
It is so bad even my mother mentioned it and she knows nothing about cars. My car also floats a bit while driving. I have been trying to wait till I got my coilovers but I didn't mean for it to take this long. It took a while to save the money, because I try not to skimp on quality.

[MAGILLA]

Firestone sounds good and I will definitely try to get the print outs before and after. Do they have the scales to test for corner weight?

I wanted to check that as well. That is why I was looking more at specialty shops. So I can do it right the first time.

[MAGILLA]

Originally Posted by SleepySR

Send me a pm , i work at a shop in town that can help you out i'm in greensboro

will do. any help is greatly appreciated.
oh and +1 rep for helpfulness

[smelly240]

Originally Posted by posdrift240

Wat a Dumb ass comment!!!

Im sure your car is slammed and prob ready for the junk yard!!

Im sure most any alignment shop around you can do anything you need them to. But you have to be specific with what you want done. With Stock RUCAS your not going to be able to adjust much.

wtf - my car is slammed, and i have adjustable everything... and not some ebay shit... And you hand the guy at the shop a lil white peice of paper with your #s on it and another peice of paper with ben franklins head on it - and he does what you want.

stock ruca's or not he can get it closer than he is - no they shouldnt have scales...

either way your post is crap. btw - ur neg rep does nothing.

[bigOdom1]

i totally understand here in auburn no one will do an alignment on my car. they see the rucas and the non stock components and suddenly they are retarded. i finally got a half ass one just so i could drive to birmingham where i can get it done right. need to check around and see who will do it and whether or not they will gaurantee it. they should but some are just a little comfortable in the short bus

[smelly240]

you'll find somewhere - here in PA - firestone, just tires, sts tire, and tires plus all said they'd do my car to my specs -

some tuning shops have racks too - chack also any german specific shops

[tattoo131313]

Be sure to call around to different shops and ask if they can get a lowered car on their rack.I've run into that problem before.

[EJ253]

you'll need an alignment pit, not a lift/rack
also you need to find a place with scales (not gunna be a tire/alignment shop)

your best bet would be to ask about it on a local forum.
CarolinaNissans.com is a good place

[Bushido]

anyone want to share their alignment specs?

[bigOdom1]

depends on what you are trying to do. otherwise stock is probably best