Azzacat Posted August 9, 2006 Share Posted August 9, 2006 That sounds like a nice piece of kit great would you be able to set up or atleast improve the alignment of my supercat. hell all of the tigers could come there as I doubt any are set correct! or is there anyone in the midlands area who could? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Al Yupright Posted August 9, 2006 Share Posted August 9, 2006 Evnin all, don’t ask me how it does it but one of the screens shows me how off centre the axles are. All I know is it works very well and one of my customers now sets FTDs and class records after I have set his Westfield at first and now his OMS single seater up. The first time we set the S.S. up we used OMS supplied geo settings which did not look right to me but went with what they said and the car was not that special the next time he let me loose with what I thought it should be and got quite close to our final settings. I am not saying you can’t do what I can with my machine but to get the results I can manually would take hours and hours and toe can be measured down to a 1/10 of a mm. I can tell you if the axles are central the scrub radius is even set back is correct axle alignment is out on the rear how much bump steer you have toe and camber settings front and rear and caster settings on the front diagonal measurements acherman readings caster trail SAI and included angels etc etc in about 20 mins. It’s what top end body shops would use after the car has been jigged to make sure everything is straight. Comes to that one of my best customers for alignment is the local Nissan body shop so cant be doing a bad job can I. If you have fully rosejointed wishbones, will it tell you if you've got the wishbones on one side of the chassis set longer than the other? Wonder if I can get 20 of my mates to go 1/20ths on one Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Blatman Posted August 9, 2006 Share Posted August 9, 2006 QUOTE If you have fully rosejointed wishbones, will it tell you if you've got the wishbones on one side of the chassis set longer than the other? I'll let you know. My car needs alighning at some point before next season, and Matt is going to be my first choice to do the work, if he'll have me back again Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
jamieashcroft Posted August 9, 2006 Share Posted August 9, 2006 you dont know anyone up north with one of them do you mat could do with mine looking at , or its a bnb and your place were are you Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Blatman Posted August 9, 2006 Share Posted August 9, 2006 Matts in Cornwall... Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Steve20 Posted August 9, 2006 Share Posted August 9, 2006 I am just completing my build and need to set the suspension up, want it done properly so can anybody recommend anywhere close to Peterborough please. Cheers Steve Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Matt Seabrook Posted August 9, 2006 Share Posted August 9, 2006 Evnin all, don’t ask me how it does it but one of the screens shows me how off centre the axles are. All I know is it works very well and one of my customers now sets FTDs and class records after I have set his Westfield at first and now his OMS single seater up. The first time we set the S.S. up we used OMS supplied geo settings which did not look right to me but went with what they said and the car was not that special the next time he let me loose with what I thought it should be and got quite close to our final settings. I am not saying you can’t do what I can with my machine but to get the results I can manually would take hours and hours and toe can be measured down to a 1/10 of a mm. I can tell you if the axles are central the scrub radius is even set back is correct axle alignment is out on the rear how much bump steer you have toe and camber settings front and rear and caster settings on the front diagonal measurements acherman readings caster trail SAI and included angels etc etc in about 20 mins. It’s what top end body shops would use after the car has been jigged to make sure everything is straight. Comes to that one of my best customers for alignment is the local Nissan body shop so cant be doing a bad job can I. If you have fully rosejointed wishbones, will it tell you if you've got the wishbones on one side of the chassis set longer than the other? Wonder if I can get 20 of my mates to go 1/20ths on one May be Ed or Paul if you can actually tell the difference that the front or rear axle was out by a mm or two in relation to the chassis you could kick JB out of Honda and drive for them next year as he seems to have had the odd moment with what should be a perfect set up car. for the rest of us mere mortals 1/10 of a mm should be close enough on front and rear geometry lets face it most of use hope that Westfield have jigged the chassis up straight in the first place. Then if you have rose jointed the wish bones and you cant count threads and use a bit of common then there is no hope. Let’s face it we would all like to think that we are better divers than we actually are Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Matt Seabrook Posted August 9, 2006 Share Posted August 9, 2006 By the way there should be no need to come all the way down to Cornwall just to get your car set up this subject has been covered on here before and there are may good places to get cars set up. So as much as I would like to see you all down here in Cornwall do a bit of digging and find a good local place. If anybody would like a chat about setting up there car and wants to book in then look me up here Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
peterg Posted August 9, 2006 Share Posted August 9, 2006 There's a place in Leicester has one of those 3D alignment machines here or alternatively, you could ring UK Equipment Ltd and ask them if they've installed one near you clicky for contact details Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Johnson Posted August 9, 2006 Share Posted August 9, 2006 We are having one of those installed at work in the morning.It will be quite interesting to see how it performs against our other alignment gear. Currently have Beissbarth,Sun,John Bean and Hunter gear. Tracked the Westie up on the Sun a little while ago and still have the figures in my toolbox.Will be going in on saturday to work on my car so will chuck it on if I have time to see how it compares to the old kit. J Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Al Yupright Posted August 10, 2006 Share Posted August 10, 2006 May be Ed or Paul if you can actually tell the difference that the front or rear axle was out by a mm or two in relation to the chassis you could kick JB out of Honda and drive for them next year as he seems to have had the odd moment with what should be a perfect set up car. for the rest of us mere mortals 1/10 of a mm should be close enough on front and rear geometry lets face it most of use hope that Westfield have jigged the chassis up straight in the first place. Then if you have rose jointed the wish bones and you cant count threads and use a bit of common then there is no hope. Let’s face it we would all like to think that we are better divers than we actually are Absolutely! A think a few of us are just perfectionists Some might say anal Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
dibbly Posted August 10, 2006 Share Posted August 10, 2006 QUOTE Matt as I understand it these machines only align the four wheels with each other so the chassie could be 5 or 10 degres out of line with the center line of the aligned wheels if you see what I mean Cannot comment on the machine shown, but a Hunter machine DOES align the car relative to the centre line of the car. It aligns the rear wheels relative to the centre line, the Front is then measured/adjusted relative to the rear axle to ensure a zero thrust axis (car pulling to one side). This is why on one of these machines you always adjust the rear axle first; If the rear axle is out or you can't adjust it (many production cars don't have toe adjust on the rear) the machine will force you to adjust the front to compensate for any rear axle errors, and although the car will appear to drive straight, it will in fact be crabbing. You should always adjust camber first as already quoted on here as the toe has much finer increments of adjustment (not half turn like camber!) and toe is much more influential on your cars *sub-limit* behaviour than Camber (rule of thumb, relative impact of Camber 1/10th that of toe, e.g a change of 1 deg camber, will feel similar to a change of 6 mins of Toe!) Knowing all the above is why I NEVER get my tracking done when I buy new tyres at a tyre outlet, they only adjust the front axle and it doesn't take into account the settings on the rear. I do it at work on the Hunter as and when required. Its also worth being very careful adjusting toe without one of these machines. I set a Westie up for a friend of mine recently as he was having steering/handling/tyre wear issues (ACB10s shot in 500miles!). Turns out it was running 1 deg total toe-in on the front axle, now running 10 mins total toe-out and he reports the car is transformed. Hope this helps Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Westfieldman Posted August 10, 2006 Share Posted August 10, 2006 QUOTE and although the car will appear to drive straight, it will in fact be crabbing. What I was trying to say Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
John Loudon - Sponsorship Liaison Posted August 10, 2006 Share Posted August 10, 2006 I think Northampton Motorsport has a "similar" machine to Matt's which is farily near to Peterborough. There is also Dave Whitehead Motorsport in Sparkbrook, Birmingham and Tranz Power in Chesterfield. I'm not sure what kit each uses. Personally, I always trust my setups to the superb chaps at Procomp in Birmingham. They dont have a fancy machine but seem able to measure things to a suitable degree of accuracy. John Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
dibbly Posted August 10, 2006 Share Posted August 10, 2006 QUOTE QUOTE and although the car will appear to drive straight, it will in fact be crabbing. What I was trying to say Just to be sure .......As long as the rear axle is set-up correctly first, the car will not crab. e.g. you CAN set a car up to drive straight and NOT crab on one of these machines, and to a very high degree of accuracy too (+/- 1.2mins on toe and camber). Basically, if you can afford to get it done, and you are sure the operator knows what he is doing, this is undoubtedly the best option...however, its not cheap Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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