Cheapo tires, worth it in the long run?

[Shale]

That was my understanding. You just sit on camber, but toe actively scrubs the tyre surface against the road.

Both Reuben and I have a bit of toe on the front of the car. My scrubbing issues are markedly worse as my toe is more aggressive (and I'm too poor, lazy and unbothered to go get another alignment, hence not complaining...just commenting).

I have just as much camber in the rear as I do in the front, and my tyre wear is almost even on the rear. The tyres are the same, however since I had to replace my RE001s up front so soon I'm onto RE050s, with an older pair of Adrenalins up back. They are fine despite about -1º camber sitting back there. TL;DR: it's only the toe that's chewing my Adrenalins.

Also, we have to consider where the car is being used. I could use a handful of examples but let's limit it to cars in question (as much as I enjoy a good punch-up).

My car has a fairly aggressive, tyre-unfriendly alignment that makes it more of a corners car than a straight line car. But I live in Auckland; what is it, 7 large dormant volcanoes and several mountain ranges? This city is not flat. Really only the main arterials and the motorway fit that description...and I despise using both. Far prefer the back streets or lurking in the mountains. The other car, the BF5, has a far more pedestrian alignment and as such, that car gets me around in the daily commute. There are a grand total of four streets between home and work. It wouldn't bother either car, to be honest. But it is more the Legacy's duty.

And Reuben's car...well! Camber is the ideal situation for hilly, winding areas, yes? Let's not forget that he lives 100km north of Auckland now, and the only real way in is via a particularly hilly, sweeping road through the middle of nowhere, heading towards the Waitakere ranges. It would be a bad idea to take a nanna-specced car, wheel alignment-wise, down that road; you need all the grip you can get if you want to maintain a comfortable (legal!) speed.

TL;DR: The advice is good, but one must also consider the application of the vehicle in question. I enjoy a fist-fight as much as the next, but this conversation doesn't really need to be had. The lessons learned: aggressive wheel alignments are not great for daily driving as they cause unnecessary wear on the tyres. But the car(s) in question are not standard daily drivers, and thus need different alignments. And it would more likely be the toe, rather than the camber, scrubbing the tyres.

[subieboy]

Shale no offence intended (and none to you either Ruben despite your rude comments).

My advice I have learn from when I was a kid fitting tyres at my local garage (1st job), and had the privilege of having a boss that let me adjust the camber and toe in on several cars that he had such as BMW M3 factory race-car, BMW 318IS factory race-car, A early Legacy rally car and Audi track car among several things...

But what the hell are you two on about??? If you dont agree with the advice of people who knows a hell of a lot more about these things (than even I) then that is fine, however if you are going to challenge it at very least go study up on what you are trying to do, then come back with a rational argument... Going on about how the car is being used is nonsense, your cars spend most of the time on public roads, granted some may drive harder than others, but if you drive your car harder then it is even more important to set the camber and toe-in up properly...

Granted you want better handling and turn in, but have you considered to even look at what say the Supercars/Supertourers/etc do with camber, toe in etc???

Excessive camber is actually worse for a road going car due to the natural camber built into the roads (especially in NZ).

Now go forth and look north and spend you coin wisely...

[Shale]

Just pause and pull the undies outta there for a moment champ ;D

Never said I WASN'T going to get a new alignment to fix the issues with the current one...just too poor currently. I am going to have a lot of the settings knocked back to be more user-friendly and tyre-friendly as it is.

More than anything it would be nice to see how the Whiteline tourer (most nanna) spec goes. Like you said it's best to take advice from those who know more; and one would assume Whiteline, with the products they make, would know what they are talking about.

Certainly won't be using their race settings!!

[Tony]

 subieboy said:

Excessive camber is actually worse for a road going car due to the natural camber built into the roads (especially in NZ).

But didnt Reuben say he has -1.1 deg camber??? Thats hardly excessive, and perfectly fine for a road car IMO.

[Shale]

That's as much as those struts can give, yeah.

I only have about -1º myself.

Isn't excessive when you start maxing out -1.5º+ through to rotang style -3 and worse?

[funkytown]

just being talking about these very things with Al from Macbuilt..

he says that track cars he set up run close to 5degs in the front.. Toe i cant remember.

I can tell you though toe scrubs the tyres real real hard! taken from personal expereince while i was waiting for my new tie rods and before i realised how easy it is to adjust by eye in the mean time.

I now have no toe in the front +ve or -ve (as its to aggressive on tyre wear), and about 2.5degs camber, a balance i have asked for between road and track car.

in the rear im running 2mm toe out about 1.5degs camber

[DPI]

 Scoobydoo']

First time ive read this thread.

The Adrenalins on the Spec C are still going strong... I'm liking them. I've taken it out on a few strops and they've held on everywhere.

On the GTB I had Toyo proxes 4 tyres which were pretty decent for the way I drove it. They may not have had the stickyness of a softer tyre but they lasted quite a long time. Don't ask me figures cos I don't know. They eventually got replaced by T1R's which I also liked, but didn't think they were much better than the Proxes 4, for the extra price you pay for them.

From memory, i set the suspension up with Rear -1.4 camber and neutral toe; front -1.6 camber and neutral toe.

With those settings, the Buddyclub Coilovers and adrenalins (plus the quick rack steering), that thing handles like a friggin dream.

As you will no doubt know by now...

[quote name='Jonnysnow said:

so stoked i started this thread before i bought those triangles/ling longs hahah. think i'll end up getting some toyo t1r's as they seem to be the best bang for buck. thanks for all the info everyone

Your best bang for buck, IMHO, is Proxes 4. I don't rate the T1R's at all.

Had them on the Spec c with above settings, and they were arse; slippin and slidin everywhere.

Had proxes4 on the Legacy wagon (brand new), with D2's and rear -2 camber, front -1.6 camber and that thing handled very well too.

Also, unsprung weight may make a small diff too...

So, anyone with big heavy chomes....ha, ha, ha...

[ReubenH]

My point, and why i'm getting annoyed, is that –1.1º of camber is HARDLY excessive, and perfectly fine, if not recomended for daily driven performance cars. And will not impact braking and handling as dramatically as you initially put it subieboy. In fact, cornering was actually noticably improved with the camber set as is now. And as also mentioned here, toe is the real tyre wear killer, if thats set badly. An interesting point here, my alignment was only about 1 and a bit years old when i installed the steering rack. We did the front toe using just our eyes, so i could drive down to the aligmnet place. It turned out the rear toe was equally out as much as the fronts that we had just done with our eyes, which actually shocked me. tyre wear has slowed down allot now that they have all been put back to 0. The alignment guy's left camber where it was.

Heck, even whiteline have some recomended figures:

Front:

Touring -1.0º

Sport -1.5 to -1.75º

Race -2.0 to -3.0

Rear:

Touring -1.0º

Sport -1.0º to -1.5º

Race -1.5º to -2.5º

[newsuba]

 Tony']

[quote name='subieboy said:

Excessive camber is actually worse for a road going car due to the natural camber built into the roads (especially in NZ).

/quote]

But didnt Reuben say he has -1.1 deg camber??? Thats hardly excessive, and perfectly fine for a road car IMO.

Agreed.

When I was on RE01R's I had about -3 deg on the front and still managed to get 18mths of road & track driving out of a second hand set of tyres.

;D

With the addition of a front lower arm brace and a re-set to ~ -1.5 deg, the car handles fine for roadwork.

[Guest]

Perhaps if you had said initially that you were only running 1 deg camber instead of saying

Im running max camber and the insides of my tyres are all worn out...

People get the wrong idea

Anyways wearing out the insides of the tyres isn't good good that its fixed.

Whiteline recommend Zero toe at the front even for there race settings

[driftrex]

 Erelyes']

[quote name='driftrex said:

i have to agree, and im an ex alignment technician. no need to get so upset over someone trying to give you legitimate advice. if you chew the inside of tyres out that quick then you have too much negative camber, end of story.

but as said each to their own :

/quote]

If you have camber and toe the car will wear a heck of a lot faster than if you have just camber. Camber wears tyres a "bit" but toe as well will wear them "a lot"

of course but excessive toe causes feathering on the edges. if there is no feathering then camber is whats wearing the inside edge.

[DPI]

Just been to the BP and there were two asian guys with a Bright orange R34 Coupe.

Big FMIC, plenty of electrickery in the cabin and nice rims...

...on closer inspection, i saw it had 'ULTRA HIGH PERFORMANCE' Nankang tyres...

Asked the driver why, and he just shrugged. Asked if he got any traction and he smiled and said...no.

Buying an R34 project: $18000

Respray: $3500

Electronics: $3000

FMIC kit: $1400

Rims: $1000

Fitting Nankang tyres: WORTHLESS

:D

[BC5RA]

I also had 1/2 worn RE01R's that lasted me 12 months at -2.5 front -1.5 rear, those settings still stand.

Certainly will look to lessen for the next wheel alignment.

[Bumpty]

 DPI said:

ying an R34 project: $18000

Respray: $3500

Electronics: $3000

FMIC kit: $1400

Rims: $1000

Fitting Nankang tyres: WORTHLESS

:D

Fitting Nankang tyres: PRICELESS!

[Jonnysnow]

on a similar subject, what psi is evryone running?

[Koom]

 Jonnysnow said:

on a similar subject, what psi is evryone running?

25.

But 34 in the tyres.

[driftrex]

36-34, never any more.

[DPI]

40psi in the Spec C and 40psi in the Safari...

[Simon C]

34psi all round in the car. 120psi on the bicycle ;D

[Guest]

Pressure means nothing without knowing the rim size and profile.

My lancaster, I run 33psi or so all round. 215/60/16

And I run 36psi front, 34psi rear in my WRX. 205/50/16

[Joker]

 driftrex said:

36-34, never any more.

+6 when they warm up (at least)

[DPI]

 Erelyes said:

Pressure means nothing without knowing the rim size and profile.

My lancaster, I run 33psi or so all round. 215/60/16

And I run 36psi front, 34psi rear in my WRX. 205/50/16

Ok, 40psi in the Spec C (235/45R17) and 40psi in the Safari (31x10.5R15: 265/75R15)

[Shale]

215/45R17, running 34psi on average. Same in the Leggy, 205/50R16 IIRC, 34psi.

[Simon C]

225/45/17 34psi.

[newsuba]

215/45-17 34~36psi

215/40-17 36psi