1975 1.8 fully stock California car. I just put in turbo tie rods as well as a new trailing arm bushing, so alignment was needed. Not easy to find shops that do alignment on these cars, but a local member recommended a racing shop about 30 miles away and I took it there. They asked if I wanted it aligned for "street driving" and I confirmed that was the case. Let me emphasize that this is a stock California car in well maintained condition (a previous owner had it for 44 years and really took care of it) and I'm a really mild street driver. It is rare I'll use every one of the 76hp this can put out . Street driving only, no AX, no racing. It drove fine getting to the shop, no pulling, no vibration, etc. They told me it drove "much better" after alignment, and that the alignment was way off, especially in the rear. I couldn't tell any difference in how it drove pre and post alignment, but remember I drive for fun and I'm not by any means an aggressive driver. I brought a bunch of 914Rubber sourced shims with me, but they needed none of them and in fact returned to me a bunch of shims that were already on the car. I didn't notice it at the time I got the car back, but the next day I could see the rear wheel stance was significantly different, with (in my opinion) a lot of camber. Prior to the alignment it had maybe 1-2 degrees of camber. Again, I can't tell any difference in how the car drives, but maybe I could if I really pushed it? My question is, is this correct? I've really not seen this amount of camber on other members cars. Also, I kind of hate the rear tires leaning inward look. Not sure if I should take it back and ask for this to be "corrected." Other options are to live with it, or take it to another shop. Any thoughts? Is this amount of camber correct?

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What the alignment sheet say they set it to? The spec is -0.5 degrees +/- 20 minutes. So -1 degree is max camber

By the picture alone, it looks like too much negative camber.

Not a matter of opinion, or how it “looks”. The shop should have set it to spec and have the numbers to prove it.

An excellent question. I just realized I left the paperwork in the car and it is currently at my second garage. I'll post that information as soon as I can get over there and look at it.

I'm gonna guess -2 degrees+

Be fine for an autocross go cart.

Rip up tires on a streetcar.

Here's a cheap test. Get a digital level and a couple of identical spacers.

I've used JENGA blocks to great effect.

Find FLAT concrete. IF you don't have a flat surface your SCREWED!

Measure yourself. Top to bottom on the exact same spot on the outer rim of the WHEEL ONLY!

I do full on alignments with a digital level, a tape measure, and an 8' florescent tube.

I don't have the ability to check or adjust caster, but many cars are not caster adjustable anyways.

With a little bit of practice, you can SMOKE a "normal" alignment tech and a 50K bed.
You will NOT be able to better a wizard...
The wizard doesn't need the bed either!

ALWAYS spin your wheels to check for run out. If the wheel, tire assembly has visible run out you're SCREWED and really need new wheels or tires. Normally it's the wheels that are bent when you have a run out issue.

To my eye it looks like more than negative two degrees.

My bet is the jokers pulled all the shims and are too lazy to use the shims to set the camber properly; takes too much time.

Car seems lowered although difficult to say.

Lowered cars by geometry creates negative carber if I recall.

This is a picture of your car when I sold it to you. It looks to me like it is too much now.

Nice looking car.

Best Bob B

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That, or possibly if you/they lowered the car and you didnt provide them extra shims they just didnt have them to bring the camber back out again.

Check the numbers on the printout they hopefully gave you.

What does the side view look like? Does the car sit level, nose high, tail low? How does it drive post alignment? Twitchy? Looks to have plenty of tire to well lip clearance. Run the correct cold tire pressure F&R. What size are the tires? Nice looking car.

Ok....I've done 914 rear ends before. I know that car and yes....It's a very nice car and great previous owner.

So first...when you did you do the rear bushings, are you sure the trailing arms are spec and then..that the arm freely moves and does not "hang up" by binding the bushing?

Second...did you change the springs as well?

Finally...it's hard to tell because the pavement appears to be not level but from all appearances...too much negative camber. Stay with the spec settings for street driving even spirited street driving.

So as far as "finding somebody"...since an alignment on a 914 is a pretty easy thing to do...Nobody wants to set it up on a Hunter rack unless they believe you have the money.

So check your trailing arms and shims, if there aren't any of them then that's your problem.

I use a protractor and string....that's all you need.

PS. Last time I tried to get somebody to put the car on an alignment rack, I handed him the stock specs. When I did that the guy no longer wanted to align the car. This happend twice since he assumed the car was modified...which it wasn't. Basically I couldn't find anybody and Eric Shea encouraged me to do it myself....so I did.

It looks low (which adds negative camber) and improperly set (i.e. not enough shims in the outer mounting point).

So don't just go by the camber spec on the alignment report but also measure the ride height.

@914_teener Interesting that you know the car and the previous owner. Other than a large binder of records, I have no backstory on the car. As he pointed out earlier, I bought it from Bob Burton, who essentially was just a middle man that was flipping it for a profit and didn't have much of the car's backstory. Care to share what you know? PM me.

To answer a few questions:

No, it is not lowered. The car is bone stock, other than the turbo tie rods. I did replace the Rivieras it came with, but the Fuchs were an option so I consider them stock. Trailing arms appear original to the car. I did the bushing on the right side, but not the left. The work was done a week before the alignment, and the alignment was done was last week. This is all recent work. It drives fine, and is not twitchy. I can't tell any difference between how it drives pre and post alignment. The ride height is equal between the front and rear, at least by eye. There is no indication that the pivot is binding on the bushing. In any case, I only did the one side and this is wonky bilaterally. It was fine when I drove it into the alignment shop, and didn't have any obvious excessive camber. I did not change the springs. I can check to see if there are any shims in place. I'll check the specs on the sheet I was given as soon as I can get back to the car, which is over at my second garage. I'll report back tomorrow. The consensus seems to confirm my feeling that this just isn't set correctly. I'm pretty sure I'm just going to bring it back to the shop that did the alignment and have them fix their error. That seems the logical thing to do, although I'm game to try it myself. They deserve a chance to make it right. That's what I would want someone to do if I did something incorrectly.

Two pictures of what it looked like right before I took it to the alignment shop. This was after I finished the last round of work (new calipers, soft lines, turbo tie rods, MC, trailing arm bushing, changing to the Fuchs). To my eye the car looks level. Not a good angle to see rear wheel camber, but I can assure you the wheels were not leaning in.

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30 minutes neg camber only, if too many shims already raise the rear end with new springs or hike the spring plates on koni or bilstein shocks

Doh - accidental post

Yup, great car. Saw it at C&C at Crystal Cove before Bob bout it; super clean
See: http://www.914world.com/bbs2/index.php?sho...=343143&hl=

OK, here's the sheet from the shop:

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Gotta love it. So they made rear camber worse and out of spec on both sides instead of just one side. Left front camber is also jacked and out of spec.

So now the dilemma: return it to the folks that are incompetent and hope they somehow improved since your last visit or find an old school alignment shop that is competent.

I’ve lived this scenario multiple times in my life. Personally I’ve never had success trying to turn incompetent people around. Your best bet is to find a small shop, and talk to the tech beforehand so they understand the scope of the work (i.e. trial and error shims to set rear camber) and the specs (-0.5 degrees +/- 0.3 degrees)

Note: their specs for rear toe are also wrong. Rear toe should never be allowed to be toe out. So someone set up the specs wrong. Your car is fine (toe in) but I don’t like that they have set up the machine to allow toe out to be “in spec”.

I know the car from the So Cal area. That is has the original front "Blue's" is cool...down't loose them. I had mine restored.

My advice...don't go to the same shop and yes...it appears they did it wrong. The cars stock didn't have much rake in the ride height. The torsions can be adjusted if you don't like that...plenty of threads on it and very easy to do.

Good luck...but still my advice is learn to do it yourself.

[quotey easy to do.

Good luck...but still my advice is learn to do it yourself.
[/quote]

Yeah. But that can be a headache. I suppose that learning to do it yourself will help you tell the professionals with access to lasers lifts and on line specifications how to actually do the work.

Yup - shame it has come to this in Merica 2024. Now they just turn a tech loose on a laser aligner and he has no idea what he’s actually doing.

I kid you not, when I was at the Chelsea Proving Grounds in mid 90s the Visualiner (time stamp 2:44) was still there and operational. It was great for a quick front end alignment. Sure there were more modern Hunter’s for 4 wheel alignments but the Visualiner was more than adequate for a quick alignment verification.

Bottom line:

Idiot on a laser alignment rig =
Skilled tech on a Visualiner =


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5Qhs9m9WLho?si=b0yZd-oH1NNcekNz

Those numbers seem all over the place.

As for front camber, you need to see if either side has maxed out adjustment (toward the inside or outside). That also is affected by ride height (set with torsion bars).

Rear camber is too much for regular street driving. How many shims are on each side?

Again, start with setting ride height front and rear. And then (at a competent shop) set the alignment, with your driving goals in mind.

Roger Kraus Racing is/was the go to local shop for P-car alignments. I took a couple of cars there for 4-wheel alignments in the past, their work was excellent. I think I heard the biz changed ownership a few years ago and who knows the caliber of the techs now.

Maybe consider taking the alignment specs to them and see if they will honorably redo their work to comply. I am sure they charge a premium.

Last time i was there (a year ago or so) Roger was still running the show but they didn't do an alignment on my car at the time because they were having a labor shortage and actively looking for qualified alignment techs.

Thanks Jeff. I value your opinion regarding the shop. Still the same owners. Roger was there, and his son Brandon was who I dealt with and who did the work. I will give them a call on Monday and see about going back with the car. Brandon did explain that he could not get the front end into spec. He had the left strut moved as far as he could. He suggested I could investigate getting a slotted plate (?) for the strut to allow more movement and then come back. He wasn't sure such a thing existed. He thought maybe the front end had been hit, but I have nothing in my records and I see nothing on the car to indicate accident damage. I know there was a lot of variability in how these cars left the factory, so that may be it. After a discussion with more technical jargon than I could follow the bottom line was he felt it was fine if I wanted to leave it as is, but I should watch for tire wear or any change in handling. I do feel the car drives fine. It doesn't pull, it tracks nicely, etc.

I printed out the specs from the Porsche Workshop manual. I assume these are what I should bring with me. We all know how much shops love it when you show up and explain to them how to do their work......

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James, he did say that they returned some shims to him, more than he supplied them with. The car definitely looks lower that when Bob sold it to him...I'd ask if they'd messed with the ride height or if he did. That rear end looks more like 3 degrees negative. If they didn't mess with ride height, I'd agree that they were lazy and didn't take the time to shim the rears properly...in actuality, it doesn't take that long to install the shims once you know how but it's not the norm for most shops these days.

Not really an issue of presenting them with the specs. The camber specs they have for front, rear, and cross camber are correct. They just ignored them.

The issue is they sent you out the door with 3 of 4 corners out of spec. Front cross camber (difference between left and right side) is also out of spec. Cross camber can cause pull issues. Even worse, they appear to have thrown a bunch of jargon at you to baffle you with rather than teaching you about what they did or didn’t do.

Both front and rear camber are related to ride height, so it is true that if the car is lowered substantially you’ll gain camber (increasing in the negative direction). I can’t tell from original picture if car was lowered or it just is the camera angles that make it look lowered because the upper wheels have been cambered into the rear wheel wheel / arches. If they did the lowering they should have advised you about the side effect. However they could still remove rear camber by shimming which they don’t seem to have done based on you getting shims back (and obvious appearance).

It is possible you could have a bent strut on left front. My opinion is that their job is to suss this out and advise you. Likewise if it was collision damage preventing them from adjusting camber, I’d expect them to be able to point out that damage rather than advising you about slotted top strut plates. FYI slotted plates are available from Elephant Racing. You definitely don’t want or need these on a street car. What baffles me is that a supposed P-car “race” shop tech mentions them but doesn’t seem to know if they exist? Just not adding up for me.

Your call on whether second chances are warranted. Based on the one side of the story, as presented, I’m not impressed. Might be a go to for modern P-cars but they don’t seem to be serving you very well based on what has been presented thus far.

Note 1: in some cases you can equalize front camber side to side by shifting the front crossmember. This would potentially remove camber from the left and shift it over to the right. The 914 crossmember doesn’t have much slop to do this with and the geometry isn’t going to yield much but it might get a tiny bit (we are fighting for tenths of a degree here). You would need a shop that knows what they are doing and that really cares to even try this.

Note 2: The other thing that I would try is to get some negative camber into the right front strut (target -0.3 degrees) so as to try to get the cross camber into spec even if I couldn’t get the left to move less negative at all (stays -0.6 degrees). This would bring cross camber to -0.3 degrees (in spec).

@SuperHawk996

Both you and I "saw" -2.5-3 degrees of negative camber in the first photos.

I said -2+ and you said, "To my eye it looks like more than negative two degrees."

I'd bet BIG money both of us are right!

The "pre-alignment" pics looked decent. They were at the wrong camera angle to really tell but looked "stock" to my eyes.

I don't believe ANY of the numbers on that sheet. I saw that shit and thought "They didn't chuck it up right!

Are there ANY shims in the rear suspension now?

SH said, "My bet is the jokers pulled all the shims and are too lazy to use the shims to set the camber properly; takes too much time."

I thought "Yep, He's RIGHT!
So, you and I are lock step here...

No WAY would I take that back before I at least took my own measurements (not that bad with a flat piece of concrete) or had another shop (hopefully decent!) measure it.

Now, I've had a bunch of time on both Visualiners and full on Lazer beds.

It's DAMN hard to align a car, take it on a test drive, have an issue, re-chuck it up and end up with the exact same numbers a second time.

The Visualiner was BETTER at consistent results. You had to MANUALLY center the heads.
The visualiner just produced final numbers, it didn't have "acceptable ranges" or a nice print out. YOU HAD TO THINK with a Visualiner.

I was initially trained on a Visualiner but got LUCKY early on.

I watched/was trained by a FREAKING master that used ONLY flat concrete and would not accept a bed. The "flattest concrete" in the Mazda dealership I worked at was in the center aisle in the middle of the service department.

He was the head of the dealership's "race" program and was a Ferrari tech during business hours in the small Ferrari dealership Roger Mauro owned.

Alignments were done by him after-hours on Saturday. Nobody wanted to work on Saturdays anyway. I was a 23 year old tech that was learning fast.

I was there for every alignment he did during my time at Roger Mauro. He taught me 1000% more than anyone else regarding suspension set up.

Do it on flat concrete!
Use cheap ass tools!
Do not trust others IF you have a way of verifying their work.

I still don't believe any of the numbers you got on that sheet!

That car has MORE than -2 degrees camber on the rear. Not -1.4!

The initial front toe looks like almost 3/4” of toe in. Seems hard to believe it drove there with that kind of extreme toe in and didn’t feel significantly different before vs after alignment.

The pictures are deceptive, if you think they show a lowered car. The car is not lowered. The shop did not lower the car. I have not lowered the car.

They did check for accident damage, and they didn't find any. They also checked to see if I had a bent spindle. I didn't hear any mention of a bent strut. Nomenclature specific to our particular areas of expertise and knowledge can be confusing to someone without our fund of knowledge. If you come into my office I can confuse the hell out of you without much effort with an explanation that a colleague of mine would find concise and precise. I think I got the bottom line on his explanation, just didn't clearly follow the path to get there.

I'll bring it back for them to recheck. We'll see what they say and I'll report back. At least two trusted members whose opinions I would hazard to guess most of us respect have spoken up to say they take their cars there. They deserve a chance to at least inspect their own work and see what conclusions they arrive at. I'm not happy about having to make a long drive, but I am positive I have done things that have inconvenienced other people without intending to do so. I won't stand in judgement, yet.

Thanks everybody for your input. It has been helpful.

3/4" of toe in will DESTROY a set of front tires in 20 miles.

Toe IS the tire killer here!

I helped a friend install a rack in an Infinity I30 once.

He was taking the car from his garage to NTB to have both a full on 4-wheel alignment done and new tires installed. He needed to drive 10 miles.

I shortchanged the job and didn't actually measure toe.

"Free for a friend" an all...

The tires were old but had another 5k worth of rubber on them.

I just quickly "eyeballed" it and he went to the tire shop.

Both front tires "corded" on the way, and he BARELY got to the tire shop.

Ninja got a NEW RULE that day! "Always, always check toe with at least a tape measure!"

He had a little under 1/2" of toe in...

And yet....it didn't feel significantly different. I'm willing to accept that someone else might have noticed a difference. I just checked and there is at least one shim in place on the right side.

@fiacra Broheen - I have a buddy who is all about suspension set up. He has a couple 914s (among many other cars) and knows what he's doing. If you end up needing some help, let me know and I'll get you introduced to him.

BINGO!

That's the route I'd take now in your shoes...

If the alignment shop was close, I'd let them have another crack at it (after measuring the camber with a digital level!).

If it's a "long drive" I'd hit Chris up FIRST.

I'd also be loath to drive that any serious distance.
Incorrect alignment can destroy tires quickly.
That would be a trailer past "close" for me.

I will say one more time that ride height is critical for attaining camber specs. Cars that are too low (or too high) run out of adjustment before getting into spec.

Two things I’ve learned over the years:
1. If it’s your first time using a shop, ask if they have done a 914 before.
2. Take a set of shiims for the trailing arm adjustment. I keep a jar full along with an extra set of bolts. And, I loan the jar to local tenets.

This is Excessive negative camber:

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Sorry to hear you're having such a difficult time with Brandon over at Roger Kraus. I've used them twice over the years with what I would consider excellent results. First time was to setup an unknown condition car to be a commuter/spirited twisty road car. Lowered with spacers at the steering rack. The thing handled like on rails after I got it back. Very pleased. Second time was to just validate specs as it had been multiple years (15+) and I'd just replaced all four tires. The alignment had held surprisingly well. Tire wear has always been a concern but never been a problem. I've always run Summer/Performance tires and yes the rears wear more on the inside but the setup seems worth it. No complaints. Tire wear was never unacceptable even when I used the car as my daily driver/commute car. I'll attach the spec sheet from my latest visit. Brandon was the alignment tech both times.

@MartyYeoman

Can you post some pictures of what the stance of your rear wheels look like? Curious to see if it looks similar to mine.

Thanks!

More cowbell to be sure. These folks and others like them at least know what they are trying to achieve. May not perform so great but at least you get the look. Not quite the same as wanting to drive.

I've always thought that would work GREAT in a "Sphere of Death".

Remember motorcycles and girls similar to a Circus act???

Bigger sphere and no regrets if they crash...

Sorry it took so long to post this.

Back of the napkin trig calcs....just by quessing aprox. -5.7 degrees.

Thanks Marty! Looks pretty much the same as mine. I did speak to the shop and initially got a wall of defensiveness, but he calmed down after a while and offered to recheck it last week. In the meantime I took it to our local expert, Bill Eason, who gave it a pretty thorough checking over and a hard drive and basically advised to drive it for a while and see how the tires wear. He feels the back end feels soft when changing lanes, but he attributes that to the springs rather than the alignment. Otherwise the car handles well. I decided not to go back to the shop (it's a long drive and I don't need to deal with anybody's attitude), but I do feel like I'd like the rear camber to be closer to factory spec rather than what the shop felt was going to give the best handling. I don't push the car nearly as hard as Bill did when he drove it, and I kind of hate that "knock knees" look. I'm wondering if I put the smallest shim (2mm) back in on both sides if that would be a bit better. This is all new stuff to me, so I'm doing a bit more research and trying to figure out if my thinking is too simplistic.

Changing the shim will alter the toe setting and this is the one you need to do on the alignment machine.

Adjusting toe is the bitchy thing

You adjust toe LAST.

Change shims till you're happy with the camber and then set toe.

It CAN be done without an alignment bed but the guy doing it would have to be very familiar with the process.

On a normal car you just adjust a tie rod end, it has a lock nut, and each turn is worth XXX movement.

On a 914 you slightly loosen the bolts and then twist the entire trailing arm to make the adjustment.
What's HARD is moving the entire mass JUST 1/16" of an inch.

It's the tiny adjustments that will drive you crazy...

This is why the Tangerine brackets look like the ticket to me.
https://tangerineracing.com/shop/ols/produc...ng-arm-brackets

If those toe adjusters work like I expect they will they will make the toe adjustment MUCH easier...

Copy that.

tan^-1 or arctan(2"/20") = 5.71 degrees.

Thanks, that's helpful. I was wondering what else I would affect if I changed camber. Probably best if I just don't mess with it since I'm not going to be able to set toe myself.

Probably a good decision. And I will always start with numbers first and then feelings (about most things in life). Almost 6° (if Marty is right) is insane, and 3° is way too much for driving on the street. I would advise aiming for 0.5°, even on both sides, and with proper toe. Whatever shims it takes to do that are the correct shims.

I’m so confused.

So the expert is advising you to run excess camber and see if your tires wear? Will he pay for the new tires when you don’t like the wear pattern?

Here’s the bottom line: you can run more camber than the OEM spec if you wish to improve handling. This is done all the time for autocross and weekend track day cars.

But if you aren’t throwing the car around in the twisties and that doesn’t seem to match your description of your personal driving style, there is NO benefit to running excess camber at the expense of tire wear. It isn’t a question of IF it will increase tire wear, only a matter of how many miles it will take to do so and whether you “age out” your tires before that wear occurs.

The funniest thing is you don’t even like the look of the increased camber which makes it even the more appalling that these experts keep pushing you to keep running that camber.

I don’t think you can even get to -6 degrees of camber without lowering and/or mods to the consoles. Camber need to be measured off the rim. Measuring camber off the tire will be misleading.

Take Chris up on the offer to set you up with his alignment guy.