Inside Tire Wear

BSell

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Okay, a few things here... First off, you're in the Corner Carving sub-forum, so just keep in mind that most recommendations are going to be coming from a handling-performance standpoint, where tire wear is a vanishingly distant concern...

That said, the big thing you're forgetting about is sidewall compliance. The stock P-Zero tires have (relatively) tall, soft sidwalls, that will let the tire deform a decent amount, and put the entire tread face on the ground, even with a touch of negative camber. By going to 20" rims, with very short, stiff sidewalls, you've removed most of that compliance, and as a result, the inner edge takes more of a beating. This is kind of the nature of the beast with that kind of setup.

Other observations: 1) If you have steel belts showing, your tires are DONE, and need to be replaced, and I mean yesterday! 2) If your alignment tech told you that staggered setups can't be aligned, you need to RUN, SCREAMING from that shop, and find one that has a clue. 3) With the short, stiff sidewall, you will need to run LESS camber and toe to get the bulk of the tire on the ground. Think 1/2* of camber, and essentially no toe, or a 1/16" total toe-in as targets. 4) Toe is the only adjustable angle on the car as it comes from Ford. For your situation ("I like my corners") I would probably suggest installing crash-bolts in the front struts to take up the excess camber without resorting to race-type parts (C-C plates) that will piss you off with NVH.

The inner front wear doesn't surprise me, but the fronts being bald when the rears aren't kind of does. Sounds like you may have excess toe dialed in, and are scrubbing them across the road. If you run your hand across what's left of the tread, from inside to outside and back again (being careful of the steel belts popping out), do you feel one side of the tread blocks having a sharp edge, and the other smooth? If so, toe is your culprit.

Did I miss the part about watching the tire pressures? Underinflation will kill the inner edge quickly in negative camber setups, especially so with rubber band sidewall tires.

Plus, it is impossible to see the underinflation as the bulging sidewall is hidden under the car.

So OP, what tire pressures do you run with the 20 inch setup?
 

Jinx

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I cant recall as of right now, but I willing to bet its overinflated if anything. I usually put just 5 to 10 under max pressure allowed in the tires to max fuel economy.
 

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Norm Peterson

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I really hope you don't wish you'd gone with the HD Steeda strut mount instead . . . those things have historically been called "crash bolts" over on the collision repair side for a reason.

Suspension is not a good place to be "cheaping out" in, even if you don't know that Ford has upgraded the early-S197 full-size OE strut bolts (meaning yours) for a very good reason. I'll even go so far as to strongly suggest you cancel the crash bolt order and upgrade to the Steeda mounts. No, I get nothing out of it.


I also think people are missing what "less camber" needs to be relative to. Since you did mention having some enthusiasm with respect to cornering, I don't think you want less than the OE preferred setting (-0.75°) unless for the vast majority of the time you are a pretty mild driver. What you do need is something less than whatever the lowering left you with. Also involved is how frequently you find yourself braking fairly hard (this argues for less camber, so you sort of have to balance this against whatever amount of hard cornering you do).


FWIW, lowering most front-steer cars tends to push the toes toward 'out'. Better for turn-in response, not so good for tire wear.


Norm
 
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Sam Strano

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Not to mention that Eibach Camber bolts are $27.50 set (though I still recommend HD mounts instead).
 

Sleeper_08

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To max fuel economy in your supercharged V8 car?

Especially to max fuel economy in an SC car. I'm even remembering to short shift into 4th around town :(

Of course on the track it is a different matter. At Mosport I burn about a litre a minute at $1.80 a litre for Sunoco 94 :)
 

Jinx

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I need the car aligned now and new tires bad.....ill budget a steeda hd or j&m when i can afford. This is a daily driver and realistically i can't hop into a non-existant second car. To prevent premature tirewear i think i should do this at least i can buy the fancy part. But part of me finds it hard to believe eibach or any other product that has such a risk of failure. How many on here run the bolts on this forums and how many on here have had these failures?

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Jinx

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To max fuel economy in your supercharged V8 car?

Well when its my dd, i try to be as responsible as i can. Its not a race car and i don't drive like its one on the street....so im not trying to make street driving any worse on gas than it is. So. I think every bit helps.

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Norm Peterson

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But part of me finds it hard to believe eibach or any other product that has such a risk of failure. How many on here run the bolts on this forums and how many on here have had these failures?
All I'll say as an engineer is that I would not solve the camber from lowering problem in this manner. And with the following explanation of my thoughts I'll leave it at that.

It's not so much that you couldn't drive around on those bolts, provided that they were installed correctly and you always drove it like a nothing-special car that had been in a wreck and wasn't ever the same afterward. That's why they were developed - a cheap and easy way to bring the alignment of a bent car back into or closer to spec so the owner could get a little more use out of his non-totalled vehicle.

The problem starts once you realize that this and other Mustang fora are pretty heavily populated by people who DON'T drive that easily/mildly/dare-I-say-cautiously. But who are still heavily influenced toward less expensive "solutions", without always understanding what they may be getting themselves into.

They probably won't actually break in two in very many cases. But they may fail to hold torque or stretch slightly, particularly if they were overtorqued during installation. Keep in mind that these things are only good for about half as much torque as the full size OE bolts, so only about half the clamping load holding that part of the strut tabs firmly against the knuckle (incorrectly aka "spindle").

They may well be an acceptably low-risk fix for a mildly driven car that's getting toward the end of its useful life, but they shouldn't be let anywhere near a car that gets cornered enthusiastically or which is frequently subjected to very hard braking.


There are documented cases where the knuckle actually broke under autocross or road course racing activities - and this with the full size OE bolts. Actual installation torque is perhaps suspect in at least one case (keep this in mind). Yes, I know I said auto-X/racing. But how much lower than "racing-hard" is the driving where a half-strength bolt might produce the same end result? Do you know whether your driving gets there?

Be careful, and don't get complacent because a few weeks go by and "nothing's broke yet".


Norm
 
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Norm Peterson

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By pure coincidence, I got a notice of reply to this topic about an hour ago . . . it's sort of relevant. Obviously, strut to knuckle bolts don't have to break to put you at risk. Note that the condition was present for some length of time.

Pro-touring.com post said:
I FINALLY figured out why it wandered slightly when crossing the center line of the road. It acted like a bad ball joint or a really bad tie rod, but none show any looseness. It turned out that the passenger side spindle to strut mounting point had a loose bolt. It was just loose enough that it was allowing the upper spindle mount to move about 1/8 inch from compression to rebound. Thank God for lock washers or it could've been a mess or a dead me! It's fixed now! This has been a major pain to figure out. I've had the car aligned 4-5 times by two different shops and NO one could figure out why it didn't drive right.
No comment about the shops' inability to properly diagnose the condition, or on the level of faith assigned to the lockwashers.
http://www.pro-touring.com/showthre...ro-Auto-X-Alignment-Specs&p=821839#post821839


And there's this . . .
Ford has their own approach to correcting camber that's out of spec, which involves reaming one of the holes slightly oversize to provide adjustment clearance for fixing out-of-spec camber situations that way. If Ford was satisfied with the available aftermarket crash bolts for unrestricted use I doubt they'd have chosen that method.


The reason I'm as stubborn as I am against these things is because I actually have experienced a sudden suspension structural failure. And it didn't happen when I was driving hard - I was only making a normal 90° neighborhood intersection turn onto my street, and it just let go. The car was the one that my wife was driving daily at the time, and she and our two kids were in the car with me when it happened.

It doesn't matter that it wasn't a camber bolt that broke on that car (I still have the car, BTW). The important thing is that something equally important did break. So I can't in good conscience recommend the use of any known-to-be-weaker-than-OE parts anywhere in the steering & suspension. It's just not worth the risk.


Norm
 
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JesseW.

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By pure coincidence, I got a notice of reply to this topic about an hour ago . . . it's sort of relevant. Obviously, strut to knuckle bolts don't have to break to put you at risk. Note that the condition was present for some length of time.


No comment about the shops' inability to properly diagnose the condition, or on the level of faith assigned to the lockwashers.
http://www.pro-touring.com/showthre...ro-Auto-X-Alignment-Specs&p=821839#post821839


And there's this . . .
Ford has their own approach to correcting camber that's out of spec, which involves reaming one of the holes slightly oversize to provide adjustment clearance for fixing out-of-spec camber situations that way. If Ford was satisfied with the available aftermarket crash bolts for unrestricted use I doubt they'd have chosen that method.


The reason I'm as stubborn as I am against these things is because I actually have experienced a sudden suspension structural failure. And it didn't happen when I was driving hard - I was only making a normal 90° neighborhood intersection turn onto my street, and it just let go. The car was the one that my wife was driving daily at the time, and she and our two kids were in the car with me when it happened.

It doesn't matter that it wasn't a camber bolt that broke on that car (I still have the car, BTW). The important thing is that something equally important did break. So I can't in good conscience recommend the use of any known-to-be-weaker-than-OE parts anywhere in the steering & suspension. It's just not worth the risk.


Norm
i'm sorry norm, but this is some BS. you quote a website about loose steering knuckles and its on a CAMARO. and who knows who had touched the thing. maybe it was never torqued in the first place.

Yes ford did have a TSB for the mustang on the original bolts, but it wasn't for size. they changed the threads on them.... find me a RELAVENT EXAMPLE of a s197 mustang steering knuckle bolt breaking... I'm willing to bet there are many thousands of camber bolts out there on mustangs and maybe only a handful have broken if ever, and even then, what percentage was due to improper installations...

and i've had a ball joint snap at 50 mph in a curve in a 67 Chevy II. shit happens, stuff gets old, becomes worn out, wasn't installed properly, rusts into, never greased.... just because one broke doesn't mean they are all going to break.
 
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Norm Peterson

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i'm sorry norm, but this is some BS. you quote a website about loose steering knuckles and its on a CAMARO. and who knows who had touched the thing. maybe it was never torqued in the first place.
It does not matter what car it was on. The strut details are quite similar, strut fasteners can loosen, or they can be improperly installed, and they don't have to completely fracture for a failure to exist.

My point is that the little scrawny ones are more likely to. What part of not wanting an extra pivot in your steering/suspension am I not making clear?

If you really think it's a "Camaro only" issue, you've got bigger fanboi problems than I could ever hope to fix. So except for a couple of lines up in this post, I won't even try.


Yes ford did have a TSB for the mustang on the original bolts, but it wasn't for size. they changed the threads on them....
... for the express purpose of obtaining greater clamping load through the strut tab and knuckle stack. I believe there was also a running production change to the knuckles making them 0.020" thicker in the vicinity of the strut attachment as well, to further ensure that the fastener torque was to the maximum extent practical going into the clamp load. Not wasted in bending the strut tabs into initial contact.


find me a RELAVENT EXAMPLE of a s197 mustang steering knuckle bolt breaking... I'm willing to bet there are many thousands of camber bolts out there on mustangs and maybe only a handful have broken if ever, and even then, what percentage was due to improper installations...
It's not the ones that didn't result in some failure that matter, it's the ones that did.


and i've had a ball joint snap at 50 mph in a curve in a 67 Chevy II. shit happens, stuff gets old, becomes worn out, wasn't installed properly, rusts into, never greased.... just because one broke doesn't mean they are all going to break.
That makes your position hard to understand.

Didn't you learn anything from that experience? Would you ever use a ball joint that you absolutely knew to be weaker than the one that broke on you? Would you recommend such a part to somebody who was trusting your judgment without question?


Norm
 

JesseW.

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i learned not to drive around on 20 year old ball joints....

the fact is no one has presented any proof that these are breaking left and right and are a saftey hazard at all. most are just assuming they are cause they "look weaker". and sure they do look weaker,(they have a weird cam and sharp looking edges, "bad engineer, bad!") but they also could be hardened, which i'm pretty sure the factory ones aren't.

also, .020" isn't enough to make a large difference (measure it on some calipers and see just how small that it) on the strength of a bolt .and it probably had to be that much bigger for the change in threads. on top of that, how do we know the camber bolts have the same thread pitch as the percieved faulty factory bolts? if i remember right, they were not breaking in shear, the nut was backing off. some in here seem more concerned the bolt will sheer into...

we don't know the engineering that went behind these, what version and strengthening of the steel is used, or if they are even backing off and or breaking. instead we get a bunch of chicken littles saying camber bolts are gonna break, number 8 cylinders will explode, etc. ALL RESULTING IN A FIERY DEATH....
 

Sam Strano

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Eibach torque spec for their camber bolts: 77 lb/ft
Ford for the old bolts: 148 lb/ft
Ford's new fine thread bolts: 166 lb/ft.

If you are ok with running 71 lb/ft less torque than Ford originally supplied, then later upped to 166, that's fine with me. I sell Eibach bolts.
 

Jinx

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Ok. I sucked it up and bought the Steeda HD mount. I ordered them at midnight and had them overnighted, so hopefully I'll see them tomorrow.

Reason: Everyone has made great points on here about the issue and I thank everyone. While the camber bolts I've received today, may in fact put my car in proper alignment and maintain it........I can't shake the paranoia that I'm getting on this issue. Risk and band-aid feeling of the camber bolt-in leave me worrying how the confidence I have in my car when I drive it. I've spent so much in this car (performance and appearance)....I hate to cheap out on a simple thing like this. I had to bite the bullet so to speak in order to press the Checkout button on Steeda's store site, but I'm sure a year from now I won't regret it. I guess you got to pay to play. The camber bolt may have a "chance" of failure......which isn't acceptable. The Steeda HD don't have any safety down falls. NVH may increase, but I find that acceptable if I car that doesn't eat up my tires and may yield benefits in other areas.
 

Jinx

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My next concern is how much the shop is going to charge to have these mounts put in and then have aligned.
 

ct07gt

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Put the mounts in yourself, it is easy, you don't even take the spring off the strut so no spring compressor needed. You just need a jack, jack stands, a metric socket set and a torque wrench. If you want in depth directions just ask or search around. Alignment should be $100 or so.
 

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