Kieron

OK, as a result of the Tyre wear thread, I thought i'd ask everyones experience with the various camber kits and how they work.

I had the shim kit on an EA, fairly cheap < $200 with alignment. replaces upper control arm pivots only.
But it wasn't satisfactory, from what I could tell, you had little or no positive camber adjustment and oddly, E series Falcons seem to suffer from + camber.
I gave up on wheel alignments with it, im quite sure the aligners don't do it properly as its just too hard ie -

take measurement with settled suspension, jack up car, loosen upper control arm bolts, slip shim in or out, tighten bolts up drop and resettle suspension, take measurement and possibly go thru cycle again. I bet it only goes thru one cycle.

So whats the Kmac and Ford setups like, are they any better?, they are certainly more expensive.

Kieron

RAPTOR

I have a shim adjuster type on the ED (Pedders). Quite happy with the results too. I agree with your comments about how well any adjusment is likely to be done though, maybe I've been lucky. No more abnormal tyre wear. Camber adjustment is made by adding/removing the same amount of shims at each side of the arm. Caster adjusment is available by pivoting the upper arm by adding/removing a different amount of shims at each side of the arm.

My understanding is that the KMac ratchet adjusters can be adjusted on the car while the suspension is fully settled and loaded. "Real-time" adjusment not adjust then check and so on.

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eb_5litre

I got the kmac ratchet kit and it works great... was around $300 fitted from memory....

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Signatures are for poofs !!

1993 EBII Fairmont Ghia 5.0L Wagon,
Lowered, Tinted, 17" Speedy Ravens & 2.5" Sports Exhaust.
( 1 of 26 built )

AND

1985 Telstar TX5 Turbo, stock as a rock.

XR8fella

i have a 93 ed, and i got a noelethane *whatever* camber caster kit, as i wore out a set of 16" pirelli's in about 15'000. And i have Koni adjustables up front, been great the last 5000kms, no visable wear on the inner of the tyre !

Aussiblue

I have a Pedders kit I fitted myself on both Fairlanes. The NB kept losing camber; I have a Smart Camber Guage (version 1) see http://www.racerpartswholesale.com/art1.htm that allows me to check caster and camber and on the NB it kept changing until I also fitted strut brace and sump guard; I assume the inner guard panels were flexing. In any event, the camber kit alone didn't fix the tyre wear; it needed the strut brace as well.

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Regards Blue

Martin

Aussieblue, was the strutbrace custom made or did you buy it from somewhere? (if so where?)

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1993 ED XR6 M5 (1 of 329)
Polynesian Green
Turbo on the way!!
1993 EBII Fairmont (Now wrecking, PM if you want any parts)
1988 Nissan R31 Skyline

Aussiblue

Pedders; but they only fit a 6.

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Regards Blue

TIKFD6

I have tried both the shim kit(Pedders, on my EA S) and i have got a K Mac Ratchet adjustable kit on my ED. its the best thing you could do. It only takes the aligners 15 mins to do the alignment. 45000 Ks from G grids when i got the kit fitted.(That is with some pretty hard driving). the old girl also has camber pins for a bit of lower adjustment to.

Kieron

What was your camber wear Blue? mine is on the outside.

when I had the new tyres fitted, I specifically asked them to tell me if it needed a kit while the guy was doing the alignment + 4 new tyres (215's), he said no its fine and now 18,000k's later I have 2 very worn front tyres. Prior tyres didn't have unusual wear (205's).

Odd thing was, after the new wider tyres, the steering was lighter too!!

Kieron

Aussiblue

Yes; it was outside camber wear and until I had the strut brace fitted I was readjusting the camber, castor and toe-in every few weeks and still getting abnormal wear on the outer few inches of both front tyres.

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Regards Blue