3rd gen Alignment specs from Pettit Racing

albertomg · 03-19-2008, 10:22 AM

For street and open track use, I run specs pretty close to those of the 16" wheels even though I'm running 17" wheels with 255/40/17. Running Konis with H&R springs.

Camber -1.5 front; - 1.2 rear
This wound up being more aggressive than I wanted but has been OK thus far. Someone on the other forum had apparently tested the Pettit settings with a pyrometer on track and said they worked well and provided proper tire temps. FYI - Having more rear camber than front camber increases understeer. The camber Phil listed above just about matches the specs on my Mini Cooper which is setup for lots of understeer from the factory.

Toe .06 degrees of toe in front and 0 in rear
For many cars driven on the street a little bit of "toe in" up front helps keep the steering from being darty when driving on the highway and trying to hold a straight line. I had mine at 0 front toe when I first got the car and didn't like it on street. It kept wanting to pull side to side driving down the highway. IIRC, more "toe in" in the rear helps the rear of the car rotate. Autox guys tend to use a decent amount of toe in in the rear.

Caster is now about 6 degrees
I experimented a bit with caster. When I got the car it had almost 7 degrees of caster. The steering had always felt heavier on this FD compared to my last one and after a year or so, I learned it was b/c I was running so much caster. While at the alignment shop, I was talking to the alignment guy and we decided to experiment with caster settings and we brought it down to 6 degrees. It made a world of difference. The steering feels much better and quicker. Now I understand why Rynberg always used to say "the FD doesn't need more than 6 degrees of caster".

Hope that is useful to someone.

03-19-2008, 10:22 AM	#6
albertomg Rotary Fan in Training Join Date: Feb 2008 Location: Bay Area CA Posts: 91 Rep Power: 18	For street and open track use, I run specs pretty close to those of the 16" wheels even though I'm running 17" wheels with 255/40/17. Running Konis with H&R springs. Camber -1.5 front; - 1.2 rear This wound up being more aggressive than I wanted but has been OK thus far. Someone on the other forum had apparently tested the Pettit settings with a pyrometer on track and said they worked well and provided proper tire temps. FYI - Having more rear camber than front camber increases understeer. The camber Phil listed above just about matches the specs on my Mini Cooper which is setup for lots of understeer from the factory. Toe .06 degrees of toe in front and 0 in rear For many cars driven on the street a little bit of "toe in" up front helps keep the steering from being darty when driving on the highway and trying to hold a straight line. I had mine at 0 front toe when I first got the car and didn't like it on street. It kept wanting to pull side to side driving down the highway. IIRC, more "toe in" in the rear helps the rear of the car rotate. Autox guys tend to use a decent amount of toe in in the rear. Caster is now about 6 degrees I experimented a bit with caster. When I got the car it had almost 7 degrees of caster. The steering had always felt heavier on this FD compared to my last one and after a year or so, I learned it was b/c I was running so much caster. While at the alignment shop, I was talking to the alignment guy and we decided to experiment with caster settings and we brought it down to 6 degrees. It made a world of difference. The steering feels much better and quicker. Now I understand why Rynberg always used to say "the FD doesn't need more than 6 degrees of caster". Hope that is useful to someone. Last edited by albertomg; 03-19-2008 at 10:25 AM.