whiskers

On the camber, the truck will pull to the side with the most negative. zero is best. just loosen the 2 bolts on the upper arm. Not the bushing bolts. The vertical bolts are slotted and can be moved in or out. Set it all to zero. and go from there. On second gens that's where I go. And usually about 1/16 to 1/8" toe in works perfect.

jimbo486

Anybody have any suggestions for when setting toe, to allow the wheels to move easily rather than fighting friction the concrete/asphalt? I'd like to be able to straighten my steering wheel a bit even though I just had a local shop adjust everything after I bought new tires. Usually setting the toe straightens it out.

dodgenstein

1st gens don't have any "vertical" bolts. The upper arms are only held on by the pivot bolts through the bushings. These bolts have a captured eccentric cam that via rotating the bolts adjusts the camber. Anyone familiar with old Mopar rear wheel drive cars will recognize the front a-arm setup.

NE frmhnd

Jack up one or both tires, or turn the adjuster and then roll the truck back and forth.

I guess the factory's fudgin it up then, because every new heavy 2wd Dodge pick-up I have seen on the lot, very noticeably, has a high amount of positive camber. And it increases as you jack it up. The camber goes negative as the suspension compresses.

You using this for road trackin or canyon carving or daily driver or work truck? Unless you're going for the first two, I'd set it as close to factory as I could, with the exception of a little extra caster, so it tracks better and turns a little sharper. My steering is plenty easy, so it would take a ton of caster to make it heavy.

thechoochlyman

Well, I ended up copping-out and went to have it aligned this morning. The guy doing it didn't have any trouble, as I just replaced everything so none of the parts were frozen together.

I know this picture isn't too great, but this is where everything was when he started.


I was rather impressed with the technology used to adjust it. It was well worth the $50 I paid to have it done. He set the toe to dead zero, and, if I remember correctly, each tire was left with a positive .4 degree camber. Now my steering wheel is perfectly flat when I drive straight, and it handles better than it ever has. I can start too feel my steering shaft play now, though. Maybe I can get a Borgeson shaft put in soon.

user name

This is one area that is definitely worth paying a pro especially on a 2wd. There isn't much to get out of adjustment on a 4wd so a good old tape measure is usually good enough on those.

Accordion man

The truest way to get an accurate measure point for toe-in is to make a spring-loaded scriber to mark a line around the tire. Jack the tire up and spin it with the sciber running against a smooth area of the tread face. Repeat on other side.

Another trick is simply put a post-it tag on each tire opposite each other then mark a line on each with an ink pen. You can roll the vehicle ahead and back to compare measurements on front and rear of tires that way.