Anyone done a DIY wheel alignment?

[impactims]

I need an alignment on my personal car and I despise bringing my car to a shop.

I have seen videos of people using string and some stands and taking measurements to align the front wheels.

I am considering going this route.

Anyone else done this?

 

[u2slow]

Yes.

Find a way to mark your starting point. That way you have a baseline to get back to after several trial & errors.

 

[MovingAlong]

I need an alignment on my personal car and I despise bringing my car to a shop.

I have seen videos of people using string and some stands and taking measurements to align the front wheels.

I am considering going this route.

Anyone else done this?

Yep, based on my math I could get accuracy to about 1/3 of a degree. Any respectable tire shop would laugh at that, I'm told they work between 10ths and 100ths...

But given that this was on a smaller salvage vehicle and tires being cheap, that was plenty close for me...

 

[PoorUB]

I had done it just to get a car to the shop, but never for the permanent solution. You can get pretty close with angle finders, levels and a tape measure. But I don't think I would do it on a daily driver that run a lot of miles.

 

[lolaetype]

I do the alignment on the Jaguar. Camber involves shims and most shops just don't want to mess with that. Caster and toe is easy by comparison. I'm very lucky in that the garage floor where I do the work is very level. The tools I use are claimed to be accurate to about 0.2 degrees which is close enough. That's probably at least as accurate as the alignment tools available when the car was built and well within the +- alignment specs.

The daily drivers go to the shop.

 

[cannuck]

I used to BE the alignment guy 54 years ago in a dealership where every car required 4 wheels to be done. We had state-of-the-art tooling but you had to be ****** careful to get stuff right. Because the cars were that consistent and predictable, I could eyeball a car on the stands to predict how close or even cross check any errors afterwards. For the last many decades I use a set of old Snap-on bearing plates, a toe reference bar and digital levels - and a great deal of care. Never had an older vehicle wear tires any worse than my new, factory correct cars or trucks. Super important to be able to settle the suspension to keep loads purely vertical (thus the ball bearing plates). We used to have preload tools to simulate road and drive induced toe loads, but i just stick with zero slop joints these days. I concur that probably no closer than 15 minutes but I can tell you I can easily find that much error due to setup from racks that can measure to 50x that resolution.

 

[cmandp]

I've done it on an S10 with my Dad directing when I first starded driving. We did toe and camber.

No way we did as good a job as a competent shop with alignment machine. It was acceptable but took lots of adjustment and check.

I'd find a competent shop and politely tell them I want all wheels within 0.1° of the nominal spec. With the alignment machine is the only proper way nowadays

 

[flat350]

There's all types of castor/camber gauges available along with setting toe, been used for years by guys with dirt track cars.

 

[Bodj Built]

I do it on my offroad truck since the suspension is custom and nobody will touch it. It's not hard, just get ready to take a lot of measurements and go side to side repeatedly.

 

[PoorUB]

Speaking of alignments, I went through the front suspension on my wife's 2006 Trailblazer a year ago and took it to a shop to get it aligned. I just got a letter from them saying it is due again for an alignment! It might have 4,000 miles on it since, but I doubt it. Also, who gets and alignment every year? I had a 2012 F150 for a work truck. When the company replaced it in 2019 it had over 225,000 miles on it and it had never been on an alignment rack. It still got good tire life and drove straight down the road, so why? I will admit, perhaps I should have gotten it checked, but it was working well and didn't want someone to screw it up.

 

[impactims]

What I’m trying to do is go at it with the string method.

Like this…

Basically, assume the rear is perfectly straight. Measure distance at 3oclock and 9oclock from string to rim. Once the distance is EXACT you the take the same measurement up front and shoot for the distance at 3oclock to be 1/16 of an inch shorter than the measurement at 9oclock. This is so that you end up with a little bit of toe in up front.

This is the method I am considering.

No levels or angle finders or anything. No camber nor caster adjustment. Just toe at the tie rods.

 

[Wrench97]

What I’m trying to do is go at it with the string method.

Like this…

Basically, assume the rear is perfectly straight. Measure distance at 3oclock and 9oclock from string to rim. Once the distance is EXACT you the take the same measurement up front and shoot for the distance at 3oclock to be 1/16 of an inch shorter than the measurement at 9oclock. This is so that you end up with a little bit of toe in up front.

This is the method I am considering.

No levels or angle finders or anything. No camber nor caster adjustment. Just toe at the tie rods.

Alot of cars today have rear toe settings and a few actually have a ball joint tie rod end that wears out.
I've even had that method fail on solid axle rears on leaf springs when one spring was bent a little or the center bolt broke.

 

[kbeefy]

I set toe with a tape all the time. Works fine.

If I'm doing significant modifications and want the tires to last, I take it to a shop for the final adjustment.
If it's something off-road-ish (4x4 or racecar) I might get a little fancier than a tape, but still DIY.

 

[cannuck]

What I’m trying to do is go at it with the string method.

Like this…

Basically, assume the rear is perfectly straight. Measure distance at 3oclock and 9oclock from string to rim. Once the distance is EXACT you the take the same measurement up front and shoot for the distance at 3oclock to be 1/16 of an inch shorter than the measurement at 9oclock. This is so that you end up with a little bit of toe in up front.

This is the method I am considering.

First you need four spots that are dead level under the wheels. Then you need to know the front and rear tracks are EXACTLY the same (not all are). Then you need to know the axial runout of each wheel and place the max and min a 12 and 6. Then you need to park the car on the 4 perfect spots to settle suspension. You also need to know that camber is equal and within specs. Here's where it get tough. If you are going to adjust anything, you are going to need to lift the car. When you set it back down the suspension the distortion of the tires from control arms going through their arc will make ride height, camber and toe different from what they will be when settled.

 

[Wrench97]

Years ago I could fix the toe in on Mopars by adjusting the torsion bars to the correct ride height.

 

[BillK]

For a car like that I would ask around and find a decent old school tire shop. I am sure it should have a 4 wheel alignment and I dont see how you can do that properly by yourself. You might get it close but probably not correct. With the price of tires nowdays I think I would want it as close as possible.

I dont know where you are located but surely there is a decent shop nearby.
Let us know where you are and somebody might know of a decent place.

 

[Chipm]

Yes, I have aligned my own cars for twenty years and get great tire wear. I just did our '24 Subaru last week. Just because the machines can measure to a picodegree or whatever doesn't mean that level of precision is relevant when considering play in suspension parts.

Toe is a simple process: two strings parallel to centerline of vehicle. Measure to front and rear of each wheel to get toe.

To get strings parallel, attach them to pieces of conduit of equal length. Set each one equidistant from front hubs, and equidistant from rear hubs.

I use an old Snap On bubble camber/caster gauge, but it can also be done with a bubble level, a ruler, and some trigonometry.

 

[e015475]

I took the truck in my avatar to the local alignment shop and they refused to do it saying their wheel attachment device wouldn't project beyond my fenders, so I do it myself

Doing it on my four-post lift makes it a little easier and saves having to get up and down multiple times. I have a set of wood blocks that I place under the front and rear to make sure the suspension is at the factory ride-height for alignment (truck is on airbags and I try to keep the ride height at the factory level)

When I built the truck, I used a Longacre caster gauge to set caster at 5 degrees it and it typically doesn't change.

To align the truck, I start by setting the camber front and rear using one of these-

Wixey Digital Angle Gauge with Backlight

Attaches magnetically to your blade to provide a precise angle reading—now featuring an easy-to-read backlit screen.

www.rockler.com

My rack-and-pinion has a detent that can be used to center the rack, so I do that next

I use the method shown in your pictures. I have staggered wheels - the string in the picture just needs to be parallel to the face of the wheels and even on both sides.

I use a piece of metal conduit that match drilled with 1/16" holes so the string will always be parallel. I set the conduit on the outside of the tires on jackstands at the height of the axles. I then take some fishing line and thread it through the conduit holes and put some tension in it to form a rectangle around the vehicle. I square it against the tires using a steel rule to rough it in then a digital calipers to get a little closer. You can measure more closely with fishing line that with a string.

The first adjustment is to get the thrust angle of the rear tires set so it is parallel to the centerline of the truck (I'll go back later and put a little toe-in on the IRS) I can add brass shims to the lower control arm mounts to bring it parallel

Next I adjust the front wheels' with the tie rods so they ar parallel with the centerline of the truck. Once they are parallel, I'll dial in a little toe-in measuring off the lip of the rim.

It helps if you have a pictorial worksheet to write the successive dimensions on as you adjust the wheels to be parallel to the centerline of the vehicle.

 

[zimman]

What are the correct alignment spec's for your car? Do you have them? Then you can attempt it.
Toe is not a problem. Camber is a little harder and caster is not adjustable on some newer cars.
I've always enjoyed asking folks to define "caster in a 10 word sentence or less" LOL it's difficult to explain.
Frankly if that's your car in the photo, it's going to be involved. IRS rear?
Zim

 

[DGersic]

I need an alignment on my personal car and I despise bringing my car to a shop.

I have seen videos of people using string and some stands and taking measurements to align the front wheels.

I am considering going this route.

Anyone else done this?

Yes.



It’s not difficult, just time consuming. I did it because I had just rebuilt the suspension, and the local alignment shop had a month backlog. My tires were already worn out, so no harm done and it got me back on the road while I waited for the rack to be open.

I was close, not perfect. Doing it in the rack, looked easier, and I’m going back in the spring to add a bit more caster.

 

[yhprum]

I’ve done it on my 1986 El Camino using a stick type guage I made going from the back side of the tread to the side. I used a universal protector that happened to sit flat on the rim centres. The tricky part for me was after making adjustments rolling the car forward and back to take any side loading off the wheels. A grease plate setup under each tire would have taken care of that.

The suspension points on the frame have quite a wide tolerance think something typically like a quarter inch, so the ultra fine tenth of a degree stuff seems more like marketing to me.

I knew someone that used laser pointers that attached to each wheel and he could protect it out a fair distance to get high accuracy by doing a little trigonometry.

 

[4x4Pete]

My vehicles  NEVER go to service shops. Except alignment. It's really the only thing that is worth the price to have done..... and I don't have an alignment rack... I use a specialty alignment shop that focuses on suspension, steering and alignments, they don't try to upsell. I do the part replacement myself, carefully, and adjust with string and tape measure. Then it's off to the alignment shop.

 

[firebirdparts]

You can accurately set toe at home, and on some cars toe is the only thing that is adjustable. If caster and camber are adjustable, take it to a shop. If anybody wants to seriously do this, I have a suggestion. Jack up one front tire and spin that tire. Take a screwdriver and make a mark on the tread surface. This mark will be accurate, free of runout. Measure to the mark. You will have to set the car back down to make good measurements. Cars are designed not to bump steer, but nothing is perfect.

Here's the bad news: Unfortunately, cars are low, and so it's hard to get a good measurement on a car. if you measure halfway up the tire, then obviously you got some mathing to do AND it's less accurate. You could try to build yourself a big bridge caliper for this, but it's hard to get them rigid enough (I tried). FWIW. If it's a truck, or some SUVs easier.

 

[racecougar]

I picked up the Gyraline setup about a year ago, and it seems to be relatively close/repeatable. On anything tall enough, I like to double check it with an old school toe gauge.

 

[mervyn]

No. I can't remember the last time I actually needed a FEA. Best of luck

 

[zimman]

My vehicles  NEVER go to service shops. Except alignment. It's really the only thing that is worth the price to have done..... and I don't have an alignment rack... I use a specialty alignment shop that focuses on suspension, steering and alignments, they don't try to upsell. I do the part replacement myself, carefully, and adjust with string and tape measure. Then it's off to the alignment shop.

I have a "lifetime" alignment from Firestone. Love it. Can get 22 alignments a year if I want. I used to work for them and actually went to their alignment school in Chicago many years ago. I still think Firestone Complete Auto Care is the best National shop out there. Seriously.
Zim

 

[CraigStu]

I tried the strings once but the car needed to be jacked up to adjust. That meant I had to reset the strings each time. I have seen people make a pair of conduit or pvc pipes that attach to the car vs stands. that way you can jack it up and not need to reset the strings/stands. For toein I use a home made version of this

Toe Bar

Fast & Easy! Similar to Toe Gauge (#79620) but this new model measures to the outside of the tire. No scribe line needed. Simple to use - Slide the rod against the tire - then measure toe to within 1/16" Adjustable up to 88" in width - Great for wide track cars Easily done by one person Billet...

longacreracing.com

or this

Aluminum Toe Plates with Magnets, Standard Style

Key Highlights: Each set includes 3/4" tapes with 1/32" increments. Kick-out design holds our plates flat against the wheel. Magnets hold the tapes securely in place while you work. Maximize your alignment precision with Longacre’s Toe Plates with Magnets, offering accuracy and convenience for...

longacreracing.com

You could make a diy version of the second one from a 2x6 and a 1x2. Key is making sure you lean it against the tire above where it bulges out from floor contact. This gives you total toein. To get the steering centered you may have to shorten one tie rod while lengthening the other side the same amount.

 

[In The Doghouse]

I did the alignment on my Camaro a few years back. The car continues to steer well and there's no noticeable tire wear.
Documented the process here. DYI Alignment
I still have the turn plates I made and would do it again because I like tinkering and learning.

 

[Wrench97]

I have a "lifetime" alignment from Firestone. Love it. Can get 22 alignments a year if I want. I used to work for them and actually went to their alignment school in Chicago many years ago. I still think Firestone Complete Auto Care is the best National shop out there. Seriously.
Zim

Not the one around here......

 

[Shadowdog500]

I picked up the Gyraline setup about a year ago, and it seems to be relatively close/repeatable. On anything tall enough, I like to double check it with an old school toe gauge.

I was looking to get one of them to set the toe on my jeeps which have solid front axles.

Here is my quick and dirty equivalent that I made with old stuff I had laying around including an old beach umbrella.



The span can be adjusted.



I have nails as pointers on each end to set it “1/8 inch toe-in” meaning the fronts of the tires are 1/8” closer to each other than the rear of the tires.



It’s basically a cobbled together version one of these store bought ones.


These help


I also cut slots in two pvc pipes to put string in to make it easier to get the strings parallel to the car when doing the string method. One pipe is set on two jackstands in front of the car and the other behind the car. If you tension them with eaqual length strings the lines will be parallel.




A garage I worked at 40 years ago that serviced buses with king pin front suspension had an ancient toe measurement device that you would drive over. It was kind of like a swivel plate that would pivot at one of the narrow ends. It was about 2 feet wide and 3 feet long. We would put it in front of the left front tire with the pivot facing the wheel. You would measure the toe by how much the plate deflected when you drove over it.

 

[racecougar]

A garage I worked at 40 years ago that serviced buses with king pin front suspension had an ancient toe measurement device that you would drive over. It was kind of like a swivel plate that would pivot at one of the narrow ends. It was about 2 feet wide and 3 feet long. We would put it in front of the left front tire with the pivot facing the wheel. You would measure the toe by how much the plate deflected when you drove over it.

I haven't heard of that style before. Any idea what to search to find photos of it?

I have an old Bear unit for Model T's, and that Snapon one that I posted above. The Bear stays on the wall, but I use the Snapon one for anything that is tall enough (trucks, Jeeps, dune buggies, ATV's, etc.).

 

[Jgaz]

Yes my own especially toe on my old Jeep.

When I crewed on a friend’s Formula Ford race car we had a pretty slick set up in his garage.
We used a builders level (no lasers then) to set four level spots on the garage floor using linoleum shims.
We had no bearing plates but used three layers of 1/4” masonite tempered on both sides. These pieces were alternated with a layer of heavy duty wax paper.
These low buck plates allowed us to jounce the suspension to settle it out after an adjustment.

His race car was light especially compared to today’s cars which made this method easier.

 

[Shadowdog500]

I haven't heard of that style before. Any idea what to search to find photos of it?

I have an old Bear unit for Model T's, and that Snapon one that I posted above. The Bear stays on the wall, but I use the Snapon one for anything that is tall enough (trucks, Jeeps, dune buggies, ATV's, etc.).

I was trying to find photos of something similar online when writing the post. I’ll search a bit more. I’ve seen one or two others over the years so someone had to sell them. The thing was old 40 years ago but it worked.

 

[nadogail]

I "Aligned" a clunker that I bought in 1976 in San Antonio for $300.
I used the Auto Hobby Shop at Lackland Air Force Base. Two strips of wood and a pair of Vice Grips made a "Good Enough" toe out gauge.
A carpenters level was "Close Enough" to set Camber.

Drove that heap for months, then sold it for more than it was worth.

 

[Shadowdog500]

I just found one that looks similar while looking for the photo.

 

[WildBill]

I've been using the Gyraline phone app and jig for a year, has worked great and has had a couple of decent updates. It continues to very closely match all the professional alignment numbers I've compared it to. I've done around 10 alignments with it and checked a lot of cars. Recently did a Camry lower control arm and it was easy to see how far it was out and fix it. Also was able to see a tweaked "never wrecked" Malibu by checking body lines vs axles with it. They have a new version out that has a built in sensor board so it will work with pretty much any phone, the old version works best on crApple phones becouse they have good sensors. Here is my original post about it.

https://www.garagejournal.com/forum/threads/cool-alignment-app.540041

The before pic on the Camry, I somehow lost the after picture but it was spot on, only took two adjustments, maybe 15 mins total between first check and having it dialed in. Since I could see it was about 1/2" out I just measured from the wheel to frame and cranked it in 1/2".

 

[andyvh1959]

So for those of you that actually did alignments for a service shop and may have seen the same vehicle repeated times, how much does the alignment really change over time and miles? I tend to run my vehicles for many years and 100,000 miles at minimum. I had a 2010 Ford Fusion that was my company car from new until 84,000 miles so all service was done and paid for at the Ford dealership. In the 40 months as my company car the dealership regularly reported on brake wear and rotated the tires but never suggested an alignment. I bought that car out of the lease at 84K and drove it up to 226,000 miles and never had it aligned. I kept close watch on rotating the tires, tire pressure and tire wear patterns.

I now own a 2019 Kia Sorento I bought Feb 2024 used with 34K on it, it was a rebuilder but I did a deep VIN search before buying it. I may take it in for an alignment. I bought a used 2009 Ford Escape, 84K miles, as my daily driver when I retired (no more company car new every 40 months for 20 years), and I need to update the tires and may get an alignment on it after I install new front struts and tie rod ends (I can hear some clunking up front). I have a 56 Dodge pickup project starting soon which will go on my old 2001 Dakota chassis. For that project I'll have to shorten the frame to get the WB right. So that will get an alignment when done, but likely in an independent alignment shop because of the mixed up chassis specs.

 

[Jgaz]

So for those of you that actually did alignments for a service shop and may have seen the same vehicle repeated times, how much does the alignment really change over time and miles? I tend to run my vehicles for many years and 100,000 miles at minimum. I had a 2010 Ford Fusion that was my company car from new until 84,000 miles so all service was done and paid for at the Ford dealership. In the 40 months as my company car the dealership regularly reported on brake wear and rotated the tires but never suggested an alignment. I bought that car out of the lease at 84K and drove it up to 226,000 miles and never had it aligned. I kept close watch on rotating the tires, tire pressure and tire wear patterns.

I now own a 2019 Kia Sorento I bought Feb 2024 used with 34K on it, it was a rebuilder but I did a deep VIN search before buying it. I may take it in for an alignment. I bought a used 2009 Ford Escape, 84K miles, as my daily driver when I retired (no more company car new every 40 months for 20 years), and I need to update the tires and may get an alignment on it after I install new front struts and tie rod ends (I can hear some clunking up front). I have a 56 Dodge pickup project starting soon which will go on my old 2001 Dakota chassis. For that project I'll have to shorten the frame to get the WB right. So that will get an alignment when done, but likely in an independent alignment shop because of the mixed up chassis specs.

In my experience it has much to do with where and how you drive.

For example, at the Chevy dealership where I did alignments, we took care of a fleet of the ‘79 vintage, downsized, Impala cop cars that belonged to the Michigan State Police.
I was convinced that curb bashing and jumping was a requirement to be a trooper. I know that officers are going to be harder on a vehicle by necessity but I also know their vehicles required regular alignments.

 

[Wrench-Polisher]

I can do camber but pretty much the rest of it you want an aligment rack unless you have a full size truck you can crawl under.

 

[Wrench-Polisher]

In my experience it has much to do with where and how you drive.

100% I know a guy who was very diplomatic about fixing a tire wear issue on a ford probe for a 400 pound woman.